Mobile Mayor Sam Jones' campaign finance documents riddled with ...

MOBILE, Alabama -- A review of Mayor Sam Jones? 2011 campaign finance documents shows unreported spending, mislabeled expenses and some checks bearing signatures that appear to be forged.

Jones listed expenses of $32,800 on his annual campaign finance 2011 report, two years out from the city?s next mayoral election.

The Press-Register asked the campaign to supply documentation underpinning the spending.

The campaign provided copies of its annual financial report, receipts, invoices and canceled checks from the campaign?s bank account.

Raymond Bell, an attorney for the campaign, acknowledged some sloppiness in the bookkeeping, but he and Jones denied wrongdoing.

Bell has confirmed that Mobile County District Attorney Ashley Rich is investigating Jones? campaign finances.

The documents that the campaign provided to the Press-Register are riddled with inconsistencies. For example, all the checks are signed Donna Mitchell, but at least three of them are written in a hand that bears no resemblance to the others, which suggests that two people wrote checks using the same name.

Mitchell is the director of Jones? Office of Strategic Initiatives, which is funded by federal grant money. A message left for her at her office went unreturned Friday.

Additionally, the registry of canceled checks provided by the campaign does not square with the expenses listed in the annual finance report.

Read Sam Jones' 2011 campaign finance report [PDF]

Nine of the checks, totaling about $1,600 worth of spending, appear to lack corresponding entries in the finance report.

Other checks appear to correspond to expenses in the report ? the amounts are the same down to the penny ? but the entries listed on the financial disclosure form bear incorrect vendor names.

Some of the entries on the expense report have no documentation to support them. The check registry supplied to the Press-Register is missing the month of July.

Many of the campaign expenses are supported with documentation. That documentation shows that expenses in 2011 ran the gamut from food and Mardi Gras throws to overhead costs associated with campaign headquarters.

The campaign?s financial report, though, labeled all $32,800 in spending as "administrative." The reporting form included categories for food and lodging, but none of those boxes were checked.

Nearly all of the campaign?s more than $4,500 in spending at Sam?s Club, a bulk retailer, went on food, drinks and common supplies like cleaner, toilet paper and paper towels.

Read Sam Jones' Sam's expenses [PDF]

That would seem to corroborate the explanation that Jones has given for the spending. He said the food and drinks supply his conference room at City Hall and his campaign headquarters, which volunteers use year-round. Jones, who is in his second mayoral term, has said that he expects to run again in 2013.

Nonetheless, a few of the purchases reflected in the documents released to the Press-Register didn?t appear to correspond to any of those activities. They included:

• $18 for a razor and shaving cream.
• $40 for a pair of Kenneth Cole "puffer vests."
• $60 for three fleece "footie" pajamas.

Bell said that a campaign staff member bought those items for personal use but repaid the campaign in cash.

No cash reimbursement appears on the annual campaign finance report. Bell said that is because the petty cash account won?t be reconciled until the next filing, which would be in August, 12 months before the city election.

Such a reimbursement would be reflected on the report as a cash contribution. Campaign rules allow contributions to be accepted only within 12 months of an election.

Because the reimbursement would be shown as a contribution, the campaign is waiting to reconcile the petty cash account on the report, he said.

Campaign finance law does not allow donations to be spent on expenses that would exist irrespective of a person?s candidacy for office.

In addition to Mitchell, another member of Jones? campaign, Barbara Wolfe, also works for the city in the Office of Strategic Initiatives.

Jones described Wolfe as a part-time campaign staffer who does clerical work.

Neither Wolfe nor Mitchell were hired for their city jobs through the Mobile County Personnel Board?s merit system, which means they work at the pleasure of the mayor?s office.?

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