Duffy May Be Forced to Pay Back $70,000

If county attorneys rule the expenditure illegal, Sheriff John Duffy will be forced to pay back nearly $70,000 from seized drug funds he used to pay his attorney in a civil lawsuit, the county’s assistant auditor and controller said Tuesday.

County attorneys are investigating whether Duffy spent the money illegally. Federal guidelines say money and property seized in drug raids must be used for law enforcement purposes, and preferably to fight drug problems.

William J. Kelly, the assistant auditor and controller, said the county has approved claims of $46,450 paid to the law firm of Martin J. Mayer as of Jan. 18. Duffy’s finance manager, Harold Donahoo, told The Times Monday that the county had paid $66,336 through June 30 and was processing $3,000 more through Sept. 30 to Mayer’s firm.

Kelly said his office is conducting a detailed review of the sheriff’s drug fund program--called asset forfeitures--from June 30, 1989 to the present. His office already has completed an audit that covers a period back to September 1986, the inception of the drug program.

Kelly said he is also waiting for the county attorney’s ruling on whether what was already spent for Mayer’s services was legal.

Duffy hired Mayer last year at $150 an hour to defend him against six deputies and officers who sued the sheriff after being disciplined for their role in the so-called “Rambo Squad” at the El Cajon jail.

The deputies and officers were punished for harassing inmates at the jail, and their supervisors were also held accountable. All of the cases were settled without going to court, and the last case--the appeal by a sheriff’s captain of her 35-day suspension without pay--was resolved last week at a Civil Service Commission hearing.

Mayer’s firm was hired late last year, according to Undersheriff Richard Sandberg, even though the sheriff employs a full-time, in-house attorney, Janet Houts, because Houts was too busy.

A county audit delivered to Duffy last June said the sheriff had improperly used drug money to pay legal fees and asked him to reimburse the county’s drug fund. Duffy has refused.

In his response to the audit delivered last month, Sandberg said County Counsel Lloyd Harmon and Deputy Counsel Anthony Albers knew of the arrangement.

“They said nothing about it being inappropriate to use that money,” Sandberg said Tuesday. “Nobody objected when the subject was brought up.”

Duffy and Harmon did not return telephone calls, and Albers would only say that he was investigating the legal expenditures at Duffy’s request.

Kelly said that, if the county determines that the expenditure was illegal, Duffy could be made to reimburse the drug fund, Mayer could be sued, or Mayer could volunteer to repay the money, Kelly said.

Mayer could not be reached for comment.

County Supervisor Susan Golding said Tuesday that she is eager for the county attorney’s ruling.

“I would assume that, if monies were misappropriated, they would be reimbursed from some other source,” she said. Duffy “spent the money without anyone’s approval.”

Golding said she and other supervisors are “shocked” at the latest Duffy spending habits to surface.

“There’s no other word for it,” she said. “For him to spend money for this type of use is incredible.”

Sandberg said county attorney Daniel Wallace signed a contract last October allowing Mayer to represent Duffy. The contract does not specify that drug funds would be used to pay Mayer’s bill.

“It would be difficult to (make Mayer repay the money) in light of the fact that the Board of Supervisors agreed to this, and we have a contract regardless of the fund it came out of,” Sandberg said. “Whether it’s pot A or pot B, we owed him that money.”

Kelly said it is not unusual for the county to stop payments on claims already approved, although it is rare for the money to be paid back.

In 1988, the county stopped payment on a warrant the county issued on Duffy’s behalf to pay his legal expenses in another matter. Duffy had used on-duty deputies to distribute 18,000 anti-Rose Bird post cards. The ACLU successfully sued Duffy for misusing his office, and the county ordered him to personally repay the organization’s legal fees. Duffy raised the $33,796 in attorney fees and court costs through friends.

Duffy is retiring in January after 20 years as sheriff. Assistant Sheriff Jack Drown and Sheriff’s Capt. Jim Roache are running to replace him.

The legal fees became a campaign issue Tuesday when Roache accused Drown of having helped authorize the funds during a meeting with Duffy and other top Sheriff’s Department officials.

Duffy using drug money to defend himself in a lawsuit is “clearly an inappropriate use of that money and not anywhere near the spirit of the law,” Roache said. “Jack Drown, as part of the sheriff’s executive management team, knew what was being done with that money.”

Drown said that, although he may have been in a meeting where the expenditure was discussed, only the sheriff can authorize such an expense.

Drown said he would use the drug money to fight narcotics abuse but did not see anything wrong with Duffy’s action.

“There are so many different interpretations as to how that money could be used,” he said. “The definition of using it for general law enforcement purposes could be stretched to include legal fees.”