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Kooiker’s Empty Charges Wreck Workers’ Finances

Last updated on 2015.04.01

Mount Blogmore's Kevin Woster notes that Sam Kooiker ascended to the Rapid City mayoralty in part with "cries of 'landfill fraud' and charges of criminal behavior." Rapid City Journal coverage notes that the seemingly political investigations into "landfill fraud" have resulted in little more than wiping out the life savings of the accused and acquitted:

As George and Shirley Fish prepared to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary in December 2009, they received notice that the city of Rapid City was suing them and Meidinger.

George and Cliff Fish, Meidinger and four of the company's truck drivers eventually faced criminal charges for grand theft and conspiracy.

Meidinger was acquitted last spring but not before exhausting all of his $57,000 in his 401k account to pay his legal fees and early withdrawal penalties.

Charges were dismissed against the truck drivers a few weeks later.

Then in August, the criminal charges against the Fishes were dismissed on the third day of their trial.

Like Meidinger, the Fishes say they have exhausted their financial resources.

The disappearance of the criminal charges came too late to save the company that represented the Fish's livelihood, their retirement and they say their good name.

Cliff Fish was forced to broker a quick sale of the business when he learned in late December 2009 that the city would not renew the company's commercial hauler's license.

In what Cliff Fish describes as "a fire sale," the business sold for pennies on the dollar and that money has been spent. It will be another eight years before Texas-based Red River Waste Solutions makes a payment, they said [Andrea J. Cook, "Legal Battles Destroy Fish Family's Lifetime of Work," Rapid City Journal, 2012.01.09].

...and...

As scale attendant at the landfill, [Randy] Meidinger worked four 10-hour days, Monday through Thursday, standing at the window punching computer keys and working with customers. He was making $17.81 an hour when he was fired on the recommendation of a Rapid City police detective.

He arrived at work on a Monday morning to discover his key wouldn't let him into the building.

With a police investigation hanging over his head, he couldn't draw unemployment.

"I had put a little money aside, which was a good thing," Meidinger said. He shares a house with a friend. The two men spend their spare time restoring cars or riding motorcycles.

Meidinger works for Black Hills Landscapes. His new employer was very understanding while he waded through the criminal case. And now he's looking forward to again starting a 401k investment account.

To pay for his defense, Meidinger was forced to liquidate the $57,159 he had in a 401k account he had accrued while working for the city. Each time he withdrew money from the account, he paid 20 percent in penalties [Andrea J. Cook, "Criminal Defense Cost Randy Meidinger His Life Savings," Rapid City Journal, 2012,01.09].

Meidinger was acquitted last May. He must have a little money left, as he is suing the city for putting him through the wringer. Rapid City has spent tens of thousands of dollars and produced no convictions.

Bob Newland would prefer to focus outrage on Pennington County states attorney Glenn Brenner for following through with the indictments. But now-Mayor Kooiker got the ball rolling; Kooiker should answer for the destruction caused.

18 Comments

  1. Bill Fleming 2012.01.10

    I expect to see Newland, Sanborn and the new crop of Kooiker inspired councilpeople try to distance themselves from this debacle as quickly as possible, leaving Kooiker twisting slowly in the wind.

  2. mike 2012.01.10

    Disgraceful. I changed my opinion on Kooiker and teh people of RC should recall him.

  3. Donald Pay 2012.01.10

    Mismanagement of solid waste matters has had a long, long history in Rapid City, and across the state. A big part of the problem is the failure of the state and solid waste management districts to follow through with open planning requirements, which are now proposed to be totally eliminated in HB 1013 (Section 29 onward). I suppose there philosophy is--if you don't follow the law, you might as well repeal it.

    http://legis.state.sd.us/sessions/2012/Bill.aspx?File=HB1013P.htm

    Doing things in an ad hoc manner without much public scrutiny leads to the sort of political games Kooiker played. There's a lesson in this: governments need to be open and honest. Using an open planning process is one place to start. Those sections of HB 1013 gutting solid waste planning are a vast step backwards, and will usher in more games playing that costs money.

  4. larry kurtz 2012.01.10

    Lost in the discussion of this tragedy is that the Rapid City Landfill has done a remarkable job reducing the volume that is buried there by integrating its recycling services.

    Dedicated containers and trucks could streamline the operation even more. Plastics and pine waste could make diesel fuel.

  5. Bill Fleming 2012.01.10

    How many of you know that under the RC landfill lies a huge fossil record of numerous dinosaur tracks, etc? A paleontologist friend of mine told me about it maybe 10-15 years ago.

