ATTORNEY-CLIENT COMMUNICATION CONFIDENTIAL AND PRIVILEGED Summary of Findings 1. The Committee debit cards were issued to Laureen Jacobs and Alisa Colatarci. The questionable purchases, as identified by GM for the period from January 2007 – April 2014 that were made with the debit cards, totaled $239,890. 2. Per review of the vendor locations where the questionable purchases were made, the majority of the locations were near the homes and the drive paths, to and from work, of Alisa Colatarci and Laureen Jacobs. 3. Per GM, the total questionable debit purchases by year is summarized below (As seen by the general ramp up during the 8 year period, it is likely that these types of transactions were occurring prior to 2007): (See Exhibit A) a. 2007 – $14,839 b. 2008 – $22,789 c. 2009 – $22,303 d. 2010 – $43,109 e. 2011 – $35,635 f. 2012 – $46,982 g. 2013 – $43,608 h. 2014 – $10,625 i. Total – $239,890 4. Per GM, cash reimbursements for mileage were to be for business miles driven only. Total debit card purchases made by Alisa Colatarci and Laureen Jacobs for gasoline totaled $46,726 from the period January 2007 – April 2014. GM stated that there should not have been debit purchases for gasoline because the employees should have been submitting an expense report and receiving their reimbursement for gasoline. Assuming an average of $.45 cents per mile reimbursement rate per the IRS guidelines, the amount of charges at gas stations would have equaled 103,836 business miles driven during that period, which is quite excessive. Also, in many instances per review of the gas charges, there were multiple charges to gas stations during any given week. 5. A summary of the total transactions with some of the larger questionable vendors, made on the debit cards are as follows (the volume of the transactions for the size office and the type of transactions indicate unauthorized purchases): (See Exhibit B) a. Target – $42,087 b. BJs – $14,907 c. Electronic Stores – $20,887 d. Grocery Stores – $9,956 e. Coffee Shops – $9,324 f. Total – $97,162 Page 1 6. Per GM the total questionable checks written by year totals $413,539 and is summarized below (also an indication of a ramp up period and of a strong likelihood that it was occurring prior to 2007): (See Exhibit C) a. 2007 – $36,694 b. 2008 – $44,118 c. 2009 – $56,844 d. 2010 – $66,078 e. 2011 – $51,627 f. 2012 – $67,831 g. 2013 – $77,383 h. 2014 – $12,964 i. Total – $413,539 7. Total checks written to cash and endorsed by a questionable employee or written directly to the suspected employees as Payee for the period January 2007 – June 2014, totals $239,376, and is summarized as follows: (See Exhibit D) a. Alisa Colatarci – $112,740 b. Valeria Colatarci – $25,649 c. Joe Aiello – $1,010 d. Laureen Jacobs – $6,565 e. F. Jacobs – $3,236 f. T. Jacobs – $7,880 g. David Haylett, Jr. – $38,686 h. Marcus Hall – $40,525 i. Heather Palmer – $3,085 j. Total – $239,376 8. A summary of the total transactions, with some of the larger questionable vendors, made with check purchases are as follows (the volume of the transactions for the size office and the type of transactions indicate unauthorized purchases): (See Exhibit E) a. Sam’s Club – $7,045 b. BJs – $18,202 c. Office Max – $8,175 d. Total – $33,422 9. The checks that were written from the checking account of the Committee to Elect George Maziarz were pre-signed by Laureen Jacobs. There were multiple people who could complete the payee on the checks including but not limited to Laureen Jacobs, Alisa Colatarci, Marcus Hall, Heather Palmer and Valerie Colatarci. 10. Checks made payable to suspected employees (Alisa Colatarci, Valerie Colatarci, Laureen and F. Jacobs, Marcus Hall, and David Haylett) from the period January 2008 – December 2013 totaled $208,809. The receipts that Connors provided, in which the payment method was cash, totaled $12,271 and credit card/debit card (unknown) totaled $24,052. FM would assume that the receipts for the purchases made with cash or a Page 2 debit/credit card would be reimbursed by the Company to the employee who purchased the items. Clearly, there is insufficient receipts from January 2008 – December 2013 for all of the checks that were written to the employees listed above. 11. It was noted on very few of the receipts that were included on the CD received from Connors, that the receipt indicated what the business purpose was for the purchases made (i.e. Gift baskets, office supplies, etc.). There was clearly a lack of proper accounting for these business receipts. It was also noted that from time to time, there would be petty cash reimbursement requests from the Albany office that stated what the petty cash was used for and was to the exact dollar amount, which is the correct way to replenish the petty cash account in a business. 12. Per review of the receipts, there was a charge to Target on 06/02/13 using the Committee Debit Card ending in 1994 which was associated with Laureen Jacobs. The receipt was for a purchase of luggage in the amount of $156.59. The receipt was reported to the NYS Filings on the January 2014 report with the purpose stating “Other” and the explanation on the report stating “Office Supplies”. GM stated there would never be a need to purchase luggage for his campaign expenses. 13. Per review of the receipts, there was a charge to Best Buy on 6/28/13 using the Committee Debit Card ending in 1994, which was associated with Laureen Jacobs. The receipt was for a Shutterfly book and a Nikon Coolpix camera in the amount of $382.78. The receipt was reported to the NYS Filings on the January 2014 report with the purpose of “Office” and the explanation on the report stating “Office Equipment”. GM stated there would never be a need to purchase a Shutterfly book nor a Nikon Coolpix camera for his campaign expenses. 14. There were checks written to Lucy Noelle (Jewelry Company) that totaled $3,551 in which Laureen Jacobs stated these items were sent to Alisa Colatarci in the office. (See Exhibit F) 15. There were multiple charges to Shutterfly totaling $8,363 from 2007 – 2014 that Alisa Colatarci indicated would be a problem. (See Exhibit G) 16. It was noted that in January 2014, when the investigation began, that the round dollar amount reimbursements to the suspected employees (i.e. Alisa Colatarci, David Haylett, Laureen Jacobs, Marcus Hall, etc.) switched to what appeared to be actual odd dollar amount transactions, which were probably for legitimate expenses. 