O.C. sheriff pays $15,000 fine in campaign case

The state Fair Political Practices Commission voted Thursday to let Orange County Sheriff Michael S. Carona pay a $15,000 fine to settle allegations that he violated election laws eight times by billing his campaign committee for thousands of dollars in non-itemized expenses that he vaguely listed as “loans.”

With Commissioner Robert Leidigh abstaining, the board approved the settlement by a 4-0 vote, according to commission spokesman Roman Porter. The sheriff’s campaign submitted a check for the total amount, along with a signed copy of the stipulation, Porter said.

The allegations arose after The Times reported last year that Carona had billed his elections committee for an estimated $130,000 in loans from 2001 to 2003 that were actually expenses.

As part of the agreement, Carona and Lesley Stoll, who worked as his campaign treasurer, have stipulated that the campaign failed to properly report officeholder expenses as nonmonetary contributions in cases where Carona used his personal funds.

The stipulation also states that the campaign failed to correctly report the total amount of expenditures and to correctly report cash balances.

In effect, the misrepresentations “significantly overstated” the campaign committee’s available cash, the commission said.

It described the misreported dollar amounts as “not insignificant” but said there was no evidence to show that the misrepresentations were intentional.

Instead, the commission attributed the violations in large part to Carona’s “inexperience” with the Political Reform Act, which requires full disclosure of campaign finances.

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christine.hanley@latimes.com