Tonia Cain case referred to district attorney’s office

The Legislative Auditor released an investigative audit report on Aug. 10. 

  Auditors concluded Tonia Cain, the facility’s former administrative program director and wife of then-Warden Nate Cain, directed staff to destroy records related to concession sales. Auditors found that concession sales exceeded deposits by $31,170 in the period from Aug. 9, 2014 to Feb. 21, 2016.

  “By using her position to direct others to alter and destroy public records to conceal discrepancies between recorded concession sales and concession deposits, Ms. Cain may have violated state law,” the audit report states.

   “Our procedure is that whenever the Legislative Auditor recommends additional investigation of a case, the matter is sent to the Grand Jury,” District Attorney Charles Riddle said. The case will be presented to a Grand Jury in the near future.

   The Grand Jury will listen to witnesses and then determine if there is enough evidence of a crime to prosecute the individual or individuals being investigated. A Grand Jury does not determine guilt or innocence.

   Nate Cain and Tonia Cain were suspended from their positions at RLCC -- Cain on March 11 and Ms. Cain on April 14 --  in connection with an investigation into improper expenditures at the center, including the unauthorized construction of a “special operations command center” dubbed “the ranch house.” Cain resigned on May 24 and Ms. Cain retired on May 21.

   The Legislative Auditor’s report did not address allegations related to those issues.

   In April, the Louisiana Inspector General’s Office requested the Legislative Auditor’s assistance in the investigation at RLCC.

   The auditor reported that five inmate organizations were allowed to open a concession stand to raise funds for their rehabilitative programs. The concession stand sells hot food and photos to visitors and employees. It accepts only tickets and tokens, not cash. Those wishing to purchase items from the concession stand are required to purchase the tickets and/or tokens from an automated ticket/token (T/T) machine in the visitor shed. 

   Ms. Cain and Procurement Specialist Jodie Bordelon would open the machines and remove the cash once a week, the audit said.

  The investigators found that the amount recorded between April 9, 2014 -- when concession sales began -- and Feb. 21, 2016 matched the deposits of $261,034 for that period. However, the concession sales records showed $292,204 of items were purchased.

  The auditor concluded that it appears cash collected from the T/T machines was neither recorded on the initial coversheet noting the amount collected nor given to the accounting office to be deposited.

  “This suggests that the cash may have been taken by one or both of the employees primarily responsible for removing funds from the T/T machines, namely, Mrs. Cain and/or Ms. Bordelon,” the report states.

  The auditor noted that RLCC employees reported that “Ms. Cain frequently emptied the machines and counted the funds alone. Ms. Bordelon stated that sometimes after she and Ms. Cain removed the cash from the T/T machines, Ms. Cain would instruct her to return to her office while Ms. Cain counted the cash.”

  The auditor said Bordelon’s statement was supported by two other correctional center employees.

  The investigators  “observed no cash shortages occurring after Ms. Cain transferred out of the business office.” 

  Bordelon told investigators that Ms. Cain told her to rewrite coversheets to omit Ms. Cain’s initials, told her to tell the inmate concession manager to change his daily sales figures to match the deposits and was then directed to replace the original sales sheets with the altered ones.

   After the sales sheets were replaced, Ms. Cain shredded the original records, the audit alleges. Bordelon also shredded documents to help Ms. Cain, the report added. 

   The auditor said Bordelon denied taking any of the missing funds. Ms. Cain’s attorney, Jill Craft of Baton Rouge, refused the Legislative Auditor’s request to interview her client.

  Craft submitted a written response to the auditor’s allegations and findings, stating that “Ms. Tonia Cain is absolutely innocent of any and all allegations made against her in the draft audit. Furthermore, the draft audit contains numerous factual inconsistencies and outright falsehoods.”

   Craft provided a point-by-point rebuttal of the allegations and comments in the auditor’s report. She said she had requested a copy of the report containing allegations against her client  before Ms.      Cain would consent to being interviewed and “that has been flatly denied.”

