 Here is an email exchange with Heather Carruthers, prompted by my “District.3″ post yesterday. Below it are related develpments and musings. Sloan
Date: Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:41:48 -0700
From: heather@voteheather2008.com
Subject: Your Blog
To: keysmyhome@hotmail.com
Sloan,
I have received a few e-mails today regarding a couple of rumors that your website printed regarding my campaign. I am disappointed you didn’t fact-check these rumors prior to publishing them.
1. According to your blog “Mayor Mario DiGennaro endorsed my Democrat opponent Heather Carruthers on Bill Becker’s US 1 Radio show yesterday morning.”
Commissioner Mario Di Gennaro did not endorse me on Bill Becker’s radio show yesterday (Friday 8/29/08). Here is a verbatim transcript of their exchange which is available in audio form at http://www.us1radio.com/morningmagazine.cfm
Mario Di Gennaro: “Go back to the elections.. I, one thing I was very pleasantly surprised about .. I’m not picking .. one person who runs against another .. I really admired Heather Carruthers..the way she spoke to Sonny and thanked him for his service and everything… I also want to thank my other fellow commissioners out there for their service…. But Heather did a marvelous job and I really respected her for it … I was pleasantly surprised”Bill Becker : “Are you backing Heather in this ?“Mario Di Gennaro:”I’m not backing and I’m not getting involved. I’m not backing anyone. I was there.. I happened to be there when Heather walked in and spoke to Sonny and spoke to Dixie and thanked them for their service .. it impressed me so I say what I think.”
2. The statement in your blog “Heather has offered Dixie a job as her (Heather’s) aide, if Heather is elected.” is absolutely untrue.
I kindly ask you to retract and correct these errors on your blog as soon as possible. Thanks, Sloan.
Best,
Heather
| RE: Your Blog? |
| From: |
sloan bashinsky (keysmyhome@hotmail.com) |
| Sent: |
Sat 8/30/08 5:45 PM |
| To: |
heather@voteheather2008.com |
Hi, Heather.
I wrote that the thing about Dixie was a rumor I had heard and could not believe my ears. That was true. And I asked you to clear it up publicly. Your campaign website received, I meant to send it and believe I did, a copy of today’s post. The Dixie and Heather rumor was getting spread around before it came to me. You still need to clear this up publicly. I will do it on my blog.
Thanks for sending the verbatim transcript from Mario’s interview by Bill Becker. If what Mario first said about you isn’t a endorsement, which he then tried to make it not sound like it wasn’t, then what was it? When I asked someone you know who is prominent in Key West politics that question, after he said it wasn’t an endorsment, he said, well, yeah, that’s what it really was. He added that Mario was trying to work something to Mario’s advantage.
This, too, you need to make clear publicly: You don’t want Mario’s support. You already made clear how you feel about him and Sonny, and the entire County Commission, in what you wrote about how Sonny and Mario treated Diane Bureldsen at the last Commission [Meeting]. That Mario then was so complmentary of you on Bill Becker’s show not very long after you took him and Sonny to task was a bit hard to take in. Maybe Mario never saw what you wrote about him and Sonny?
FYI, someone you know well, who, in my estimation, has been one of your strong supporters, told me yesterday that I need to be diligent and work hard in my own campaign, because the Keys need me. Today, this same person told me that you soft-pedaled on the Gang of Three on Election Night, when Bill Becker asked you a question about them.
Bill gets my posts and tells me he reads them. He had received the one you wrote about Sonny and Mario. The Gang of Three has been a big issue for quite a while. I have been at candidate forums with you. I don’t remember you speaking of the Gang of Three at those forums. I saw that you were soft-pedaling the serious stuff. I only saw you get riled up and speak out when something very close to home happened, which was Sonny’s anti-gay, bigoted remark to Kay Thacker about Diane Bureldsen.
I told someone today that it’s not enough to speak out when you get punched in the belly where you live. You have to do it across the board. And, I would think, you don’t let people whose behavior you don’t like smozzle up to you in public, on the most popular Keys radio station, and get away with it. Hell, if Mario had something like that about me, I would have called Bill Becker and insisted that he give me equal time, so I could make perfectly clear, on the air, what I thought and felt about what Mario had said.
