Wednesday, KWTN asked Assistant State Attorney Jon Ellsworth if his office was investigating the double-dipping charges. No comment.
But KWTN has learned that the National Court Reporters Association's (NCRA) Committee on Professional Ethics has recommended that Roeser be reprimanded for (1) "failing to maintain the integrity of the reporting profession" and (2) failing to "guard against the appearance of impropriety."
In her response to an ethics complaint last October, Roeser admitted that she made a number of incorrect entries on her time sheets which may have resulted in her being paid twice for the time in question.
But she argued that these inaccuracies were "inadvertent" and that she did not intend to double-dip.
The NCRA's Ethics Committee agreed that Roeser's incorrect time sheets could have, indeed, been inadvertent. But the violations of the NCRA's Code of Professional Conduct "occurred in Ms. Roeser's handling of her accounting of her (freelance jobs). On two occasions, Ms. Roeser incorrectly completed her time sheets to give the appearance that she had earned pay from both the Court and the freelance firm for which she had performed some outside reporting duties."
Here are excerpts from the Committee On Professional Ethics' recommendation to the NCRA Board of Directors, dated Jan. 12, 2000:
"The time records are clear and, in fact, Ms. Roeser admits that she incorrectly completed the time sheets. In her response, Ms. Roeser states that these errors were not made intentionally nor do they show a pattern of conduct. The Committee does not dispute this.
"Provision No. 3 of the NCRA Code of Professional Conduct requires members to `guard against not only the fact but the appearance of impropriety.' The Committee determined that the most significant fact in this matter is that Ms. Roeser was the Court Reporting Manager; she was responsible for the enforcement of the rules and participated in the drafting of them.
"For someone in her position to have violated these rules, even if such violation was inadvertent, does not guard against the appearance of impropriety.
"Provision No. 9 of the Code states that a member shall `maintain the integrity of the reporting profession.' By completing her time sheet so that it gives the appearance that she intended to receive double pay from both the court and the freelance firm, Ms. Roeser failed to maintain the integrity of the reporting profession."