17. It was noted that Laureen Jacobs, Marcus Hall and Alisa Colatarci would send interns to the bank with a check made payable to the intern, or made payable to cash, and would have the intern bring the cash back to the office. It was noted that Mike Norris, an intern working for the campaign office, had reimbursement expenses totaling $9,393. All of the checks were written by Marcus Hall and the checks varied in dollar amounts and were not written for round dollar amounts. GM stated these appeared to be legitimate Page 3 reimbursements for certain expenses pertaining to the campaign. There were also checks written to Andrew Norris, who was an intern, totaling $8,500. All of the checks were written for round dollar amounts. All of the checks were written by Marcus Hall and Alisa Colatarci, including a check written to Andrew on 10/20/2010 in the amount of $2,500, which was written by Marcus Hall. Certain interns only received 1-2 checks for round dollars amounts and we believe that this is the case because they may have questioned the legitimacy of the transaction. (i.e. Tricia Denny) 18. Through review of the receipts for the period from 2008 – 2013, there were excessive purchases of office supplies along with personal type expenditures that would not be for the benefit the GM Committee. The only potential rebuttal would be that the personal expenditures were for gift baskets but per GM, there would only be approximately 2 gift baskets a month, which was exceeded with the amount of receipts obtained from 2008 – 2013. 19. Per review of the receipts for the period from 2008 – 2013, it was noted that there were charges to miscellaneous vendors that had multiple gift cards purchased on them. GM stated that they sometimes bought gift cards for the basket donations but nothing compared to the amount actually bought. 20. Per review of the receipts, there was a receipt that had 5 - $100 gift cards purchased on it from Tops in Tonawanda. The receipt was purchased using the Debit MasterCard ending in x2000, which belonged to Alisa Colatarci. The charge was not reported on the NYS Filings. 21. Per review of the receipts for the period from 2008 – 2013, the total amount of receipts totaled $207,811 which are listed by year below: (See Exhibit H) a. 2008 – $3,075 b. 2009 – $18,340 c. 2010 – $39,049 d. 2011 – $42,446 e. 2012 – $59,726 f. 2013 – $45,175 g. Total – $207,811 22. It was noted that there were generous donations and sponsorships that were given to Laureen Jacobs and Alisa Colatarci kids’ schools and activities. The total amount of checks written for Alisa Colatarci and Laureen Jacobs kids’ schools and activities, from January 2007 – April 2014, totaled $5,430 and $13,220, respectively. (See Exhibit I) 23. Per GM, he never had AT&T services and therefore, there should have been no charges to AT&T. GM stated Alisa Colatarci had AT&T services and these charges are related to her personal account. The total checks written to AT&T from January 2007 – April 2014 were $9,314. The total debit purchases charged to AT&T were $1,955. GM noted that the charges stopped during 2014 when the reports came out about the unreported expenses. (See Exhibit J) Page 4 24. There may be items determined to be questionable or unauthorized by GM, when in actuality, there may be a portion of the expense that is legitimate. The perpetrators could state that the charges are legitimate and state that they were used for Committee expenses, but lack support for their contentions. 25. Through a comparison of the Committee’s Board of Elections filings against records and information provided to us by the Committee, we identified questionable expenses not identified on the NYS Filings totaling $209,429. Some of these amounts could have been reported under “unitemized” if they were under $50. a. Debit Purchases – $126,754 (See Exhibit K) b. Check Purchases – $82,675(See Exhibit L) 26. Upon review of the NYS Filings, we identified amendments to three prior reports. There were 2 amendments that increased total expenditures by $134,850.23. There was 1 amendment that was made to decrease expenses which totaled $2,989.24. From the information made available to us by the Committee, it is not possible for us to determine the reason(s) for the amendments and expenditures, or who authorized the additional amendments listed below: a. An amendment to the Committee’s 2010 27 Day Post General Report was recorded on or about May 24, 2016 at 6:35 p.m. to include an expenditure of $39,070.42. The expenditure is described as “UNITEMIZED 2010 JAN/FEB” with no address or explanation and a listed purpose of “OTHER”. (See Exhibit M) b. An amendment to the Committee’s January 2012 Periodic Report was recorded on or about May 24, 2016 at 6:40 p.m. to include an expenditure of $95,779.81. The expenditure is described as “UNITEMIZED FALL 2011” with no address or explanation and a listed purpose of “OTHER”. (See Exhibit N) c. An amendment to the Committee’s July 2013 Periodic Report was recorded on or about July 13, 2016 at 4:57 a.m. to include a decrease to the unitemized expenditure totaling $2,989.24. The expenditure is described as “UNITEMIZED” with no address or explanation and a listed purpose of “OTHER”. (See Exhibit O) 27. We summarized the expenses and deposits activity, reported in the NYS Filings versus what activity was reported in the bank statements. At December 31, 2015, the NYS Filings show a closing account balance of $945,720 versus the bank balance of $778,123, on a $167,597 difference. (Exhibit P) 28. Per GM, the Senate paid for Time Warner Cable for the office starting 2011 and the expense was only approximately $75/month. Per review of the checks there were charges to TWC that dated back to 2007. The total checks written to TWC that are in question amount to $11,125. (Exhibit Q) Page 5