Indicted Butler County auditor will fight suspension from elected office, lawyer says

BUTLER COUNTY, Ohio (WXIX) – There are three new developments in the indictment of Butler County Auditor Roger Reynolds following a public corruption investigation.

Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost’s Office is expected to send a copy of Reynolds’ indictment to the Ohio Supreme Court “to initiate suspension proceedings against a public official who has been charged with a felony in a state or federal court when the felony relates to the performance of the official’s duties.”

Reynolds’ lawyer, however, tells FOX19 NOW “We will be contesting the suspension. Not only are the allegations false, but they do not involve the Auditor’s office or Mr. Reynolds’ work as the Auditor. We hope that the community will not rush to judgment in this matter, and will wait for the full story to come out at trial.”

Reynolds, 52, of Liberty Township is charged with three felonies including bribery and two misdemeanors for allegedly using his position for personal gain, the attorney general’s office said.

State law permits Ohio’s attorney general to ask the state’s top court to suspend local officials accused of felonies related to their official duties.

The Ohio Supreme Court appoints three retired judges to review the facts and they can suspend officials while the criminal case proceeds through the court system.

Suspended public officials can still receive their taxpayer-funded salaries and benefits.

Reynolds was paid $106,498 last year and is expected to earn $108,362 this year, according to the Butler County Treasurer’s Office.

The Butler County Sheriff’s Office began investigating in late August after FOX19 NOW reported Reynolds was seeking – at times using his county elected office email account – more than $1 million in public money for road improvements on Hamilton Mason Road as he facilitated the sale of his parents’ property into a $20 million senior residential complex.

The Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation and the Ohio Attorney General’s Office joined the case, and the Ohio Ethics Commission also got involved.

If convicted, Reynolds faces a maximum sentence of 7 years in prison and thousands in fines.

Reynolds, a Republican who has been the county’s auditor since 2008, was summoned to appear in Butler County Common Pleas Court next week, on Feb. 17 at 1 p.m., court records show.

His criminal attorney, Chad Ziepfel, has said “Mr. Reynolds has never solicited, accepted, or paid any bribes, and he has never used his position, authority, or influence to improperly benefit himself or anyone else.

“Mr. Reynolds has served the Butler County community with honor for the past 19 years, without even a hint of impropriety. He is proud of reforming the Auditor’s office, restoring trust with the citizens, and fighting for fair property valuations.

“Mr. Reynolds will vigorously defend himself against these charges and looks forward to continuing in public service for years to come.”

Butler County Sheriff Richard Jones said in a news conference Wednesday the investigation remains ongoing and Reynolds should resign immediately.

“Being indicted, I don’t know how you stay in office with these charges and manage the county’s money and real estate and he’s accused of these deals and what he’s already admitted to in the media, helping his family and his father.”

The investigation revolves around Reynolds’ actions regarding the development on Hamilton Mason Road between Cincinnati Dayton and Maud Hughes roads.

There also are allegations in a civil lawsuit he has been corruptly trying to control development on Hamilton Mason Road.

He and his parents have ties to several acres of land on Hamilton Mason Road, property and recorder records show.

His parents and/or a corporation they own have multiple land parcels, and Reynolds’ Liberty Way Farms LLC is the owner of land near Maud-Hughes Road that he purchased from his parents in 2020, property records show.

In other new developments Thursday:

• A spokeswoman for the State Auditor’s Office told FOX19 NOW they are aware of reports about Reynolds and “will take the information into consideration” during the county’s regular financial audit, which is ongoing right now.
• Taxpayers will not fund Reynolds’ criminal defense, according to Butler County Chief Assistant Prosecutor Dan Ferguson. But county taxpayers did shell out the $100,000 insurance deductible to defend Reynolds in the civil lawsuit that Sheriff Richard Jones revealed this week is at least partially connected to Reynolds’ criminal case.

In a news conference Wednesday, the sheriff called the lead plaintiff, Gerald Parks, an 88-year-old neighbor of Reynolds, “one of the victims.”

Parks has lived next door to Reynolds’ parents for decades and also has a separate plot of land nearby he’s been trying to develop.

Parks, his daughter and attorney claimed in an interview with FOX19 NOW late last summer that Reynolds tried to buy some of his property in 2015 for well below fair market value or said it would be landlocked.

At the time of that offer, Parks’ wife was suffering from terminal cancer. She later passed away.

Parks ultimately turned Reynolds down after his daughter got involved.

“After consultation with his daughter, Parks met with Reynolds at a local Frisch’s Restaurant and told Reynolds that he was not interested in selling his property at this time and certainly not for the price Reynolds offered him,” the suit states.

“At that meeting, Roger Reynolds gave Mr. Parks an ultimatum: sell the property to Roger Reynolds, or be landlocked and Roger Reynolds would see to it that any proposed development of the property would never get through planning and zoning,” the suit reads.

His lawsuit accuses Reynolds of extortion, bribery and tortious interference with his business contracts. His suit alleges he’s lost three contracts to develop his property due to Reynolds’ meddling, among others.

Parks told FOX19 NOW in a Sept. 9 interview at his home that he doesn’t care who buys his property, but he does want to get what he feels is a fair price.

“They always turned it down, found something wrong,” he said. “One guy fixed all the complaints they had. There was no complaints left, and they still turned it down. He just does not want me to sell the property unless I sell it to him.”

Other allegations in the suit, according to court records:

• Reynolds “demanded” $500,000 from one of Parks’ developers to purchase two acres of Reynolds’ father’s land. The developer considered buying the additional acreage to add to Parks’ property for senior housing development.
• Reynolds “incorrectly” told the developer he needed more greenspace. He also said he would use his clout to fight the proposed development if they didn’t buy his dad’s land.
• Reynolds sought a $200,000 consulting fee from one of the developers for Parks’ land to get the project through the zoning process.
• “As retribution for refusing to sell the property to Roger Reynolds, in 2017, Roger Reynolds, in his position as the Butler County Auditor revoked Parks’ CAUV (Current Agricultural Use Value) property tax designation and increased the taxable value of Mr. Parks property.”

Applications for CAUV must be filed with the county auditor. For property tax purposes, farmland devoted exclusively to commercial agriculture may be valued according to its current use rather than at its “highest and best” potential use. By permitting values to be set well below true market values, the CAUV normally results in a substantially lower tax bill for working farmers.

Parks’ lawsuit claims Reynolds failed to provide any notice to Parks as to the revocation of his 2017 CAUV tax valuation, how to appeal it – and wouldn’t tell his daughter why it was revoked when she inquired.

A $30,000 charge was levied against Parks on his first tax bill of 2018, the amount of tax savings that he had accumulated for the three previous years with the CAUV designation, his lawyer says.

Parks also had a higher annual property tax rate from that point on, according to the lawsuit.

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