The Greene County Commission has sued Sheriff Jonathan “Joe” Benison in a dispute over nearly $5 million in bingo funds that state auditors determined should be repaid.
The lawsuit seeks $4,966,427.69 from Benison after a 2025 examination by the Alabama Department of Examiners of Public Accounts found millions of dollars in inadequately documented disbursements from accounts overseen by the sheriff.
Greene County’s local constitutional amendment allows certain nonprofit organizations to operate bingo and gives the sheriff authority over licensing and regulation. The sheriff’s office maintains a Bingo Fund for money collected through those operations.
State examiners reviewed the sheriff’s finances from October 2018 through April 2024 and initially identified more than $5.3 million in charges. After Benison provided additional information, auditors reduced the amount by roughly $370,000, leaving just under $5 million due and unpaid.
Among the questioned expenditures were more than $3.15 million paid directly to employees on top of salaries paid by the county commission.
Auditors also identified roughly $2.16 million in Bingo Fund spending that lacked adequate supporting documentation. That included more than $1.17 million paid to consultants and attorneys, along with payments to merchants, restaurants, hotels, automotive repair shops, gas stations, grocery stores and individuals.
The state examination also found repeated accounting problems, including failures to reconcile bank accounts monthly and maintain adequate records supporting expenditures.
After the audit, the remaining $4.97 million was certified to the Alabama Attorney General’s Office and the district attorney for the 17th Judicial Circuit for collection. The County Commission’s lawsuit says no collection action had been filed before commissioners moved forward with their own case.
The commission is asking the court to order repayment, require a full accounting of bingo revenues and restrict additional spending from the fund that is not expressly authorized.
“Every month that the Certified Charges go uncollected is a month in which nearly five million dollars that should be serving the citizens of Greene County is instead unaccounted for,” the complaint states, according to WBRC.
Benison has previously denied wrongdoing.
Responding to the state audit last year, he described it as part of a “vendetta” by officials in Montgomery and argued that questioned expenditures included money used for scholarships for Greene County students and payments to sheriff’s deputies.
“I didn’t back down when they sued me, and I won’t back down now,” Benison said at the time.
The current lawsuit asks a Greene County Circuit Court judge to resolve who is responsible for the nearly $5 million auditors say remains unpaid and to determine how the county’s bingo revenues should be handled going forward.
Sawyer Knowles is a state and political reporter for Yellowhammer News. You may contact him at [email protected].
