Relación de la confesion del ladrón José Martínez como documentada por Lorna-Gail Dallin.
Taking the Confession
The true and verifiable story of how two volunteers came to hear the confession of a “Yucatan Grandee” when he admitted to taking money from the MEL coffers.
Prologue – A matter of perception
* At the General Meeting of January 9th, 2012, exception was taken to the AC Board president stating that volunteers and board members found out about the theft “at the same time”. Not true. This tract will show why it is not.
* Who took the confession becomes a critical / key issue in what was to follow.
Genesis
It all started with a list. The list appeared one day in mid 2010, pinned up on one of the bulletin boards at MELL. The list was neat and well presented with a border of pale green down one side. It announced itself as a roster of the present members of the A.C. (asociados civil) Board of MELL. The list started a buzz amongst the volunteers and members who studied it. Very few knew any members of the board listed there and most knew no one at all. A frisson of unease rippled through the membership.
Soon volunteers were asking each other and asking the Administrator “who are these people?” I (LG) knew 3 of the 8 names listed; some recognised the name of a lawyer used by many gringos in the house buying process. No one knew the president of the board. Clearly the lack of connection or lack of knowledge of the governing body of the library began to bother some volunteers and members.
When asking about in the community of friends and acquaintances a number of volunteers were hearing warnings from their Yucatan friends about the current president … a Yucatan Grandee. Three separate volunteers within a 2 week period came to LG to pass along the warnings about financial shadings that seemed to be the operating mode of the president. These stories were difficult to accept without feelings of reluctance over acting on 3rd or 4th hand information. Nothing overt was done … we were wary and hoping that board members were also hearing these warnings.
Lamentations
On December 30th, 2010, our administrator of nearly 5 years, retired and we entered into a period of utter mayhem. The incoming Replacement (R) had less than 3 days to work with the out-going administrator. The Replacement (R) had been hired by the President on the strength of her English comprehension skills. The R. had no computer skills, no idea about the library until she was hired and had never set foot inside the building prior to her 1st day on the job. To her, it was the American Library.
The volunteers were called upon to step up to the challenge of operating the library without an administrator. LG volunteered to cover all things pertaining to the volunteers until the R could take over her full duties as administrator. Into this chaos stepped the president, the Yucatan Grandee. He started coming to the library (in the new year of 2011) almost every day instructing the R. about financial reporting and other fiscal matters. He began taking all cash from the building, cash that comes in across the desk on a daily basis from fees, fines, book sales and donations.
Prior to all this tumult, LG had been approached by one of the AC Board members. This AC-er (member of the AC Board) had a plan to expand the board by bringing forward volunteer members to join the board. There was talk about forming a committee of volunteers who would act as an administrative committee reporting to the AC Board. The AC-er proposing this plan seemed to want the “push” for this to come from the volunteers rather than from any member of the board.
In January, 2011, LG called a meeting of the volunteers to boost morale, cover some operational procedures at the front desk and to ascertain if there was any interest amongst the vols in actually stepping up to some extra work on behalf of the library. There was some interest but no one had a burning desire to take on more chores while chaos reigned and the Chili Cook Off loomed.
February 27, 2011, The Chili Cook Off – our 10th annual – took place. This is a major fund raising event, a major push to fill the coffers of MELL and this event swept all other considerations aside. Who could think of anything else except how to manage the event in the face of no coordinator and a useless administration. But … get through it we did and sometime in early March, the president announced that over $45,000 pesos was raised with more to come from the corporate participants. No small feat.
Just a note here about one of the volunteers who refused to give the president any money from the advance ticket sales for the Cook Off which was kept at the front desk. She insisted that he sign a receipt showing the amount of money taken. This volunteer was one of the several who had received warnings from a Yucatan friend concerning the Yucatan Grandee.
By March it was clear that the R. was no replacement at all and she resigned. An eminently suitable candidate was waiting in the wings and she was hired by the president in March 2011. She had spent some time prior to being hired as a volunteer at MELL so she had some idea of what she was getting into. This new administrator came with a Master Degree in Library Science as well as a degree in English Lit. This was Maria.
