The problems with volunteer organizations mentioned above reminds mme of our local Friends of the Ann Arbor Library organization. A well-intentioned volunteer agreed to head the organization a couple of years ago. He quickly got over his head as had the enthusiasm but not the skills to run the organization. He was promptly replaced after causing significant financial loss not due to theft but due to incorrect decisions.

Prior the conclusion of Ms. Knight’s appearance an African-American man was brought before Judge Morris who plead guilty to the crime of attempted robbery. This man did not use a weapon – he simply told his victim “I won’t hurt you if you give me your purse” – and did not get the purse. Judge Morris told this man that under Michigan law he was now facing life in prison. This man’s only ally was a dedicated public defender as Judge Morris walked him through his allocution.

My son could not help but be shocked that Ms. Knight, whose appearance immediately, was not likely to face any immediate jail time despite her over $1.0 million theft because she committed a white collar crime. From the perspective of anyone who was listening in the Court that day, the dramatic difference vividly justifies the complaints that many have with our courts and the injustice which is done there.

I wonder what my son’s comments would have been if he had been in Court on August 24th? After spending 25 minutes of the Court’s time and agreeing to an immediate repayment of $75,000 as a condition of sentencing, Ms. Knight’s attorney told the Court that it couldn’t cash Ms. Knight’s check because “we need time for all the checks to clear.”

Rather than remand Ms. Knight to custody, Judge Morris gave Ms. Knight 10 days to come up with the money. I wonder what my son would have thought. I wonder what would have happened to the man who is facing life in prison for attempting to steal a purse with $30 in it would have said? The logic of not sentencing Ms. Knight to an immediate and lengthy jail term is certainly lost on all three of us.

I still think it’s much easier to steal from a volunteer-run, non-profit organization than a corporation, which can pay full-time professionals to oversee all the work. As I wrote in my piece last week, what makes such non-profits great — the volunteers – is what makes them particularly vulnerable to the con artists like Kimberly Knight: it’s not full time work for them, and a certain level of trust and decency is assumed.

I can obviously not speak to the question of why most people join boards, but knowing many AAAHA board members over the past two decades, you’d be hard pressed to find any with ulterior motives — e.g. prestige or social advantages, let alone power. They tend to be parents who simply want the whole thing to work for all the kids, not just their own.

And like you, despite all the evidence before us, I remain an optimist about human nature. As Martin Luther King Jr. famously wrote, the arc of history bends toward justice.

-John Bacon