astro
August 9, 2003, 5:10pm
1
From the Washington Post
The absolutely amazing thing is that no one ratted them out. It was a software program catching the cash shortfall that caught them. I’m just amazed that they thought this was going to go undetected. Is the DC Government really that screwed up operationally?
A computer spot-check of Cooks’s work showed how much money apparently was slipping through. Up to half the money that should have been coming in wasn’t being paid, the FBI affidavit said.
On March 3, Cooks reported that she collected $10,292 in checks and credit card charges for traffic fines, but the Affiliated Computer Services computer showed that $20,987 was actually due for those infractions – a difference of $10,695.
Computer Found Alleged Bribes And Can Reinstate D.C. Tickets
Outside the District’s motor vehicles office, where irritated motorists queue up to pay their traffic tickets, Sherry J. McKnight would stroll along the sidewalk and offer people a cut-rate deal in cash to wipe their records clean, prosecutors said yesterday.
Once she had a customer, McKnight waited patiently for ticket window No. 2 and handed over a slip of paper with a driver’s registration number to her friend inside – teller Tonette R. Cooks, prosecutors said. Cooks clicked away at her computer and deleted tickets from that person’s record, they said in papers filed yesterday.
What Cooks and McKnight didn’t realize was that a backup computer system, run by a private company making money to process each ticket, would keep track of every keystroke and every fine that Cooks didn’t collect.
Cooks and McKnight now face federal bribery charges. And the people who thought their tickets were gone have a surprise: Thanks to the backup data, the city intends to come after them to collect.
People who refuse to properly understand how computers operate will long regard them as being smarter than they are.
I bet there are lot of people nervously waiting to see whether they’re going to be in more trouble than having to pay the original ticket.
Several years ago I heard they decided to do an audit on the parking garages at O’Hare airport in Chicago. Suddenly they realized they were collecting twice as much toll money as they had in the past. I don’t believe anyone was every prosecuted for that “skim” that lasted many years. Gotta love it, sweet home Chicago.