CIETC Verdicts: Mixed Bag
Nathan Greene
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By Emily Geiger
I have mixed feelings about the CIETC verdicts that came down yesterday. I think it’s too bad that the jury was so lenient with some of the defendants, but it also seems like the government didn’t have the strongest case.
Jane Barto was convicted of obstruction for trying to cover things up after the fact to save her own skin. She was acquitted of the conspiracy charge, meaning the jury did not think that she was part of orchestrating this mess. I guess they thought she and Ramona weren’t discussing business during their drinking soirees. I’m also guessing the fact that Barto worked for Workforce Development and was not receiving an exorbitant salary herself had something to do with this verdict. If she really was sticking her neck out to funnel CIETC officials all this money so they could give themselves bonuses, wouldn’t she want a piece of the pie, too? Unless there was some evidence that Ramona or one of the others was personally giving kickbacks to Barto (which I never heard anything about), I do think it seems rather unlikely that she would risk her own job just to get her drinking buddy some extra cash.
Karen Tesdell drew the short end of the stick. She was an accountant who actually worked at CIETC and got a much higher salary than she deserved compared to other state workers with similar positions and qualifications. She is also, I think, in her 70’s, so it will be interesting to see what sentence she gets. It could be as much as 30 years, but I’ve heard that it will be more like 10. I’m sure the judge will feel bad tossing a grandma in the slammer, but, apparently the jury didn’t let that get in their way, so maybe the judge won’t either. This also does not bode well for Ramona. It seems like the jury did not take too kindly to those who worked at CIETC and actually benefitted financially from the scam.
Dan Albritton… what to say? He got off scot free; the conspiracy count against him was dismissed. The conspiracy theorist in me wondered whether Dan’s union thug buddies maybe paid a visit to any jury members or their families. I did find it a little weird that the first people he thanked on his way out of the courthouse were the unions for standing by him in this difficult time.
Another part of me thinks that it was just too hard to prove that he helped manipulate the system to make it easier for Ramona to get her bonuses without any testimony from Ramona to that effect. Yes, we heard about how they were doing the nasty, and we can make assumptions based on that, and we’d probably be right. But apparently these assumptions were not clear enough to surpass reasonable doubt in the minds of the jurors.
Too bad, because my suspicion is that this guy was in it up to his eyeballs, just like Archie. Once again, it would have been helpful if they could have shown that he personally profited from this whole mess. Too bad they didn’t have evidence of something like Ramona buying him extravagant gifts….
Given their apparently very close relationship, you have to wonder if part of the whole crazy act from Ramona was so that she wouldn’t have to testify against her boy toy. It sure looks to me like that helped him out an awful lot.
On a side note, I’m guessing Archie is kicking himself today, wondering if he could have gotten off just like Albritton if he hadn’t taken the plea deal.
And on another side note, could Ramona pick any ickier guys to sleep with? Obviously the jury didn’t consider the argument that ol’ Dan must have been helping Ramona manipulate the system for her financial gain, ‘cause no one would want to get naked with that guy for free.
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