Kevin Blakeley Investigation Closed

8/3/2019 Kevin Blakeley Investigation Closed

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TO:FROM:DATE:SUBJECT:

Robert Reid, Cuyahoga County SheriffRick Bell, Criminal Investigations Division ChiefNovember 1,2011KEVIN BLAKELEY INVESTIGATION CLOSED - ABATED BY DEATH.

On October 27, 2011, I received from the Cuyahoga County Sheriffs Office (CCSO)their case investigation of deceased Euclid Detective Kevin Blakeley. The CCSO had beeninvestigating theft of drug forfeiture monies from Euclid Police case files, as well as theft ofFraternal Order of Police (FOP) union dues monies, when Blakeley took his life. Blakeley was anarcotic detective as well as the treasurer for the FOP Union. After reviewing the Sheriff sOffice investigation I concur with their investigation and find that there was sufficient evidenceto present to the Grand Jury an Indictment for Theft of both Law Enforcement Trust Fundmonies and Theft of police officers union dues.

The Case Investigation began when Defendant Antwoine Garrett, after serving federalprison time for a drug trafficking conviction case that originated in the city of Euclid, completedhis prison term and formally petitioned the court to receive the $5,719.20 which had been


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confiscated at the time of his arrest in 1999. The case was prosecuted federally however themoney was never forfeited as part of the disposition so the defendant Garrett hired an attorney todemand the return of the money. The attorney hired by Garrett corresponded with the the City ofEuclid's law director who through email correspondence attempted to get Blakeley to retrievethe money. Blakeley was responsible for the Narcotic Property Log Books. However, accordingto documents and emails Blakeley responded that the monies were turned over to a SpecialAgent with the DEA (Ex. 1). After being contacted, the Special Agent denied that he and hisagency ever received this seized money from Blakeley. Upon further inquiry by the city,Blakeley provided chain of custody property documents which purported to have a propersignature of the DEA Agent accepting receipt of the money. This document appeared to havebeen tampered with, that is, to have a signature of the Federal Agent copied from a previousentry on another chain of custody receipt in this same case. (Ex. 2) This matter was referred bythe Euclid Police Chief to the CCSO for investigation.

In their investigation the CCSO interviewed Euclid Police Department personnel whohad determined that there is a minimum of $40,000 missing from the Euclid Police Departmentcases listed in the 2009 and 2010 property books. Property Books from previous years could notbe recovered and are presumed missing and possibly destroyed. Therefore a complete audit couldnot be performed. The CCSO's review of the 2009 and 2010 property log notations reveal threemain types of entries. The first type are money entries with no dispositions, the second type arenotation entries to " LETF" (Law Enforcement Trust Fund) and the third type are notation entriesreturning the seized money to a defendant i.e. "RET. KB" (returned Kevin Blakely). Of thisthird type (returned to a defendant) the Sheriffs investigative reports indicate there areapproximately 49 persons who had money seized from them and who had log entry notations


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marked returned. The Bureau of Criminal Investigation and Identification (BCI) laboratoryreport findings indicate that the questioned writings in the 2009 and 2010 property log bookswere written by the writer of the known Kevin Blakeley samples provided to BCl forcomparison. (Ex. 3) After a thorough review of the personal bank accounts of the Chief ofPolice and all other police personnel who had access to the seized funds demonstrated noirregularities, the Sheriff's Office investigation focused on Blakeley as the sale personresponsible for missing monies. Although other cash monies cannot be accounted for andappear to have been stolen, the third type of property log entries with a notation to return seizedmoney to a defendant became the focus of the investigation as they can readily be identified asentries made in Blakeley's handwriting and can be cross referenced with a court Journal Entry.The Journal Entries order the confiscated money to be forfeited to the LETF fund which isinconsistent with the property log entries to return money to a defendant. (ExA). SheriffDeputies report that some of these entries are of misdemeanor cases while others are felonies. Acomplete accounting of all monies seized from arrested persons cannot be completed as there isinadequate accounting and missing property logs.