Sloan
I am now hearing on the “Coconut Telegraph” word, rumor, or whatever label fits, that the Gang of Three have thrown their resources behind Heather in the District 3 race. This would not suprise me, if it is true. Clearly the Gang of Three have Carlos Rojos on their most wanted list, after he whomped the incumbent Sonny gang member out of the race in the recent primary. Surely the Gang is smarting doubly because the Dixie gang member got whomped even more by Kim Wigington. And surely the Gang is worried that the Mario gang member’s days as County Mayor are short. I never expected to get any support from the Gang of Three or their backers, and I didn’t expect them to back Carlos, so that leaves them with either backing Heather in the District 3 race, or staying away from the polls. Personally, I’d rather see them stay away from the polls. But I don’t expect that to happen because I say it, which leaves me saying that I’d like to see Heather publicly tell them that she doesn’t want their support or votes. After what she saw happen at the last County Commission meeting, I cannot imagine her wanting anything to do with any of the Gang members, or any of their followers. For her to let them start fawning over her now would be about the same as prostitution, wouldn’t it?
Sloan Bashinsky, non-affiliated county commission candidate, District 3
So yesterday I received reports from two Keys women that our soon ex-County Mayor Mario DiGennaro endorsed my Democrat opponent Heather Carruthers on Bill Becker’s US 1 Radio show yesterday morning. My immediate response was incredulity. My next response was I wondered how Heather felt about that, after what Mario and his county commissioner sexist gay-bashing chauvinist pig buddy, Sonny McCoy, recently did in a county commission meeting to Heather’s gay friend, Diane Bureldsen?
My next response was wondering what Mario is trying to get for Mario?
My next response was I remembered the night of the Key West primary last fall, after Jimmy Weekley nearly took it without a runoff and incumbent Mayor Morgan McPherson came in second in a multi-candidate field, in which I was one of the candidates. Mario called me within an hour of the results coming in and bugged me very hard to do everything I could to get “that boy” reelected. Repeatedly Mario referred to Morgan as “that boy,” and how he wanted “that boy” to remain Mayor of Key West. I wrote about that the next morning, and told Key West people that the very last thing they wanted was Mario having any sway in their city government. I lobbied throughout the rest of that race against Morgan being in bed with Mario. I begged Morgan to renounce his ties to Mario. Then Morgan won, and everyone has since seen just how tight Morgan and Mario are.
And now Mario has endorsed Heather on US 1 Radio.
If you think Mario isn’t up to something, then you need to check yourself into the state mental. You can bet the conch farm that Mario isn’t acting alone here. You have to imagine that behind the scenes Sonny McCoy is in on this. Sonny, who would not even shake Carlos Rojos’ offered hand after he, a neophyte in Keys politics, smashed Sonny in the recent Republican primary. Sonny, who said something nasty to Carlos, instead of congratulating him. Shortly after which Mario asked Commissioner George Neugent if he (Mario) could still be Mayor? George did not even answer him.
And now Mario has endorsed heather on US 1 Radio.
Heather came out very strong on her campaign website against Mario and Sonny’s atrocities at the last county commission meeting. I posted Heather’s remarks, along with Diane Burledsen’s remarks. I was glad Heather did this, because I had withdrawn my endorsement of her because she was not taking any risks in her campaign. And yet, now I am remembering when Mario took out after me at a county commission meeting after I made strongly critical remarks about the County still being in bed and doing business with former County Administrator Tom Willi, and the County Commission needing a lawyer on it who could understand contracts. My recollection of that meeting is that Heather was there and she said nothing during that meeting. So now I am wondering if what outraged Heather over what Mario and Sonny did to Diane Bureldsen was that Heather and Dianne are gay? Or was it because they are women? Or was it because I did not get thrown out of the county commission meeting, even though I twice asked Mario if he was going to throw me out? Maybe Mario only throws women out of meetings.
When I started asking people to vote for Heather a couple of months ago, I felt like a great weight had been lifted off me. I was relieved. Over and over I had said being a county commissioner is a job from hell. It’s an 80 hour a week job. The pay is lousy. You have to be willing to die, be assassinated, to be able to do it correctly. I said only a lunatic or crook, or both, would actually want the job. And I said that if I were elected, I would do what the job required. I would be a pest. I would leave nothing untouched. I would challenge everything, and what I wasn’t smart enough to figure out on my own, the angels would show me what I need to know. None of that has changed. That is how it will be, if I am elected. And you can bet the conch farm that I will owe no one anything. I will not have any political obligations. I will have no political alliances. I will be totally independent of any person or party or group. And I will not be part of any new gang that might form on the County Commission. You can also bet the farm that developers will hate having to deal with me. As I told County Commissioner Sylvia Murphy’s opponent, Sal Gutierrez, the other day, “Compared to me, the tree-huggers are capitalist pigs J.” Sal said he agreed.