   Craft addressed the implication of nepotism by pointing out that Ms. Cain had worked at the correctional center for 23.5 years before her retirement. She married Cain on Feb. 3, 2014 “years after she was originally detailed into the position in the business office.”

   Craft said her client was voluntarily demoted to a records position on Feb. 15, and was not in the business office from Feb. 15 to Feb. 22, which is part of the period covered in the investigative audit. She was also out of that office from mid-July 2015 to August, when she held a position in security, the attorney added.

  Craft said Ms. Cain was placed on administrative leave in April due to an allegation that she was deleting emails from Nate Cain’s computer. She was found innocent of that charge but was told she would continue on leave until the investigation was over.

  The attorney contends there are several ways to account for the missing $31,170.

  She said tickets to purchase items from the concession stand were not marked as having been used. “On several occasions, it was discovered that inmates were actually bartering the tickets,” Craft said, indicating that tickets may have been used more than once to make purchases.

  “Additionally, the ticket machines often jammed and had no mechanism to account for the quantity of tickets actually sold,” Craft continued. “When the machines jammed, which occurred on a regular basis, they would be out of order and had to be reset. In that process, often times a paper clip was used and manually inserted into the machine in order to unjam the tickets which, in turn, were damaged or destroyed.”

   A third machine dispensing tokens was purchased, at Ms. Cain’s recommendation, in October/November 2015 due to the frequent jamming of the two paper ticket machines.

Craft said the money was always counted by two employees and she never told Bordelon to leave the office while Ms. Cain counted the money. Craft also said all employees in the accounting office rotated in the collection and counting of the money from the T/T machines.

   Craft also said a former inmate who served as concessions manager allowed people to buy food and “pay later.” However, the attorney noted, “there was no way to verify the orders were ever paid for ‘later.’” It was also discovered that the inmate was selling food for cash to visitors and sending the money to a girlfriend.

   This inmate once reported selling 7,000 hamburgers in one night. When Ms. Cain asked him for receipts, he said he did not have them because he would destroy them every two weeks because it was too much to keep.

   She said there are other instances of inmates taking tickets and tokens to use as bartering money and/or to make purchases. The box containing used tickets was accessible to the inmates working in the concession stand, Craft noted. 

  “Not only is Mrs. Cain innocent,” Craft writes in her response, “but the bulk of the audit apparently relies on the admittedly false records of convicted criminals. They do not ever sell 7,000 hamburgers in one night and several inmates were fired for stealing tickets and/or attempting to use them for barter in the prison.”

 

   As a result of the investigation, the Legislative Auditor recommends RLCC:

- Develop and enforce internal controls, including cash handling and key security policies and procedures.

- Ensure employees are properly trained on internal controls, including cash handling and key security policies.

- Ensure that all funds are collected timely, documented adequately, recorded accurately and deposited daily.

- Review and compare the daily total deposits to the tickets/tokens dispensed on a regular basis and immediately investigate any differences.

- Review and compare concession sales in relation to concession inventory records, concession funds deposited and documented spoilage.

- Reconcile the number of tickets/tokens dispensed with the amount used at the concession stand and immediately investigate any differences.

- Require two employees to be present when cash is removed from the ticket/token machines through conclusion of the counting process.

 

  In a “management’s response” to the auditor’s report, DOC Secretary James Le Blanc said the department will “restore the misappropriated funds, totaling approximately $31,170, to the five affected offender organizations ... based upon the past percentage of annual prior sales.” 

  Le Blanc also said the department will seek reimbursement from Ms. Cain by seeking restitution through criminal proceedings and a civil suit for damages to be filed by the department against Ms. Cain.

  Le Blanc said steps have been undertaken to implement the recommended revisions to the correctional center’s policies and procedures concerning the concession operations. He said the department’s overall regulations will be strengthened as well.