One example of the scheme is as follows: the 10/26 /06 property log entry from the 2006book shows an arrest of Stephan Hendrix by Euclid Police. Although the 2006 property log isnow missing before it went missing the Euclid Police Department copied a suspicious log bookentry which was turned over to the CCSO at the start of this investigation. The photo copiedproperty log entry shows $1,339.00 was confiscated from his pocket while another $6,950.00was confiscated from the console of the car. The Municipal domestic violence case wasdismissed for the drug case to be forwarded to the County. However, someone makes an entrythat the judge ordered the money to be returned to the defendant even though the official Journal


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Entry from the Court of Common Pleas says that the money is to be forfeited. The Clerk ofCourts for Common Pleas sent the Journal Entry to the Euclid City Police Department which isresponsible for dividing the money between the Law Enforcement Trust Fund (LETF) of theEuclid Police Department and CCPO. According to the Sheriff's investigation, Sheriff Deputiesinterviewed Hendrix who stated that he never received any money back. Blakeley had directaccess to the confiscated money, was in charge of the retrieval of the money, and was also incharge of the property log entries. The money which should have been placed in the respectiveLaw Enforcement Trust Funds has never been recovered.

Sheriff detectives have interviewed some of these criminal defendants to confirm thatconfiscated monies were never returned to them. These monies as well as the other entriesmarked returned to defendant were not placed into the respective LETF funds. This moneyshould have been utilized by Law Enforcement to fight future drug activity through policeinvestigations and DARE education programs.

A review of the 2009 and 2010 property books revealed the following:

In year 2009 there were 40 entries made to LETF and 29 entries marked returned to defendant(s).In 2009 there was approximately $32,214.87 deposited in to the LETF Account.In 2009 there was approximately $7,110.01 returned to defendants.In 2009 there was approximately $4,614.05 without disposition.NOTE: there are 21 entries in this evidence book without a disposition.In year 2010 there were 6 entries made to LETF and 20 entries marked returned to defendant(s).In 2010 there was approximately $3,049.00 deposited into the LETF account.In 2010 there was approximately $23,005.74 returned to defendants.In 2010 there was approximately $22,497.74 without a disposition.NOTE: There are 35 entries in this evidence book without a disposition.


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MISSING FOP FUNDS

During their investigation, the Cuyahoga County Sheriffs Office also examined KevinBlakeley's bank records from 2 personal checking accounts. An examination of those accountsincluded itemized transactions and all canceled checks dating back approximately two years. Itwas learned that Blakeley received several checks from 2 checking accounts of the FraternalOrder of Police (FOP). A review of the FOP checks (15 from the FOP PNC account and 2 fromthe FOP Key Bank account which had Blakely's personal address) reveals the checks were madeout to Blakeley, signed by Blakeley and endorsed on the back by Blakeley. Seven (7) of thesechecks went into Blakeley's personal PNC account ($8,923.06) and ten (10) ofthese checks wentinto Blakely's personal Eaton Bank Account ($15,714.19) for a total of $24,637.25. (Ex 5).Detective discussions with FOP president Kurt Eyman indicate Blakeley stole that money.Eyman indicated that Blakeley was not entitled to that money and that the board of trustees forthe union had a two signature policy. Blakeley was the only signator on the checks. It wasexplained to Eyman that in the memo line of the checks Blakeley had written hotels, conferencesand expenses. Eyman stated the Union has credit cards to pay for those particular expenses andtherefore there would never be a need to reimburse Blakeley. The city of Euclid automaticallydeducts each police employee's union dues and once a month would issue a check directly to theFOP treasurer Kevin Blakeley. Blakeley would deposit these monies into the FOP accounts.Blakeley would write checks from these two FOP accounts to himself and deposit them into hispersonal checking accounts. The total amount of the (17) checks was $24,637.25. These fundsbelonged to the FOP membership.

Kevin Blakeley Investigation Closed

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