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"A new report released Tuesday by the Bureau of State Audits reveals more than $622,000 in abuses involving taxpayer funds.Following tips from whistle-blowers, state auditor Elaine Howle found numerous illegal activities involving\u00A0California employees.Among the highlights in the report:A fraud scheme involving a Franchise Tax Board employee, an Office of the Secretary of State employee and a courier service owner that resulted in bribery convictions for all three individuals, who must now pay $227,430 in restitutionMore than $92,000 in illegal unemployment benefits in a conspiracy to defraud the Employment Development DepartmentMore than $100,000 in improper travel benefits that included\u00A0reimbursing employees to commute from home to workNearly $119,000 in improper overtime paid to inspectors from the California State Athletic CommissionThose overpayments to 18 different inspectors included amounts ranging from $666 to $25,257. KCRA 3 asked state officials how they could miss such massive overpayments.\"The understanding that we had was because these individuals are state employees, that we required to pay them premium time, which is time and a half,\" said Russ Heimerich, a spokesman with the California Department of Consumer Affairs, which oversees the State Athletic Commission.Heimerich said his department asked the auditor to look into the suspicious payments. He told KCRA 3 the inspectors are now required to reimburse the state for the overpayments.The auditor also found other abuses,\u00A0at other agencies, involving for example, \u00A0$53,800 in unnecessary goods and services for the Department of Fish and Game, including $5,000\u00A0in Home Depot gift cards.\"We hear of these cases over and over again of misuse, fraud and waste in state government and certainly there's a lot more going on,\" said Jon Coupal, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association in Sacramento. \"This is just the tip of the iceberg.\"Several state employees and their accomplices have been sentenced to prison. Others have been suspended from work, while the state is seeking to recover the funds.The tips came from whistle-blowers who called the state's toll-free\u00A0hotline to report abuses. The state auditor received\u00A0more than 7,200 calls altogether, which resulted in 15 separate investigations.\"People are watching,\" said Margarita Fernandez, chief of public affairs for the Bureau of State Audits. \"The good news is typically it's another state employee that sees that something is going on and something wrong is happening and they report it to us.\"The state auditor has uncovered $31 million in fraud, waste and abuse by California employees since 1993.The whistle-blower hotline is 800-952-5665."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.kcra.com/article/state-audit-reveals-600k-in-fraud-misuse-of-taxpayer-dollars/6400848>