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State Employee Skips Work On Friday For 17 Years

Posted by samzenpus on from the I-wouldn't-say-I've-been-missing-it-bob dept.

Officials say retired New York prison food services director Howard Dean had a really hard time waiting for the weekend, so he skipped work on Fridays for 17 years. Dean made sure, however, to include those Friday hours on his time cards. The extra hours and bogus travel expenses netted Dean nearly $500,000, according to officials. From the article: "State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli and Inspector General Joseph Fisch said their investigation found Howard Dean, 64, of Locke, bilked the state Treasury of about $230,000 by skipping work at the state's Food Production Center in Rome every Friday for 17 years but claiming the hours on his time cards, the New York Post reported Wednesday."

39 comments

  1. Uhh... by kainewynd2 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    found Howard Dean, 64, of Locke, bilked the state Treasury of about $230,000 by skipping work at the state's Food Production Center in Rome every Friday for 17 years but claiming the hours on his time cards

    Maybe they should look at the management during his time there as well? Just a friendly suggestion...

    --
    I just don't get... eh, ugh... never mind. This post wasn't worth the research I put into it.
    1. Re:Uhh... by pushing-robot · · Score: 3, Funny

      You'd think they would have at least noticed when he started running for president. It's like he wanted to get caught.

      --
      How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
    2. Re:Uhh... by batquux · · Score: 1

      Let's see... $230,000 / (17 * 52 * 8)... roughly $32.52 / hour! And it seems there's an opening...

    3. Re:Uhh... by clone53421 · · Score: 1

      That probably includes benefits: pension, health insurance, etc.

      --
      Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
    4. Re:Uhh... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It was a cry for help.

    5. Re:Uhh... by MindlessAutomata · · Score: 1

      I bet he screamed when he got caught.

  2. There was an even worse case by George_Ou · · Score: 4, Insightful

    There was a woman who worked (for San Francisco I think) on night shifts. She would come in and punch in, go home and sleep, come back in pajamas to punch in during break, then come back to clock out. She did this for several years. Of course the real question is that if no one missed her all those years, does the city really need this position in the first place.

    1. Re:There was an even worse case by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Flamebait

      Of course the real question is that if no one missed her all those years...

      Yes, the position is important. The continued existence of these positions contribute to maintaining the membership and revenue of the union to which all of these crucial civil servants belong. It is imperative that these unions continue to enjoy increasing and unassailable power forever, and you are well advised to cease your questioning of this policy.

    2. Re:There was an even worse case by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      Indeed. At least in this case the guy was at work Monday - Thursday. If he was finishing everything that needed to be done in that frame then there wouldn't have been any cues from a productivity standpoint. If the woman mentioned never was there though, then they literally didn't need her.

      Never question the logic of government positions though. Sometimes I think they're there just to give people a job (not always - I'm a government employee myself - just for some positions). Where I'm at we have 1 position that just stretches the imagination. When a clerk takes in a building permit, they send her an email letting her her know that the permit has been received so that she can then send an email to the plans examiners that the permit has been received. Nevermind that all of these people are in the same office at a distance that they could shout back to the plans examiners and they would hear them, but yep, her job is essentially to forward emails - and always to the same people; no routing decisions involved.

      When I once suggested that the clerks directly email the plans examiners to simplify the process I was given the "Shut up and leave it alone." look.

    3. Re:There was an even worse case by Chrisq · · Score: 1

      At least she should have had the decency to bring a sleeping bag into work and sleep. Where would the British motor industry been today if we had that kind of Attitu .... oh wait!

    4. Re:There was an even worse case by stonewallred · · Score: 1

      Lol, unions tried and tried and still haven't managed to get into RJR. Might be because back in the 60s through early 00's RJR was one of the best employers in the world. Health insurance that was free and they even had a highly rated and well staffed private hospital capable of anything but the most severe emergencies. Free glasses and braces and dental care for employees and their families. Medicine was $4.00 a prescription back in the 70s and 80's, no matter what it was. Not to mention stock options that made thousands of employees into millionaires. Retirement? Lol, pensions that are still honored today with the same free medical care. Pay? Usually between 100% to 300% more than similar jobs in other sectors in the same areas. It was not uncommon for people who swept the floors to be making $16-20 bucks an hour in 1980, in an area where the normal middle class wages were less than 10 bucks an hour. Unions have done good things, but by no means are they the end all, be all of the job market.