I suppose I also should say that I heard yesterday from the same two Keys women, which I have not yet been able to confirm, that Heather has offered Dixie a job as her (Heather’s) aide, if Heather is elected. Dixie, whom Heather sharply criticized, along with all of the county commissioners, for not rising up and defending Diane Bureldsen at the last county commission meeting. Dixie, who never cried out in protest over what Sonny did to Celeste Bruno while she was Sonny’s aide, or after she fled from Sonny’s office to be Dixie’s aide. To be honest, I could not believe my ears when I heard that Heather had promised Dixie the aide’s job. To be honest, I had figured for sure that Mario and Sonny would find work for Dixie in the private sector, because of all she had done for them. To be honest, I hope Heather will publicly renounce Mario’s endorsement and end the rumors that she has offered Dixie a job.
I suppose I also should say today, to wrap this all up, that Carlos Rojos goes out of his way to avoid me at candidate forums and campaign functions, and when we pass on the street or sidewalks. He sees me and turns his head and walks the other way. I understand why he does this: I busted his chops plenty of times in posts. And I will probably continue to do that. I only mention this now because Carlos seems to be getting sympathy over Sonny McCoy not shaking his hand and congratulating him for winning. I will not shake Carlos’ hand and congratulate him, if he wins, because he, like Sonny, is an architect, and because he once told me that he and I were a lot more alike than I knew and I could trust him and he would always tell me the truth, and because I received this email form a reliable source the other day:
Sloan,Good afternoon, I was looking at your opponents Carlos Rojas Expenditure Reports, and there seems to be more contractors/Developers than Dixie Spehars Reports, Even the Spottswood & Shirley Freeman which are Democrats are donating to this guy, Along with other democrats, I think he is for sale, and its actually cheap. HAHAHAHA Hope this info helps for your side of things. Please leave my name out of things.
Thanks,
Sloan Bashinsky, non-affiliated county commission candidate, District 3 seat
 Today’s post is a summation of my experiences with Internal Affairs in the Sheriff Office after filing the complaint based on the email “Anita Johnson” sent to Sandy Downs, who forwarded it to me. With the complaint, I included “Anita’s” entire email, including her entire email address. She got very upset with me about this, and said she would never again offer anything up about the Sheriff’s Office. She said I had put her and her family at risk to the Sheriff Office, because they had ways of tracing her “fictitious” email name back to her real person. She said enough to indicate that she works for MSCO and has much she could say and probably prove, but she made it very clear that she was not willing to do that. I told her there was very little I, or anyone, could do, if people like her, who had the evidence, would not come forward with it.
My email dialogue with Jon Ellsworth, of Internal Affairs was even more disturbing. I learned that he took Capt. Chad Scibilia’s word for everything. I learned that no attempt was made, despite my repeated prodding, to contact “Anita Johnson” by email and offer her whistleblower status and protection, and invite her to come forward with her evidence and submit to polygraph over it. I learned that since 2000, the Sheriff Office has done around 750 polygraphs, mostly for employment applications, some for criminal investigations. I learned that Capt. Scibilia did about 200 of those investigations and that he did the polygraph on Bill Becker and Bernie Stump, after they were asked by the Sheriff Office if they would submit to polygraph. Bill Becker told me this himself, and that they both passed the polygraph and were cleared of any involvement in Tom Stump’s still unresolved disappearance.
I also was told that the contract the Sheriff Office has with the Police Benevolent Union prohibits the use of polygraph in Internal Affairs investigations and, by Sheirff Roth’s interpretation, with any permanent Sheriff Office employees. When a prominent Key West attorney told me yesterday that this was because polygraph is unreliable, I retorted that the Sheriff Office did not think polygraph was unreliable in screening employment applicants and clearing people suspected of involvement in crimes. They can’t have it both ways, I said. Yet that is exactly what the Sheriff Office and the Police So-called Benevolent Union are doing. They have no objection to the Sheriff Office spending money and officer time conducting polygraph examinations, as long as such are not performed on law enforcement officers, who ought to be the very first to be polygraph-examined, if anyone one is so examined by the Sheriff Office.