ON April 27, 2011, The AC-er called another lunch meeting this time with LG and the former administrator, Reg. Again, discussions were around the formation of a group from the volunteers, a committee to be the Library Administrative Committee. (See Appendix: “Proposal from AC Board Member”). At this get together we talked about those vols who would make good candidates to go forward to the board. It was stated plainly at this meeting that the former administrator would never be approved for a place on the board because of hard feelings about him harboured by the Yucatan Grandee. Several other candidates were rejected as well for reasons which might be called frivolous.
Following this meeting with the AC-er, emails began to fly, pushing, pushing to have the meeting with the volunteers to find candidates. There seemed to be a pressure from the AC-er to get this process nailed down and accomplished as soon as possible. Once the idea was accepted by the volumes about forming the committee and candidates were ready to go forward, there would be a volunteer appreciation “do” for the vols, hosted by the Board, paid for by … the board? MELL? This appreciation never did take place since the vols were not in the mood for some reason and could not commit to a date that pleased all.
A Volunteer’s meeting was called on May 7th, 2011, with a good turnout. At this time, the description of the proposed committee, the Library Administrative
Committee, as set out by the AC-er, was presented and volunteers were sought to put their names forward. It was becoming clearer who were interested.
It was agreed amongst the volunteers interested in joining the board, that information about what they would be joining was needed. This is standard procedure for anyone thinking about joining a board. Get the picture, the financial picture, an idea of the budget, and look at the governing structure whether it is the bylaws or regulations of the Hacienda (Mexican equivalent of the IRS) and the minutes of past meetings. These documents were duly sought, asked for from the AC-er and the president. As he was often in the Library at this time, it was easier to ask him in person, to see these documents. The pres. assured us that the documents were “coming”, that they would be placed in a black binder at the front desk for all paid up members and volunteers to see.
Here is what eventually showed up: the governing docs from Hacienda (in Spanish) with pages missing. Also a tally sheet was forth coming showing what money had been taken in over the front desk in the past 6 months. What was not on offer was a financial statement, no bank statements, no minutes (had there been no meetings?), no budget.
Thru May and June, 2011, we (two volunteers and the administrator) began to press for this information. The administrator, M., kept after the president to bring the asked for documents so we could all get on with doing what we had been asked to do. M. was trying to make a budget for the coming year – could we start on some acquisitions? Yes, we needed some new computer equipment. Do we have money budgeted for that? DK began pressuring the president to “show us the money”. Nobody would be moving toward joining the board until the financials were presented.
Acts of the Apostles
Now things began to hot up for the Yucatan Grandee. He was under pressure from 2 fronts. At some point in early July, M. said she would no longer give the president money from the petty cash until he showed her deposit slips for the amount he was taking. She made it clear that she felt responsible for the money and could not continue to see it leave the building with no accounting.
By the end of July, the president had failed to show up at 2 promised and confirmed meetings with DK to which he said, he would bring the bank statements.
After several missed meetings, DK shamed him into meeting anywhere, anytime … just do it. An August 2nd meeting is set to take place at the home of DK with LG present. At last the president comes to the meet with some papers.
It was clear from the outset of this meeting that the president was nervous and reluctant to let us actually handle the statements. Following are LG’s notes from that meeting compiled shortly after the sit down.
Notes on a meeting with:
Dan Karnes DK
José Martinez Yucatan Grandee
Lorna-Gail Dallin LG
Aug2, 2011 – at the home of Dan Karnes
Re: Recent bank statements of the Merida English Language Library.
This meeting was set up to receive from Jose Martinez, bank statements for the Merida English Library. The understanding was we would, at the very least, be able to look at them and verify the solvency of MELL. The “viewing” of the bank statements was requested by the volunteer designates to the Board of MELL (and by the administrator, Maria Herrnandez). The bank statements were part of a package of documents asked for by the volunteer reps.
José arrived promptly at 10.00 am with a file folder in which were photocopies of bank statements. He seemed reluctant to let us really look at them and Dan asked if he could photo copy these pages so he and I could go over them at leisure. Dan and I gave many assurances that no one but the two of us would look at these statements and that copies would be made without the bank account numbers or name of the account being shown … just “in case” they might go astray. Jose was reluctant about having copies made.
