Marion Town Clerk Ray Pickles has been indicted by a statewide grand jury for allegations that he stole over $610,000 during his last six years serving as the executive director for the Carver, Marion, Wareham Regional Refuse Disposal District.

            Pickles was fired from his 45-year position as executive director in January 2018 when the District’s board comprised of members from the three towns noticed significant financial inconsistencies.

            Pickles also served 29 years as the town administrator of the Town of Marion from 1972-2001.

            In a press release on March 18, Attorney General Maura Healey and Inspector General Glenn Cunha announced that Pickles, 85, was indicted on larceny charges after months of investigation in partnership with the Marion Police Department and with the cooperation with the District’s three towns. 

            Pickles faces criminal charges of six counts of Larceny over $250.

            Authorities allege that Pickles maintained two District bank accounts to which only he had access and from which he wrote checks out to himself, and also established accounts under the District in two other banks – accounts that only Pickles knew existed. Pickles is accused of depositing checks intended for the District into these accounts and allegedly used the money to make payments on his personal credit cards and also withdrew cash for personal use.

            “Authorities further allege that Pickles billed the District for services he did not perform and used District funds to pay for personal expenses,” it states in the press release.

            A second defendant has also been criminally charged in connection with the allegations against Pickles, former CMWRRDD board chairman and former Carver health agent Robert Tinkham, Jr.

            Tinkham, 57, is accused of accepting a total of $65,000 in payments while chairman of the District’s board for inspectional services he did not perform, paid to him by Pickles who was the only person who had access to those District accounts.

            Tinkham faces criminal charges of one count of Larceny over $250 and one count of Presentation of False Claims.

            Pickles and Tinkham will be arraigned at a later date in Plymouth Superior Court, and prosecuting the case are Special Assistant Attorneys General John Brooks and Ashlee Logan of the Inspector General’s Investigations Division with assistance from Chief Trial Counsel James O’Brien of the AG’s Criminal Bureau.

            Lead Investigator Logan Davis and Analyst/Investigator Will Bradford from the Inspector General’s Office investigated the case.

            Marion Town Administrator Paul Dawson issued a public statement, saying, “The accusations constitute a staggering abuse of the public trust, and we are grateful to the Marion Police Department, the Inspector General’s Office, and Attorney General Maura Healey’s office for their diligence in bringing out the details of these alleged thefts.”

            Pickles, Tinkham, and Pickles’ wife, Diane Bondi-Pickles, 66, are all defendants in a Plymouth County Superior Court civil lawsuit filed by the District on June 22, 2018, which alleges that the three are responsible for roughly $838,000 in stolen District funds. The three face a number of civil counts that include Fraud, Conversion and Civil Theft, and Civil Conspiracy.

            Pickles denied any wrongdoing in his July 23, 2018 signed affidavit and blamed his old age and lack of support for the various discrepancies in the financial records he kept, saying, “In recent years, due to my age and limited professional support, my record keeping has not been what it was during my time as Town Manager in Marion and during my early years with the CMWRRDD. He denied any wrongdoing, saying, “I believe that all of my actions were taken in the best interests of the CMWRRDD.”

            According to Dawson, there is no legal mechanism to remove Pickles from his position as town clerk before 2020 when the three-year position returns to the election ballot.

            Pickles also served several terms as an elected member of the Marion Board of Assessors until he was defeated in 2018. He was also the building commissioner and zoning enforcement officer for Marion before he retired in 2001, and served as the town administrator of the Town of Gosnold until he announced his retirement on May 11, 2018, according to the Gosnold Board of Selectmen’s meeting minutes.

By Jean Perry

The Marion Board of Health is still complaining about pipes, but this time it isn’t about Elizabeth Taber’s smoking pipe– it’s about Elizabeth Dunn’s water pipe.

            Dunn, a Board of Health member, wasn’t at the March 12 meeting, so she sent it a letter via Health Agent Karen Walega to ask the board to investigate a recent incident involving excessively dirty water flowing from the faucets of her village home.

            In response, Walega asked interim Department of Public Works Superintendent Jon Henry to attend the meeting to assure the board that there is no threat to public health.

            Dunn said in her letter that she ran the water that morning, and described it as “absolutely black,” adding that several other neighbors had the same complaint.

            Henry knew exactly what the problem was – testing of the sprinkler system being installed at the new Tabor Academy dormitories being constructed on Spring Street.

            According to Henry, a third party conducts the tests, not the Town of Marion. But, he added, “Our people were on the job and supervising it the way they should.” Having said that, though, what they are dealing with are materials of cast iron and ferrous metals with sediment that collects over time within the pipes. “And when you open a hydrant, you get a sudden rush of water in a much faster weight under normal use,” Henry said. “The disturbance of the pipe disturbs the sediment.”

            The result is water that, although not harmful, is particularly “unpalatable.”

            “It’s a crapshoot as to where the sediment is going to go,” said Henry, “so it’s virtually impossible to notify people downstream that there may be sediment in the water.”

            When the Town flushes the fire hydrants twice each year, it does notify the public because when the hydrants are disturbed, it affects all the water in the vicinity.

            “But with short duration testing, we don’t notify,” said Henry. “We really can’t notify anybody with any degree of accuracy.”

            Henry said the sediment collection in the pipes is mainly from the iron and manganese in the water, and over the last 20 years the Town has been balancing those elements out with other chemicals to affect the pH of the water.

            Henry showed the board an example of what the inside of a typical water pipe looks like when thickly lined and coated with years of sediment. Although the elements themselves do not pose a health risk, once in a while e-coli bacteria can get trapped in the sediment and subsequently dislodged into the drinking water under similar circumstances. This time, luckily, that did not happen, he stated.

            “And we test every day, seven days a week,” said Henry. “The threat in this case is what I describe as a low-level [threat]. The water doesn’t look palatable, but I would recommend people avoid drinking it until the pipe clears out again.”

            And definitely don’t wash your clothes with it, he added.

            The next meeting of the Marion Board of Health is scheduled for March 26 at 4:30 pm at the Marion Town House.

Marion Board of Health

By Jean Perry