Witnesses testify to fiscal disconnect in EM

Witnesses on Tuesday painted a picture of fiscal confusion in the trial of a former Eagle Mountain mayor charged with misuse of public money.

The seven charges against Brian Olsen stem from reimbursements he received during his tenure as mayor of Eagle Mountain in 2006. From February 2006 until Olsen's resignation in October of the same year, the prosecution alleges that he sought and received reimbursements for travel that did not take place.

City staffers testified Tuesday that Olsen had little knowledge of the reimbursements the city paid out to him each week.

Olsen's former assistant, Angie Ferre, and others said they automatically created mileage and meal reimbursements for Olsen each Thursday based not on information from Olsen but on an electronic calendar of his activities, using the Internet site MapQuest to figure the miles he should be paid for.

On several occasions they created reimbursement requests and payment checks for Olsen before the events on the electronic calendar had even happened. On some occasions, Olsen was paid for travel to meetings that had been canceled. The payments were made because they were scheduled on his electronic calendar.

Up to a half-dozen or more reimbursements were grouped onto the weekly checks paid to Olsen, with total amounts ranging from hundreds to more than $1,000. Staffers testified that Olsen would not have had direct knowledge of exactly what he was being reimbursed for.

Staffers also testified that until Olsen's trial began this week, they were unaware that there was a written city policy in place on how they should handle reimbursements for mileage and meals.

They testified that on two occasions, Olsen voluntarily paid the city back a total of more than $900 because he had been reimbursed too much money, and that staffers sometimes did not have Olsen sign his reimbursement forms even after he had been reimbursed.

Ferre testified that in February 2006, Olsen had asked her to attend a meeting for him at the last minute. The next week, when she asked him to approve her mileage reimbursement for the trip, Olsen "acted irritated," Ferre said, noting that Olsen said he'd attended the meeting earlier in the day.

Staffers also testified that in October 2006, Olsen repaid the city for a reimbursement that had been paid to him for a conference he never attended. Staffers said he told them he did not attend because his pregnant wife was on doctor-ordered bed rest. They said Olsen told them he was afraid the reimbursement for a meeting he never attended would make him "look bad" and that he "had enemies."

Olsen dated his check for about a week before the date he wrote it, staffers said. Also in October 2006, Olsen had staff gather all his reimbursement forms submitted while he was mayor so he could sign those he hadn't previously signed. At that time Olsen embossed them all with a mayoral seal.

Sgt. Patty Johnston, an investigator for the county attorney's office, testified that at the time Olsen repaid the money, the county had already opened a secret investigation into Olsen because his staff had alerted county attorneys to irregularities in his reimbursements.

Prosecutors said they expected to wrap up their case today. Nine jurors are hearing the case in the courtroom of Judge David Mortensen. The trial, which started Monday, is expected to last five days.