Preventing Fraud and Mismanagement in Government: Systems and Structures

YOUR 800–POUND GORILLA TO STOP PUBLIC CORRUPTION

Preventing Fraud and Mismanagement in Government provides an unbiased look at the most common types of public fraud and corruption, digs into the human behaviors driving them, and offers a detailed standard of best practices to keep organizations on track.

This focused guide tackles the fraud, waste, and the abuses of power that threaten to devalue the functions of our public service agencies. By disseminating tools and methods that promote greater transparency in operational practices and also by providing the reader with objective standards that they can use to easily spot irregular patterns and wrongdoing, this text can serve as a reference for the dedicated fraud fighter. No other single resource enables you to:

Fully understand the nuts–and–bolts of the financial workings of government entities Compare and contrast how your agency performs in relation to an established set of financial practices Review a wide variety of in–depth case studies where malfeasance happened even at the highest levels of government

If you′re charged with cleaning up a public agency, Preventing Fraud and Mismanagement in Government is all you need to consistently detect and stop unacceptable behaviors and inspire a self–governing spirit throughout a team of people.

Foreword vii

Acknowledgments ix

About the Authors xiii

Preface xv

Introduction xix

Chapter 1: Government and How It Works 1

Chapter 2: Public Finance and How Government Creates Cash Flow 61

Chapter 3: Accounting for Government 117

Chapter 4: Who Works in Government and What Is Their Motivation? 191

Chapter 5: Fraud in Public Agencies: Horse Trading or Stealing? 247

Chapter 6: Corrupt Policies and Actions 325

Chapter 7: Policing of Public Corruption and Fraud 371

Chapter 8: Final Thoughts 401

Appendix: Tables 457

Index 497

JOSEPH R. PETRUCELLI is a founding partner of PP&D Accounting Services Inc. and Fraud Forces Inc., where he provides forensic accounting, tax, and consulting services. A recognized expert in forensic accounting, he is the author of Detecting Fraud in Organizations.

JONATHAN R. PETERS is a professor of finance in the business school at the College of Staten Island of The City University of New York.