That Chad Scibilia did not volunteer to be polygraph-examined in this particular case, in which a complaint was filed against him for operating a private polygraph company out of Capt. Bob Peryam’s Sheriff Station in Marathon, which is not where Capt. Scibilia works for the Sheriff Office, is beyond my comprehension and belief. I mean, if Capt. Scibilia is one of the main polygraph examiners for the Sheriff Office, if he truly believes there is value in polygraph, if he is an honest man, if he has integrity, one would think he would have immediately offered to be examined under polygraph. He is not bound by the Union contract in a case filed against him. He can waive the contract. But he did not do that. Apparently he hid behind it.
Last bellow is Jon Ellsworth’s and my last email exchange, which included the entire email history of this case, to which Sandy Downs replied, “Oh my God.”
Copies of the entire chain also where shared with sheriff candidate Ken Davis, Head of Internal Affairs, Lt. Cindy Peryam, and Sheriff Rick Roth.
On Thu, 28 Aug 2008 18:13:29 -0400, sloan bashinsky
keysmyhome@hotmail.com> wrote:
My responses in [ ]. Sloan
Subject: RE: [Fwd: RE: 2nd request for C. Scibilia MSCO polygraph case documents]Date: Thu, 28 Aug 2008 16:05:54 -0400
From: JEllsworth@keysso.net
To keysmyhome@hotmail.com
Mr. Bashinsky,
I have already responded twice regarding the allegation that Captain Scibilia used the Marathon Substation as a business address. I again find no evidence that Captain Scibilia violated any rule or policy in this matter (see earlier responses).
FYI, when I initially spoke with Captain Scibilia he advised that when he first joined the polygraph association he was working in Marathon and used that address. Because mail delivered for an agency member at any substation gets forwarded to them internally, he never changed the address with the association.
[You only just now report this explanation from Capt. Scibilia?]
As I indicated before, pursuant to our union contract, the agency no longer uses polygraphs in internal affairs investigations. The sheriff has directed that this policy applies to all permanent employees.
[This is an amazing agreement with the Union, and an amazing policy. I can only imagine the worst after learning that this is how it is with MSCO -- no permanent employees have to submit to polygraph examination. Amazing.]
Captain Scibilia did the polygraph examinations of the Beckers.
[You examine people like Bill Becker and Bernie Stump, who might know something about missing persons -- in fact, Bill told me that he and Bernie were asked by MSCO if they would take polygraph tests, and they went in and were examined. But the Union does not want MSCO employees taking polygraph examination? Again, simply amazing.]
Jon Ellsworth
[As is simply amazing that you did not respond at all to my inquiry about how come you and Lt. Peryam and Sheriff Roth did not immediately email "Anita Johnson" and offer her whistleblower status and protection, and ask her to tell what she knew and ask her if she would submit to polygraph? As I'm forwarding a blind copy of all of this to Anita, I'm telling her: Do you see why it doesn't do much good to tell what's going on at MSCO, if you are not willing to come forward and prove it? As I'm telling you, John, and Lt. Peryam and Sheriff Roth, what kind of environment must exist in MSCO for an employee to be so afraid and for the top brass to display no willingness to do any more than speak with the individual charged with conduct unbecoming. Not an environment I want for my Sheriff Office. And I truly hope not one the voters want. Sloan Bashinsky]
 Last down below is the part of an email yesterday from Sandy Downs, containing the web links to her psychological report from her divorce case. The links are in reverse order, which is how it came to me. It took a while for Sandy to figure out, with another person’s help, how to scan it so that it came out with print large enough to read. It also took Sandy a while to decide to release it to the public. On putting it into a post, I discovered I am unable to open any of the pages of the report. I initially said Sandy would post it to her campaign website, and perhaps that is what comes next.
From time to time since before I entered the Key West mayor’s race last year, I have written that people running for office have no right to privacy, and I have warned in what I wrote that no stones will be left unturned. This is how it should be, because candidates for office need to be transparent before the people they seek to represent. Otherwise, voters do not really know the candidates and do not know who they are choosing to represent them.