    5. Re:There was an even worse case by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I work in a large company in the middle east at the moment. Here they've introduced finger-printing for clocking in and out in order to ensure people are coming to work.
      Now what they are doing is exactly what that woman did - clock in, go home sleep, come to work clock-out.

    6. Re:There was an even worse case by Pharmboy · · Score: 1

      This is why unions are so important, to help stop the type of treatment that RJR has subjected its employees to. And best of all, the unions only request a portion of your paycheck and that you vote for who they say to vote for.

      --
      Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
    7. Re:There was an even worse case by Daniel+Dvorkin · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The continued existence of these positions contribute to maintaining the membership and revenue of the union to which all of these crucial civil servants belong. It is imperative that these unions continue to enjoy increasing and unassailable power forever, and you are well advised to cease your questioning of this policy.

      In private industry, there are organizations that allow people to draw enormous salaries -- much larger than any state employee will ever make -- without doing any actual work at all, for years at a time. These organizations generally go by names like "board of directors" and "executive suite," and interestingly, they spend much of their time trying (successfully, as comments like yours show) to convince people that unions are the root of all evil. Why do you suppose that could be?

      --
      The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
    8. Re:There was an even worse case by Zot+Quixote · · Score: 0

      Companies that treat their employees well don't have unions...SHOCKER!

      If every company out there treated their employees that well, there wouldn't be a need for unions. No one said they are the be all end all, but RJ Reynolds isn't enough to sustain the middle class all by itself.

  3. For the love of Cthulu help me by lul_wat · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Why with firehose articles if I click to read a comment it reloads the whole page and only shows that comment?? Then I have to go back and reload the whole page to see comment subjects In normal slashdot articles it just makes space for the comment on the page

    --
    Divide a cake by zero. Is it still a cake?
    1. Re:For the love of Cthulu help me by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      Same with idle aricles. Very annoying.

    2. Re:For the love of Cthulu help me by Rhaban · · Score: 1

      The worst is that it unfolds the comment first, then proceeds to the redirection. I think i'll install a "disable javascript" emergency button that i'll hit just between these two events.

    3. Re:For the love of Cthulu help me by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yea it's really annoying. Even that slider on top of the comments doesn't work for idle. Works fine on the main page. No idea why.

    4. Re:For the love of Cthulu help me by clone53421 · · Score: 2, Informative

      Strip “idle.” out of the URL and it kills off the Idle-styled CSS/javascript buggery.

      http://slashdot.org/firehose.pl?op=view&type=story&sid=10/04/16/2021221

      --
      Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
    5. Re:For the love of Cthulu help me by BitZtream · · Score: 1

      Well, in Chrome, the comment expands for me, then the browser jumps to a new page with the comment alone. Just like you, it works fine on normal pages and doesn't jump to a single comment entry.

      I suspect some javascript issues. As I write this I also look up at the button above the subject box ... which is apparently the 'cancel reply' button, I say apparently because I had to figure out wtf it said since reading dark green text on a dark grey background is rather difficult.

      Perhaps slashdot should go back to more static html pages until they can get some devs who know what test frameworks are and how to use them.

      --
      Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
    6. Re:For the love of Cthulu help me by lul_wat · · Score: 1

      I would mod you up but I can't. You sir are a scholar and a gentleman. Unfortunately it's not a perma-fix

      --
      Divide a cake by zero. Is it still a cake?
    7. Re:For the love of Cthulu help me by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I have cursed this problem so many times, not understanding what is the problem or how to fix it and always had to give up and leave the comments section alone. One time, I nearly RTFA because of it. But you have fixed it! Thank you! I could hug you (or more) if you were here!

