LOCK HAVEN -- A jury found a former Clinton County commissioner not guilty of theft charges in the case of missing money at the Lock Haven Area YMCA.
After hearing a day of testimony and deliberating for four hours Tuesday, jurors acquitted Adam Coleman on all counts.
Coleman has been waiting the better part of a year to defend himself against theft charges in Clinton County court. After all, he was a county commissioner in the county where he grew up, then lost re-election after investigators charged him in connection with money missing from the YMCA in Lock Haven.
All along, Coleman said the money was a loan and that he paid it back.
"It's a shame the money was taken from the YMCA, I'm happy today the jury of my peers saw it for what it was and saw I was not guilty of anything," said Coleman.
During the brief trial, the YMCA's former director Jerry Clark testified that Coleman was in on the scam and the former commissioner submitted a fake invoice to get a check for more than $1,400.
On the stand, Coleman told jurors he thought the invoice was "an IOU."
"Everything Mr. Clark had any remote connection to was tainted by everything he admitted to doing and I think the jury saw through his testimony," said Coleman's attorney Robert Englert.
"The only deliberations that count are those that are undertaken by the jury, we have absolute confidence in them and that they found reasonable doubt existed," said prosecutor Clark Madden with the Pennsylvania Office of Attorney General.
When the charges came out last year, Adam Coleman was chairman of the Clinton County Board of Commissioners, leading to a failed bid for re-election.
"This stuff comes out, I go from being first in the poll, to last in the poll, this had a lot to do with what transpired in the election last year."
Coleman said he has not ruled out running for public office again.
Coleman's mother, Kimberly, served some jail time for her role in the scam.
Clark, the former YMCA director, is still serving time after admitting he stole more than $100,000 from the Lock Haven Area YMCA.