CONTINUING COVERAGE
The Journal-News will have gavel-to-gavel coverage of the criminal trial of former state lawmaker Pete Beck. Follow staff writer Michael D. Pitman today on Twitter at @MDPitmanJournal.
The first non-executive hire for Christopher Technologies testified Thursday that Pete Beck was one of the company executives that “yelled” at her for questioning an issue with her 401K.
Julie Jones, an administrative assistant, was hired on at the tech company in December 2006 and says she was fired in the August 2008 after asking about issues with her 401K plan. She discovered the company took money out of her pay checks to deposit in her plan with ADP, but it was never received.
That’s when she testified that her boss, Mark Woods, the company’s chief technology executive, and Beck took her into the basement at the company’s West Chester Twp. Location and “yelled” at her for not going up the chain of command, but instead emailing Beck on July 31, 2008 and copying key executives in the company “to find out where the money was.”
Jones said she sent the email to Beck because “he was the chief financial officer. He was in charge of it.”
Beck, 62, is the former state lawmaker accused of dozens of criminal counts for his involvement in the failed tech company Christopher Technologies, often referenced as C-Tech. The bench trial is being heard by Hamilton County Common Pleas Judge John Andrew West.
The prosecution, being lead by the Ohio Attorney General’s Office, claims Beck was the unequivocal chief financial officer of the company, while his defense team says he was never officially hired nor appointed to the job.
Beck faces 55 counts that include securities fraud, theft, perjury and money laundering — though 14 counts could be eliminated.
On Monday, Woods testified he had fired Jones for “insubordination,” and said “I don’t believe I was aware” of the issue of the 401K until after she was fired. Jones said Woods was well-aware of the 401K issue before she was fired, and before he left Christopher Technologies.
Beck defense attorney Ralph Kohnen asked Woods on Monday if he recalled a meeting that lasted a couple of hours where he and former Christopher Technologies CEO John Fussner and Jones were in the basement about the issue.
Woods testified Monday that he had a meeting with Jones in the basement, but didn’t recall the subject as they “had lots of meetings in the basement.” However, he said he was “conflicted about some of Julie’s behavior, specifically about her acting in a greater capacity than she was (hired to).”
But that meeting with Jones, Woods and Fussner, a former Beck co-defendant, was the first of two about the 401K issue – an issue that included a dozen missing contributions and the loan repayments – that took place in the basement, according to testimony on Thursday.
On Thursday, when questioned by Senior Assistant Attorney General Jesse Kramig, Jones said the second meeting after the email was with Fussner and Beck. She sent it because she thought someone at ADP was stealing money from Christopher Technologies.
The Fussner and Beck meeting, Jones said, could be heard by everyone in the building, and she was told “I had no business sending the email to everybody I sent it to” because they said “it was none of my business, and that I needed to keep my mouth shut and stay out of it.”
Beck attorney Caitlin Felvus asked Jones who was really in charge of this failed tech company.
“At the end of the day, Mr. Fussner did the yelling?” Felvus said. “Mr. Fussner was the one so mad at you, screaming at you in the basement, wasn’t he?”
Jones answered “yes” to both questions.
Day 10 of the Pete Beck trial begins at 9 a.m. Friday in Hamilton County Common Pleas Court.
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