Former mayor found guilty of theft in office
LONDON — After more than five hours of deliberation, a Madison County jury found a former Mount Sterling village mayor guilty of one of two felony counts of theft in office.
Charles Neff, 80, mayor for 12 years and a longtime councilman
before that, also was found guilty of misdemeanor counts of falsification and dereliction of duty for failing to transfer 25 percent of village income-tax revenue into a capital-improvements fund, as required by village code.
In closing arguments, Neff’s attorney, Scott R. Mergenthaler, cast his client as a trusted and loyal resident of the community who was exploited by his village administrator, a close friend.
Mergenthaler said that Neff’s downfall was trusting Joe Johnson, who is serving 10 years in prison for stealing
almost $1 million in village funds.
“He (Neff) was a sucker who was duped by this con man,” Mergenthaler said. “It was a mistake, it was negligent, but it doesn’t rise to recklessness.”
The jury concluded that Neff intentionally overpaid Johnson more than $9,500 in unused vacation and sick time after Johnson resigned in December, 2015, disregarding the amount determined by Neff’s own finance committee. He was acquitted of a similar charge involving almost $13,000 in overpayments, paid to Johnson by Neff on a blank check.
Neff is scheduled to be sentenced Nov. 16. He faces up to three years in prison on the
felony theft conviction.
Mergenthaler implored the jury: “We have to figure out why Charlie Neff would want to help this crook, when Charlie never got a cut of any of this money.”
Johnson, he said, manipulated Neff while Neff’s wife of 60 years was terminally ill.
Johnson “duped the entire administration, including the law director and people under him, and at the time his best friend, Charlie Neff, at a time when he was most vulnerable.”
The village finance committee had approved Johnson’s benefits, but at a rate much lower than the $48 per hour that Neff approved, prosecutors argued.
In his closing statements, Bob Smith, special prosecutor for the Ohio auditor’s office, said the case focused on what Neff knew.
“Charles Neff knew he did not have the authority to spend Mount Sterling money and he did anyway. Mount Sterling is now in fiscal emergency because of this whole series of events,” Smith said.
While waiting on the verdict, Neff said he’d known Johnson for about eight years and considered him a trusted friend.
“He was a pallbearer at my wife’s funeral,” he said. “Joe would bring in a check and say sign it ... I trusted him like crazy.”
Others in the village also have been prosecuted: Victoria Sheets, a former fiscal officer who testified against Neff, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of falsification and is serving probation. Bonnie Liff, a former secretary and clerk, pleaded guilty in July to one count of theft in office. She is to be sentenced Thursday.
The conviction is the last of the prosecutions related to Mount Sterling, said Ohio Auditor Dave Yost, noting, “Unfortunately, the scars left by this dark period of selfishness and lax oversight will impact this community for years to come.”