A former judge and criminal investigator landed an assignment Friday as the first Director of Program Integrity in state government, part of a fresh set of efforts by Gov. Tim Walz to contain a spiraling problem of fraud in Minnesota programs.

Seeking to set up new defenses, Walz turned to Tim O’Malley, who was previously a judge in the Court of Administrative Hearings and past head of the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. He also said a third-party entity known as WayPoint would partner with state agencies to implement fraud prevention programs.

“Minnesota's long standing high standards of integrity of public funds go hand in hand with a culture of generosity, you can't have one without the other,” Walz said at a Capitol news conference. “Any amount of fraud is too much.”

O’Malley said

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