While looking over the statements it was evident that only summaries of deposits and withdrawals were shown and there was no “2nd Sheet” which would show individual transactions. José was vague about these 2nd sheets, finally admitting that he had them but had not brought them. Dan insisted that we would need to see the whole bank statement for each month before any of the information was of any use to us in getting a picture of MELL’s financial situation.
José then confessed that he had taken money from the account. He said he was desperate for some $$ at some point and he was so ashamed of having to borrow it from the MELL accounts. When asked how much, he said “about $250,000 pesos”. He said he intended to pay it back.
“I am so ashamed, I am so ashamed!” he kept repeating.
Dan then stated that Jose would have to resign from the board and Jose agreed. Dan then asked again to have the bank statements so he could photo copy them and Jose still refused. Dan then told Jose, quite forcefully, that if he didn’t let him (Dan) have the statements to copy, that he would phone all the board member and tell them what was going on and the whole thing would blow up and become more of a “mess” than it already was. José relented, gave Dan the statements and they were copied.
We stated to José that we would remain very quiet about this, telling no one outside two or three current board members. Dan would tell Surratt and then a meeting of the board would be called to discuss what to do.
Later, when Dan looked at the photocopies, he told me that he could see that the statements had been “altered” by typing over numbers and using whiteout.
Addendum to:
Notes on August 2nd, 2011 meeting between Dan, Lorna-Gail and the Yucatan Grandee
Upon reflection, I would like to add some further observations to my original notes. This pertains to the period after J.’s confession, when he mumbled a figure of 250 thousand and it didn’t hit me as to how much that sum was. I kept thinking, “Oh, he has taken some thousands of pesos; my image was of him pocketing some of the money on the way to the bank to make a deposit. He kept on saying how sorry he was and how ashamed, that I began to be uncomfortable and sought to calm him. Of course I felt sorry for him, he seemed quite distressed once he had confessed.
Dan and I were giving reassurances that we and the board would want to keep this quiet, that we needn’t tell anyone but Dan did suggest that he would have to tell Malena since she would have to resign from the board as well. J. said he understood that. And here is where I came in with reassurances that he had actually done some good things for the Library and perhaps we could have an appreciation party … for volunteers and board members. This would make things look a little more natural. I was thinking that we could normalize this and then get some $$ back from Jose. I had no idea of the extent of his plundering until later that day when Dan got more bank statements from another source which had not been altered. There was the “2nd page” which gave the complete picture because of course there had been no deposits.
When J. left Dan’s house that day, I am convinced that he felt he had got off lightly because we were so anxious to help him feel better about his misdeeds, not knowing fully what they were and thinking that we could gloss things over.
He … J., must have thought we were soft and easy to steal from. We were so nice to him, so kind. What fools he must have thought us.
And that is how we members of the library came to find out that MELL had no cash assets. Gone. All of it.
At this point as several AC-ers met with the Yucatan Grandee to hear his admission of guilt, DK got together with the administrator, Maria, and began piecing together an estimate of stolen funds. They used the bank statements finally supplied by the Y.G. along with whatever other statements still survived at the Library, then added in the estimates of what money had come to MELL from fund raising events such as the Chili Cook Off and the 4th of July Party, but was not deposited. A sad picture began to emerge. Financial tracking and reporting from the end of December 2010 to the end of March, 2011 was somewhat chaotic and spotty. It quickly became apparent that the sum which had been embezzled was considerably more than the $250,000 pesos admitted to by the Yucatan Grandee. This information was shared with the board at an August 6th meeting.
On August 6, 2011, an emergency meeting of the AC Board was hastily convened at the Library. Present at that meeting were: S.W., Mitch (chair), R.B. George Fischer (since resigned and off the board), LG, DK (non-members) and someone from Mitch’s office taking minutes. No Chloe (she was believed to be out of town) no Carlos (he wasn’t informed of the meeting) and no Tonia (well, she wasn’t exactly on the board). The administrator, Maria, was called to the meeting but told to wait outside the room until invited to be included.
