Man accused of swindling charity funds

AUSTIN (KXAN) - A former employee of the Austin-based chapter of the American Cancer Society is accused of swindling an estimated $590,000 from the charity. An FBI affidavit claims Austinite John Phillip Martin, 50, used the organization's Sprint account to buy and sell cell phones over ebay and Craigslist over a three-year period from February 2005 through September 2008.

Martin faces a federal fraud charge for of using cancer society's account to sell the phones for personal gain, according to the affidavit. Martin was arrested last week and is free on bail, awaiting trial. He faces 20 years in prison on the mail fraud charge.

"It's hard to imagine something like that could be happening," said Austin American Cancer Society Spokeswoman Jackie Bayly-Bryant. "We have reinvestigated, or looked into, the ways that we can tighten the controls even further."

As a result of the incident, Bayly-Bryant said the charity no longer allows employees to order equipment and process bills directly. The affidavit said Martin's scheme began by ordering cell phones in 2005 not needed for employees through his cancer society e-mail address.

He got around the charity's accounting by altering copies of legitimate Sprint invoices by copying and pasting fake amounts of money for the phones-which included BlackBerrys, Palm Treos and Samsung Instincts, according to the affidavit.

Martin learned of the investigation into his behavior in October when he contacted the American Cancer Society for his $46,338 severance check. The affidavit said the American Cancer Society in Austin eliminated his position, along with three others in September. Martin worked for the Austin's chapter of the Cancer Society for 17 years.

The American Cancer Society's internal auditors began investigating Martin in October, after the charity received an invoice for approximately $119,000. The affidavit said Martin admitted to ordering and selling the cell phones for personal expenses. Calls to Martin's attorney, Bill Ibbotson, were not immediately returned Wednesday.