Facing what sources say could be federal criminal charges against him, embattled Chief Deputy Jerry Ursin has resigned from the Orleans Parish Sheriff's Office, Sheriff Marlin Gusman's office announced Monday.
"Effective today, Orleans Parish Sheriff Marlin Gusman has accepted the resignation of Chief Deputy Jerry Ursin," said the one sentence statement from Gusman's office Monday afternoon.
The news came as the state legislative auditor released a scathing report on Gusman's office. Among other findings, state auditors criticized a private security business operated by Col. Lucien Roy Austin, who was charged March 25 in a federal bill of information. State law, according to the auditor, prohibits deputy sheriffs from owning a security company.
Last week, WWL-TV and The New Orleans Advocate reported that multiple sources said Ursin is implicated in the detail-skimming case involving Austin.
“Although Col. Austin’s OPSO job duties included organizing off-duty details performed by OPSO personnel, it appears that Col. Austin organized off-duty details during his regular work hours for his personal business, a Slidell-based Louisiana for-profit corporation named Austin Sales and Service, Inc.,” said the audit released Monday.
Austin’s business was paid more than $2 million, according to the audit. Also, the audit claimed recorded indicated that Austin billed customers for services that were never rendered.
“By owning a corporation for which he provided services of a law enforcement nature during his regular OPSO work hours, Col. Austin may have violated OPSO policies and state law. Further, by charging customers for services not performed and by negotiating company checks payable to others, Col. Austin may have violated state and federal laws,” said the audit.
The bill of information against Austin names a co-conspirator – “Employee A” – as participating in the detail scheme by allegedly accepting checks for off-duty detail work that never took place. Austin is accused of listing ghost employees for details such as the 2013 Super Bowl, the Voodoo Music Experience and a variety of Mardi Gras events.
Other unnamed people also are implicated as accepting fraudulently collected money through checks from Austin and his detail business, Austin Sales and Service. Austin is accused of inflating invoices by about $83,000 in a scheme that operated from 2009 until January 2014.
Austin was charged in a bill of information, usually a clear sign that a defendant is cooperating with authorities and plans to plead guilty.
When Austin was charged, Gusman distanced himself from the case, stating that Roy Austin left the office last year and the detail-skimming allegations were independent of the sheriff’s operations. Gusman also stated that his office has “cooperated with each step of the investigation involving Roy Austin.”
As Gusman’s second-in-command, his name surfaced prominently in the recent departure of Chief of Corrections for the sheriff’s office, a position mandated by the jail’s ongoing federal consent decree.
When Carmen DeSadier left in Feburary, her letter of resignation blasted Chief Deputy Ursin for interfering “with the forward progress I seek to gain.”
“His abrasive tactics, questionable practices, and bullying of personnel who attempt to work with me has created an atmosphere of fear and disdain,” DeSadier wrote. “He participates in the belittling of staff to make himself appear superior and to feed his obsession to exercise authority over others.”
Ursin retired from the New Orleans Police Department in 2003 as an assistant superintendent. He was hired by Gusman in 2008.
The statement from the OPSO issued in response to the legislative audit did not mention Ursin but sought to distance the office from Austin.
"Those activities were independent of OPSO business and related to a private business that Austin allegedly created. Austin retired from the OPSO last year and is longer affiliated in any capacity. The Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office continues to cooperate fully with each step of the investigation involving Roy Austin," said the statement.