BY LINDA DeNICOLA
Staff Writer
OCEAN TOWNSHIP — Of the three people who have pleaded guilty in the bribery scheme in Ocean Township, only one has been sentenced so far.
Free on $200,000 bail since March, former Ocean Township auditor Louis J. Gartz was sentenced on Aug. 9 to a 26-month federal prison term.
U.S. District Judge William H. Walls also fined Gartz $10,000 and ordered him to surrender to the federal Bureau of Prisons by Oct. 11 to begin serving his sentence.
Still awaiting sentencing are former Ocean Township Mayor Terance Weldon and former Township of Ocean Sewerage Authority (TOSA) chair Stephen D. Kessler.
In March, Gartz pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court, Newark, to a single count of bribing a public official when he was the auditor for the township. He admitted that he paid $10,000 in bribes to Weldon to ensure that his company continued to be given public contracts with the township.
According to information provided by the U.S. Attorney’s office, during sentencing arguments, Assistant Attorney A. Matthew Boxer described Gartz’s long history of making cash payments to public officials in Monmouth County. In addition to those Gartz specifically admitted to when he pleaded guilty on March 16, Boxer said that Gartz admitted to FBI agents that he had made numerous cash payments to public officials over decades.
Gartz’s attorney, Robert S. Bonney Jr., Red Bank, described the two payments Gartz admitted making as akin to “gratuities,” an argument which Judge Walls specifically rejected since the money was paid in an attempt to influence official action by public officials.
The judge also rejected an argument that Gartz acted as he did because he was “financially vulnerable” as he neared retirement.
“The punishment is for violating the public trust because all of us are dependent on the integrity of the public order,” Judge Walls said.
Gartz served as the public auditor for the township for more than 25 years. His plea agreement was another link in a series of arrests of public officials throughout Monmouth County that began in 2002 when FBI agents arrested Weldon. In October 2002, Weldon, who was also the Asbury Park city administrator, pleaded guilty in federal court in Newark to taking $64,000 in bribes.
As mayor, Weldon was in a position to influence the receipt, acceptance and administration of federal funds allocated to the township. He was also in a position to influence the hiring of contractors that performed services to the township, including auditing and accounting services, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
According to the court documents, one such project involved financing the repair of damaged sewer lines. After the accounting firm rendered services and received payment for the sewer-line project, Gartz personally delivered $5,000 in cash to Weldon on a Monmouth County golf course.
The document states that Gartz did so with the understanding that Weldon would provide a portion of the cash to another person, who at that time was an appointed TOSA official. He made the cash payment to Weldon with the aim of influencing Weldon in connection with accounting contracts to be awarded by Ocean Township.
Gartz also made the payment with the intent of rewarding Weldon and the TOSA official for hiring the accounting firm to carry out the sewer-line accounting work.
The document states that sometime in 2001, Gartz arranged for the delivery of a second cash payment to Weldon, with the understanding that a portion of the payment would be passed along to the TOSA official, who prosecutors will not name.
On July 14, Stephen D. Kessler, a former chairman of TOSA, pleaded guilty to extortion. Kessler admitted that he accepted bribe payments from Gartz when Gartz was the auditor and accountant for the sewerage authority and for the township.
Kessler said the payments came to him through another public official, who was identified in court that day as Weldon. The payments were in return for their official influence to benefit Gartz’s accounting firm, including continuing the firm’s status as accountant to the sewerage authority.

