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Charges filed against former Milwaukee County employee (UPDATE)

By: Beth Kevit, [email protected]//June 26, 2013//

Charges filed against former Milwaukee County employee (UPDATE)

By: Beth Kevit, [email protected]//June 26, 2013//

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Freida Webb, the former director of Milwaukee County’s Office of Community Business Development Partners, faces a maximum of $55,000 in fines and 23 years in prison for her alleged role in a scheme to steal federal grant money.

The Office of Community Business Development oversees the county’s disadvantaged business enterprise program.

Webb has been charged with forgery, misconduct in public office, theft by fraud and having a private interest in a public contract, according to a criminal complaint.

All four charges are felonies.

Webb was arrested July 19 and released July 20 pending a court appearance.

Webb’s alleged accomplice, Milwaukee contractor Homer Key, also faces four felony charges.

Webb and Key could not be immediately reached for comment. They are expected to appear in Milwaukee County Circuit Court on Thursday afternoon.

Key was charged with forgery, conspiracy to commit the crime of having a private interest in a public contract and two counts of theft by fraud, according to a criminal complaint.

Those charges carry a maximum of $70,000 in fines and 29-½ years in prison.

From 2005 to 2010, Webb hired Key to oversee the county’s Capacity Building Program, designed as a seminar for disadvantaged businesses on topics such as accounting and marketing. The county used CDBG money, provided by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, to run that program.

The Milwaukee County district attorney’s criminal complaint against Webb alleges she colluded with Key to fabricate a Milwaukee County contract for federal Community Development Block Grant money in 2011.

Webb did not hire Key to oversee the program that year but allegedly fabricated a contract to that effect when she encountered problems paying instructors.

Webb “knowingly approved more than $10,000 in fraudulent billing that Mr. Key submitted under that contract,” according to the complaint.

Key then “kicked back” $2,700 to Webb, according to the complaint.

The complaints against Key result from a broader conspiracy whereby the contractor allegedly “stole at least $40,000 of grant funds through fraudulent billing” from 2005 through 2011.

According to the complaint against Webb, she knowingly approved incorrect invoices.

Key “padded his billing” with “excessive” class preparation time and administrative costs and, the complaint alleges, billed for classroom instruction and follow-ups that never occurred. During the same period, according to the complaint, the Milwaukee Urban League paid Key $45,917.36 to run the same program. The complaint stipulates the district attorney’s office does not believe the MUL was involved in the conspiracy.

From 2005 through 2010, according to the complaint, Webb billed for “every penny of available CDBG funding.” She came $620 shy of the limit in 2011, according to the complaint, after asking Key to submit an invoice for $4,500 in one-on-one training that never happened.

The deception also entailed billing $4,400 for a graduation ceremony that could have cost, at most, $200, according to the complaint, and disguising the cost for the evening’s dinner as a business marketing class.

The alleged conspiracy also included paying Key $3,285 to design and revise a brochure for the Capacity Building Program in 2006, 2008, 2009 and 2010, the equivalent of 42 hours of work. According to the complaint, that brochure was updated with “several mouse clicks” in 2008 and remained “virtually identical” in 2009 and 2010.

Webb was dismissed from her position after her arrest in 2012 and replaced by Nelson Soler.

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