Girard Baseball Association case presented to Trumbull grand jury

By John W. Goodwin Jr.

The suspect once served as the association’s president.

GIRARD — A city employee is charged in the theft of thousands of dollars from an organization meant to benefit young people in the community.

Police Chief Frank Bigowsky said the case against Randy O’Neil, a street department employee, was presented directly to a Trumbull County grand jury. O’Neil was subsequently indicted in connection with taking funds from the Girard Baseball Association.

Bigowsky said O’Neil was arraigned in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court on Thursday.

O’Neil once served as president of the baseball association.

Bigowsky said the police department became suspicious of O’Neil’s dealings several months ago but decided to pass the information on to the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation.

“Since one baseball association board member is a Girard police officer and the person accused is a city employee, I thought it prudent to contact BCI and let them do the investigation to eliminate any appearance of bias or conflict of interest,” the chief said.

Mayor James Melfi verified that O’Neil has been employed by the city for several years, but declined to give any official comment on the standing of O’Neil’s job in light of the arrest.

Jim Standohar, current baseball association president, said he and other baseball association members spent time reviewing the accounting records of the association after O’Neil’s tenure as president and found “questionable things” in some of the records.

According to Standohar, those investigating the records believe that O’Neil would write checks for services and purchases that had nothing to do with the baseball association. He is believed to have then pocketed the money from those checks, he said.

Standohar could not offer an exact dollar amount, but said the figure is in the thousands of dollars.

“What happened with Mr. O’Neil is very unfortunate and certainly set the baseball association back. We have great volunteers and sponsors that have helped us bounce back, but the funds are missed,” he said.

Standohar said it is important to understand the association is now under new leadership and moving in the right direction.

“The baseball association is very disappointed in the actions of the previous administration and wish to move on,” he said. “I am the new president and the way I look at it, I am in charge of making sure baseball is healthy and around for the youth of this community. [The kids] only have a few short years to play and we want to make them the best possible.”

jgoodwin@vindy.com