The Oregon Department of Transportation 

Three longtime Oregon Department of Transportation employees who worked out of the agency’s regional maintenance station in Clackamas pleaded guilty this month to theft of government property.

On Oct. 4 in Clackamas County Circuit Court, the wife of one of the ODOT employees was included among four defendants who admitted to their roles in a multimillion-dollar equipment reselling scheme.

ODOT employees Frank C. Smead, John Wayne Tipton and Autumn Arndt — along with Smead’s wife, Marta Smead, who was not employed by ODOT — were each guilty of purchasing equipment using an ODOT procurement card, creating fraudulent invoices and reselling more than $6 million worth of items for their personal profit.

Over the course of many years, equipment worth several million dollars was fraudulently purchased and resold, according to an investigation by the Oregon State Police. The scheme was discovered during an unrelated ODOT investigation.

Sentencing is scheduled to take place Jan. 6 in Clackamas County Circuit Court.

When the charges were announced in early 2020, ODOT Director Kris Strickler said the agency would improve monitoring measures to prevent future thefts. These measures included:

• Repurposing staff in ODOT’s Central Authorization Unit to provide more close oversight and auditing of purchases.

• Engaging an outside entity to help the department discover vulnerabilities in financial controls and find ways to close those loopholes.

• Explore ways to improve the agency’s inventory control system.