  6. Bob Newland 2012.01.10

    I am for liberty and I am for justice. Sam Kooiker cried wolf, and now it appears there were no wolves. I may have cheered for the wrong man, although I never applauded his efforts in this matter. It does not matter that Sam told some folks he had probable cause to believe a crime had occurred. People trained to investigate crime investigated Sam's allegations and then said crime had occurred. The fact that there was apparently no evidence of a crime is no longer on Sam's shoulders. I may come to the view that Sam is less than I thought and hoped he was, but there are checks and balances in the system in the form of detectives and prosecutors. They compiled a case, made accusations, got indictments and got embarrassed at trial. What the f[...]?

  7. caheidelberger Post author | 2012.01.11

    "no longer on Sam's shoulders"? I have a hard time accepting the idea that checks and balances absolve the false accuser, especially when the accuser pressed those falsehoods so hard for political gain. The existence of a judiciary to review and annul bad laws does not give legislators license to make bad laws just to score campaign points. Similarly, there remains some account to which Kooiker should be held.

  8. Bob Newland 2012.01.11

    Okay, I will try one more time. If Sam Kooiker did something wrong, he should be held accountable. If he made charges he knew or should have known were false, he should be flayed.

    Carrying that further, if he made false charges, those charges were investigated and prosecuted by others who must have been in collusion with him to ruin the people they ruined. The conspirators should also be flayed.

    If he made an honest mistake, he should crawl on his belly and apologize to the people he ruined, and he should make an effort to help them become whole again.

  9. Bill Fleming 2012.01.11

    ...and that's the whole point in a nutshell, Bob.

    Kooiker and his cronies pumped up the whole landfill issue, even to the point of accusing Hanks and others of a felony (obstruction of justice) to create a distraction from, and to exact revenge upon Hanks and members of the City Council for censuring him over the Rapid Ride debacle, which was exactly the same type of pumped-up overdramatized fiasco.

    It was clear from the start that Kooiker knew the real numbers on the Rapid Ride deal and continued to use false information even so. Then, later, he went on a crusade, with the help of guys like you, Frankenfeld, Kreible, Sandborn, Mason, et al to systematically remove people from the council who voted to censure Sam.

    People will recall that he censure and the landfill were Sam's only campaign platform, and he suckered everyone into getting on his side with their sympathy (poor-old-picked-on-Sam) vote, smearing the reputations of a lot of good people in the process, and now, clearly ruining some people's lives because of it.

    The whole thing stinks. It always has.

    Sidenote: Not that that's any big deal, perhaps, but it's the reason I left the Decorum Forum. It just got to a point where I didn't want to have my name associated with anyone who was going to be part of beating the viscious Kookier revenge drum.

    So yeah, I lost some friends over it. And I think you should all apologise. Because, as you note, Sam didn't do this by himself. He has quite the goon squad helping him.

  10. Bob Newland 2012.01.11

    Write your buddy Brenner and ask him to apologize.

  11. Bill Fleming 2012.01.11

    Like I said, Bob, I've lost some friends over this. Brenner is one of them. Of course, he went out the window as far as I'm concerned when he railroaded my good friend Pete Fuller, so he's not been on my good guy list for quite some time. Glad to see the Sam spell has lifted from your head though. That's a good sign.

  12. Jana 2012.01.11

    Looking from afar, this wasn't about the Fish family or their operations. It was about a general hate and distrust of government and elected officials, the Fish family was just the sacrificial lamb.

    Funny thing is that Kooiker is now what he used to hate.

  13. Bill Fleming 2012.01.11

    Exactly, Jana. I could never figure out why in the dickens Sam would want the mayor job. My hunch is, right now, he probably can't either. It's not really his thing. I'm guessing he might not run again. If he does, he's gonna get creamed.

  14. Jana 2012.01.11

    Classic case of the dog that caught the car and didn't know what to do after he caught it....he just knew he was angry at the car.

  15. caheidelberger Post author | 2012.01.12

    My goodness! We might succeed in getting our elected officials to join the daily blogospheric crackerbarrel yet!

  16. larry kurtz 2012.01.19

    Landfills being converted to energy islands. @RepowerAmerica: Here’s a way to recycle, reduce, reuse: Tuscon, AZ is looking to use its old landfills as locations for new solar farms

  17. larry kurtz 2012.02.13

    @rcjMontgomery: It was interesting how many verbal hoops people jumped through in the "alienation of affections" hearing today to avoid saying "Brenner."

Comments are closed.