Kankakee, KRMA attorneys negotiating settlement with former executive director Simms

KANKAKEE — A federal civil lawsuit filed against the former executive director of the Kankakee River Metropolitan Agency Richard Simms and his daughter Anna, could be nearing a conclusion.

KRMA and the City of Kankakee sued Simms, his daughter and the two corporations they run to recoup funds the Simmses fraudulently used to develop computer hardware they claimed as their own.

KRMA is the region’s wastewater treatment plant.

The agency is responsible for treating wastewater from its member municipalities: Kankakee, Bradley, Bourbonnais and Aroma Park. It also treats wastewater from Manteno and Chebanse by intergovernmental agreement.

Now 77, Simms also was director of Kankakee’s Environmental Services Utilities department.

Federal authorities convicted Simms in 2022.

A judge sentenced Simms to nine months in federal prison and two years house arrest for stealing $2 million from the public coffers.

A check of U.S. Bureau of Prison records show Simms was released from BOP custody in September 2022.

Simms, who records show lives in Marietta, Ohio, was also ordered to repay the approximate $1,257,000 improperly paid from ESU and $768,000 from Kankakee River Metropolitan Agency, the region’s wastewater treatment plant, from the timeframe of October 2014 to April 2018.

CIVIL LAWSUIT

The civil lawsuit was filed Nov. 24, 2020.

According to the lawsuit, KRMA seeks $769,000 that the Simmses and their companies unjustly obtained from KRMA; punitive damages, and such other and further relief as appropriate.

City of Kankakee seeks $1,257,000 that the Simmses and their companies unjustly obtained from the city punitive damages, and such other and further relief as appropriate.

According to the U.S. District Court of Illinois records, the parties involved filed a document informing the court they were in settlement talks.

During an Aug. 28, court date, U.S. District Judge Eric I. Long, the case docket Long was administratively closing the case.

What that does is moves the case to a court’s inactive docket, while the court retains jurisdiction for purposes of future activities on the case, the docket entry said.

The case will be reopened when the stay is lifted. The parties are directed to provide a status report within 90 days on the status of their settlement discussions, the docket entry said.

A document filed Nov. 22 said, “Over the last 90 days, the parties have been collecting information and discussing approaches to and structures for a settlement that could result in the dismissal of this case.

“The parties have had a number of meetings and have exchanged proposals but are still working to reach a consensus approach.”

Both sides asked Long that a status report be held Jan. 7, 2025.

THE FRAUD

The federal lawsuit argues this action arises from the fraud perpetrated by Richard Simms and his daughter

Anna Simms who associated together to cheat KRMA and the City of Kankakee and enrich themselves at the expense of taxpayers. Together with their corporations, Richard and Anna unlawfully used public money for their own benefit, and to develop and sell software and create trademarks and marketing materials to help them market their ill-gotten software, all for their own private profit.

According to the court documents, Simms and his computer software development firm, Plum Flower International LTD, submitted payment invoices totaling $2,025,000.

Plum Flower was the company run by Simms’ daughter, Anna.

Simms, however, never had approval from KRMA nor the ESU board of directors to spend this money for software development as the organizations never entered into contracts with him for this purpose.

During the five-year time frame in question, Simms received more than $2.5 million in salary and legitimate payments: approximately $1.1 million from KRMA and $1.6 from ESU.

Simms registered Plum Flower in March 2014 with the State of Illinois purportedly to develop a software application for medical companies to track medical records.

A federal investigation reported that although Simms did not have board approval or contracts with his engineering firm to develop software, he submitted fraudulent and inflated invoices to KRMA and ESU for software development.

Simms is accused of circumventing KRMA’s invoice payment procedure by submitting invoices directly to its accounting firm. As a result of this practice, KRMA’s superintendent and administrative assistant did not approve or were unaware of the invoices.

Plum Flower used approximately $161,000 of the funds, federal documents showed, to pay another company to create a software application — called Eco App Pro — which they intended to sell on the open market. Most of the remaining funds were used for the personal benefit of Simms, according to court documents.

Using the funds secured from KRMA by Richard Simms, Simms Engineering, Anna Simms and Plum Flower then went about paying other persons and entities to create lucrative software that Plum Flower and Simms Engineering now claim to own and have attempted to sell on the open market for private profit, the civil lawsuit said.

Based on information and belief, the persons paid include individuals in foreign countries, including a software developer in St. Petersburg, Russia, named Oleg Shamin who worked for Plum Flower from approximately November 2017 to July 2018, the civil lawsuit said.

https://daily-journal.com/news/crime/kankakee-krma-attorneys-negotiating-settlement-with-former-executive-director-simms/article_acca1aa6-affe-11ef-a498-5b34b1aacc39.html