Samson's audit report released

A report of the investigation into former Montana State University-Northern head football coach Mark Samson’s violation of university policies has been released.

An auditor’s investigation the matter revealed that Samson “misappropriated $2,925 from MSUN by taking the revenue collected for the football camp and depositing it into a bank account not authorized by MSUN.”

The auditor considered $1,203 of the total to be for the personal use of Samson. That number is made of $1,000 for a cashier’s check, $53 for gravel delivery and the $150 cash withdrawal for the coach.

The money that called for the investigation was in connection to the annual Northern Football Camp for grades K-12 June 9 to 11. Registration for the camp was $65.

The report says that normally, the offensive coordinator runs the camp, but Samson ran it this year.

Checks, which were asked to be made payable to “Northern Football Camp,” written for the camp were to be deposited into a MSU-Northern account.

The revenue collected from the camp, the report says, is usually put into a locked bank bag, taken to the athletics assistant at the athletic department, forwarded to business services, who would then make the deposit into a Northern bank account.

The investigation was initiated when the irregularity in football camp revenue was noticed.

When Samson was interviewed by the auditors, auditors said he told him that he had the usual procedure with depositing the money, meaning he gave the revenue to the athletics assistant.

When the auditor showed the coach a photograph of a check deposited into his “Northern Football Camp” account, “he said that it was a personal account, but the bank had added the Northern Football Camp language to the account.

“He added that the account had only been open a couple of months and that there were not many checks written from it. He said that he had not used the account for his personal benefit, and he agreed to provide bank statements associated with the account,” the report says.

The audit was completed Aug. 8, and Samson was urged to resign Thursday.