      But now, why doesn't a guy like you have higher karma? *looks at your comment history: Israel, Israel, China, China, Israel, Palestine, Apple* oic

    8. Re:For the love of Cthulu help me by clone53421 · · Score: 1

      But now, why doesn't a guy like you have higher karma? *looks at your comment history: Israel, Israel, China, China, Israel, Palestine, Apple* oic

      I’ve been at the karma cap for quite a long time now. Flamebait and troll are more about how you say something than what you actually have to say.

      --
      Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
  4. citation needed by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    srsly!

  5. Slashdot is not Wikipedia by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Seriously.

  6. God bless the Baby Boomers by Rogerborg · · Score: 1

    This was likely agreed on a handshake back in nineteen-dickety-six. Heck, the guy has probably got a fishing boat and a lifetime's supply of Cubans (cigars, gardeners, whatever) written into his pension.

    --
    If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
  7. Sounds like by Higaran · · Score: 1

    They did this in an episode of Malcolm in the middle, Hal the dad was on trial for, like bribery or corroption or something, but then all the supposed proof all happened on a friday, it turned out to be a setup and they guy had the proof of everywhere he had been playing hookey at on fridays, like the zoo and county fair and stuff.

    1. Re:Sounds like by dustman81 · · Score: 2, Informative

      Hal was charged with embezzlement for allegedly bilking his company out of millions and placed under house arrest. Hal casually mentions to Malcolm that he has played hooky from work on Fridays for years. The evidence presented in court against him was that all the events occurred on Fridays. Once Malcolm realizes this, he has his father find all of his pictures and tickets of him playing hooky, which were time stamped on the Fridays that the embezzlement took place, thus showing that there was no way Hal could have been embezzling money. Of course, Lois was furious that he had been skipping work on Fridays and now since he had admitted to skipping work, had lost his job.

  8. in addition to restitution... by sdnoob · · Score: 1

    he should be working monday through friday for 5 to 10 to make up for it.

  9. supervisor by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Apparently the supervisor took the day off as well. How was this able to continue for so long with no one asking questions.

    1. Re:supervisor by MBGMorden · · Score: 1

      It said he was a director. That's upper management. These folks usually aren't too heavily scrutinized as there aren't too many steps up the ladder till you get to the top.

      --
      "People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
    2. Re:supervisor by krazytekn0 · · Score: 1

      He was the supervisor. Being a director there, he really would have very little direct supervision, if any, more like a board meeting once a week or month

      --
      Not all life is cyber. Extra Income
    3. Re:supervisor by JWSmythe · · Score: 1

      It's actually pretty easy in most places, if you know how things work, and have an eye for cheating the system.

          I'd guess in his position he had the opportunity to travel to sites on a regular basis. It would be easy enough to schedule to be at a site say Thursday and Friday. When you get there, tell the people at the site that you are scheduled to be there for only Thursday. Finish up what you're doing Thursday afternoon, and enjoy your 3 day weekend on the clock.

          I usually didn't have that luxury. Since I usually work with servers, if I'm vising a site, they're expecting to see that a server went down here and there on the scheduled days.

          The less important your job is, the easier it is to hide. "Oh, I was over in another department when you didn't see me." or "Oh, I was in a meeting with [someone who has lots of meetings all day and gets nothing done]"

      --
      Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
  10. In the local parlance... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    We call bullshit, then.

  11. crack investigators by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Their crack investigators, must have had a hard time weaving this web

    This guy was saying hey! here I am come get me! (Think the french in the castle in monty python and the holy grail)

    Where the hell where the supervisors of this criminal, the only mistake he made was piss off the wrong person

  12. Of course not by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    does the city really need this position in the first place

    Of course not, but what government always needs is justifcation for more spending. At the top of the pyramid, as long as the money passes through your hands, you win.

  13. shit-rolls-uphill by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    fool me once, shame on you, fool me 884 times fire his boss.