By Michael Howell
Ravalli County has asked District Court Judge Jeffrey Langton to issue a default judgment against former County Treasurer Valerie Stamey for $151,478.22. Stamey was accused in a civil lawsuit filed in June 2014 of 58 counts of failure to perform her duties as Treasurer. She was fined $29,000, that is $500 per offense. The remaining $122,478.22 is an accumulation of costs related to getting the office up and running again after Stamey’s departure, which included, among other things, the cost of hiring an accounting firm to establish order in the books and hiring a retired treasurer from Beaverhead County to come in and get the office up and running.
The county tried six times over two years to serve a summons on Stamey in the case. She was finally found living in South Carolina and served in May of 2016. In response, Stamey sent a letter to the County Attorney stating that she would not respond to the court summons because she found it to be “constitutionally invalid.” She also claimed to have been “framed” and that she was a victim of an “existing standard of operation” and was “sabotaged” by her staff. She also claimed that no district court in Montana had jurisdiction over her since she now lives in South Carolina. Since the letter was not sent to the court it is not considered a legal response. As a result, the county attorney has asked the District Court to issue a default judgment against her.
The case is set to be heard in Langton’s court on Wednesday, October 5.