At the top of the meeting, one AC-er threatened dire consequences if one word of this “got out” and if anything did “get out” they would “fire Maria” (a direct quote). DK and LG assured those present that they understood the desire to keep things quiet and had impressed this upon the administrator. Another member of the board was sure this keeping things quiet would never succeed and that within a few weeks, news of the theft would have leaked into the community.
Following the confession of August 2, DK began his investigations of possible courses of action and as a lawyer himself, sought out the counsel of an abogado who had some experience with AC boards and their business. Roberto Poncé was recommended to DK by a Yucatan lawyer and former member of the Library board. At this point, Dan and I felt included in discussions as to what should be done and when and by whom. But that was about to change. The lawyer was able to put together a picture of the Y.G.’s solvency by checking to see if he indeed owned properties in Progresso or in Merida (as claimed) that he could sell. It was clear, eventually, that he owned nothing of value save his domicile (which was kept in his son’s name) and his reputation in the casta divina.
At this time the Acting President (Mitch) began working with the Y.G. to find a monetary solution. Ideas of criminal charges were not considered feasible as the expense of such action would be too great. Now the Yucatan Grandee started working the AC Board as they began unravelling the myriad of lies and half truths about solvency of the ex-president.
DK was still hard at work gathering facts, figures and advice on how to proceed with recovery of funds. He thought he was working in concert with the board. This working together was soon to end. By August 15, 2011, the AC –ers began to shut LG and DK out of the picture. No more notices of meetings were forth coming. No sharing information, no communication. One “sort of” explanation was given: DK “upset” the Yucatan Grandee … DK made the Y.G. “nervous”.
So began acquiescence to the thief.
In an August 15 email to the AC Board (minus Chloe and Carlos) DK outlined some recommendations on how best to proceed. This email was ignored and there were no further communications between the Board and DK. We were out of the loop.
The Gospels
Let us just pause here a moment and examine this “shut out”. If it was meant to discourage DK’s and LG’s interest in dealing with “the situation”, it had quite the opposite effect. DK and LG had taken the confession, pushed by Maria and we could not help but feel some ownership in effecting a reasonable out come. Those who had been asleep at the wheel were now taking charge, albeit two years too late. How could we not want to know what was happening? This seems to be a pivotal part of all that followed. All the passion and interest on the part of the volunteers rests on this point. We had a share, an interest in this situation because we had precipitated the finding out of wrong doing. We had a right to our passions!
Through the remainder of August and September and October, the Y.G. led a merry chase through obfuscation, dissembling and misdirection. Deadlines were not met, worthless papers from the bank were shown by the Y.G. as proof he was working on a loan. As days and weeks passed with no money in sight, any confidence we had in the AC Board to handle the situation was eroded.
At a volunteers meeting of Saturday, October 15, 2011, information about the theft was imparted to the volunteers. Shock and disbelief, anger at the theft of the money “earned” by the volunteers, was expressed. At this meeting 6 volunteers definitely put their names forward to be considered by the “asociados” for inclusion on the board. They naturally took a keen interest in what was happening with the recovery of money and the actions of the AC Board. (See
Appendix: Minutes of the Meeting of 11/15/11)
On November 15, 2011, the AC Board announced to the general membership that the theft had taken place. Then on November 30, 2011 they announced recoupment of $250,000 from the Y.G. This timing of announcements made it look like it took the AC Board only 2 weeks to resolve the situation. From the time they found out about the theft to having a certified cheque in their hands, we can see from the true and accurate account of this “Taking the Confession” that it in fact took 4 months.
Exodus
And thus ends this part of the saga of the “troubles at MELL”. The AC Board has characterized the volunteers and concerned members as rabble rousers when all along we have been the force which brought the embezzlement to light. We owned that feat! For exposing the dysfunction of the AC Board and its president, we were vilified for telling the truth and then for seeking justice for Maria.
Someone else with herculean powers of observation will have to tell the next chapter in which we see how Maria Herrnandez went from being an eminently suitable administrator, ready to take our much appreciated library into the 21st Century, able to work well with a staff of volunteers; to being the heroine, the cause celebre and finally the martyr.
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