An accusation charged Charlotte Beall, former Probate Judge of Johnson County, with violating her oath of office by misfeasance resulting in loss of monies lawfully held by her office between January 1, 1997, and September 24, 1999. After pleading guilty, she received a probated sentence conditioned on her payment of $54,000 in restitution to the county. The trial court based the restitution amount on the State’s claim that shortages in probate court bank accounts during the period covered by the accusation totaled approximately $54,000. Beall appeals the restitution order. Among other things, she argues that under the applicable four-year statute of limitation, she should not have been ordered to pay restitution for monies lost more than four years before the April 10, 2001 accusation. Although we find no merit in this argument, we vacate the order based on insufficiencies in its findings.
At the restitution hearing, the primary State’s witness was an accountant who had conducted an audit of Johnson County offices. His attention was drawn to the office of the probate court because it was delinquent in remitting its collections to the county’s general fund and was disorganized. He determined that from January 1, 1994, until May 24, 1999, approximately $73,388 in funds paid to the probate court were missing from its bank accounts. He explained that he made this determination based on discrepancies between collections by the court as shown on its official ledger and records of bank deposits. According to the accountant, the monies were taken by someone making bank account deposits that either were not receipted on the ledger or that were receipted for a lesser amount on the ledger. When asked on cross-examination whether this should have resulted in more money in the account than on the ledger, he responded, “It should be, but I think that’s why we’re all here; it wasn’t.” Apparently because the accountant’s calculation of shortage amounts for 1997 through 1999 totaled $55,492.87, the prosecuting attorney informed the court that according to “my math” the shortage in the period of time relevant to the four-year statute of limitation was approximately $54,000.
