The Office of the Comptroller of Puerto Rico published the result of an investigation into the attendance of three employees of the Department of Recreation and Sports of Trujillo Alto, from September 2018 to October 2019. The complaint alleges that a recreation and sports coordinator, an amateur boxing instructor and a volleyball instructor recorded full work shifts, although they did not comply with their work schedule. In addition, it is indicated that the director of the Department was aware of these situations.
The investigation revealed that these three officials included time not worked on their attendance sheets. They submitted the attendance to the director of the Department of Recreation and Sports for approval, who processed them for payment to the Department of Human Resources.
The recreation and sports coordinator manually recorded 318 working hours on his work sheets. He made the manual recording to complete his work shifts and attend basketball practices and games.
The auditors detected that the coordinator is also the manager of the Municipality's basketball teams since 2018. However, the Department of Human Resources did not have any letter authorizing his work as a manager as time worked, nor had the Municipal Legislature approved any ordinance in this regard. Nevertheless, the director of the Department of Recreation and Sports of the Municipality considered that the time recorded as manager was part of his work as a municipal employee.
On the other hand, the volleyball instructor, who was an employee of a university institution, did not record her five-hour shift daily, from 5:00pm to 10:00pm, but rather at the end of each fortnight. The auditors detected 153 occasions on which her clock-out punches from the university conflicted with her clock-in at the Municipality. In addition, for the audited period, 77 hours were recorded that were not worked at the Municipality.
The volleyball instructor, for her part, created competitive teams and charged $70 monthly to the most outstanding participants of the volleyball clinics. No ordinance established the charging of this type of tuition, nor was it a concept of collection by the Municipality's Collections Office.
The report also notes that the amateur boxing instructor recorded full work shifts of five hours daily on June 25 and 27 and September 26, 2019, on which he participated in press conferences and two weigh-ins in the capacity of professional boxer. These boxing events were held at the municipal sports facility.
Because of these situations, the crimes of aggravated illegal appropriation, filing of false documents or data, transfer of falsified documents and violations of the Organic Act of the Office of Government Ethics of Puerto Rico, among others, could have been configured. In addition, the director of the municipal Department of Recreation and Sports could have committed the crime of failure to comply with duty by not having fulfilled his responsibility nor the provisions established in the applicable law and regulations.
The conclusions of this investigation were remitted to the consideration of the secretary of Justice and the executive director of the Office of Government Ethics on May 3, 2022. In addition, it is recommended that the Mayor evaluate the possibility of carrying out a recovery, and that he take the administrative measures he deems in accordance with the results of this investigation. The result of this investigation is dated September 9, 2022.
See the Result of the investigation RIQ-DIE-23–05.
To see other published reports, visit our section of Audit Reports.
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