What brought all of this to a head for Sandy was Keys Energy Service’s trial attorneys in the lawsuit filed against Keys Energy and other defendants by the Personal Representative of Sandy’s deceased son, Preston Hartman. Preston was one of five children Sandy had by Robert Hartman, four, or maybe five of them through natural childbirth, Sandy told me, because she wanted to see what God really wanted her to experience on this world. The rough divorce from Bob fourteen years ago, with five young children on her hands, along with little help from Bob and very little money in her pockets, and all the other vissitudes of life, produced the psychological report. What Keys Energy’s lawyers want with it I cannot imagine. Sandy was not present when Preston was electrocuted on a jobsite where his stepfather, Nick Downs, and his older brother were working in Key West. I can see no probative value whatsoever for Keys Energy’s lawyer requesting the report. The only reason I can see for it was Keys Energy’s lawyers wanted to try to intimidate Sandy into settling the case cheap against Keys Energy, by threatening to make the report part of a public record. As if Keys energy has any real exposure. By law, as a public utility, Keys Energy can only be liable for $100,000, and I imagine that is covered by private or self insurance. I can not imagine what Sandy’s psychological report would have looked like if she had been examined after Preston was killed. Now that report would have had bearing on her pain and suffering, while the report Keys Energy has now obtained has no bearing whatsoever.
What should have happened in this case is this: All of the potential parties at fault in Preston’s death should have told their insurance companies to settle the case at the policy limits, or face a client testifying in behalf of Preston’s estate at trial. That’s what should have happened in this case, and that’s what should happen in all cases such as this one. But that is not what happened, and as a result, what was a unimaginable loss was gouged into something a lot worse by the litigation. And the primary casualty was Sandy. This is why I have consistently begged her to let Keys Energy go and renounce any and all money already paid into Preston’s estate by the other defendants, including Tarzans Tree Service, Inc., which was owned by Sandy and her husband, Nick. No amount of money will heal this loss. Not even a billion dollars would heal it. I know this for a fact, because not a billion dollars would heal the loss of my own son. Not all the money on earth would heal that, and for all I know, every penny of it would drag me back into reliving it again. And again. And again. Each revisit tearing the great gaping hole in my soul ever larger and uglier. My even being distantly involved in Preston’s case has taken me back into that terrible hole, and I have felt like I might die from it. Literally. But taken back into it I was, so I would write in this way today, begging this world, especially the American part of this world, which views litigation as a solution to many troubles, to find another solution. Litigation simply is not a solution. It only makes things worse. And especially does it make things worse for the people who were injured by what caused the litigation.
Alas, Sandy not only has this case tearing her apart, she also has a never-ending child support case against Robert Hartman tearing her apart. That case, too, I have begged Sandy to end, for the same reasons stated above. I have not been persuasive, and this has caused me to feel in my bones that she simply is not up to the task of being your sheriff. It is not, as I have told her, the most important thing for her. This is very painful for me to write, but it would be more painful if I did not write it. As Preston was want to say, “You can’t get to where you want to go if you only travel on sunny days.” And who knows? If God wants us to experience childbird naturally, perhaps God also wants us to experience death naturally.
Sloan Bashinsky, ex-lawyer
| From: |
sandra downs (sheriffdowns@gmail.com) |
| Sent: |
Wed 8/27/08 8:51 PM |
| To: |
keysmyhome@hotmail.com |
| Security scan upon download |
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 YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH captions an email from Kay Thacker enclosing the Miami Herald’s report on yesterday’s primary results. Amen.
County Commissioner George Neugent summed it up very well last night on the Comcast/US1 Radio broadcast, when he said voters wanted a change because they didn’t want the County Commission to be run in the way it has been run since the Gang of Three came into being. Toward the end of last night’s broadcast, George finally told the audience what he had been sitting on for a long time: how the Gang of Three came into being.
It went back a few years to when the County Commission was considering the Duck Key wastewater treatment plan, and Count Commissioner Sonny McCoy leaned over to George during that meeting and said George’s position was correct but Ken Sorensen had told Sonny he wanted it to go the way George opposed and he (Sonny) was going to vote in favor of it. In that moment, George told the audience last night, the Gang of Three came into being. He told me this same story maybe three weeks ago, but I never felt moved to write about it, and maybe it’s best that I didn’t. Maybe it’s best that it came straight from the horse’s mouth on the night of this truly important shift in our county government, which many dedicated Keys people worked very, very hard to bring about.
Perhaps the Duck Key story was a harbinger for what now is the most important task facing Keys people and their government leaders: modern countywide sewerage treatment and disposal. At candidate forums leading up to last night, in candidate questionnaires put to me by various civic and professional groups, I said the first order of business was to remove the Gang of Three, and then the first order of business would be to stop killing the ocean and reef. We now must turn our full attention and effort in that direction, and apply all of our energy and resources to getting it done. We must not let anything ever again take precedence. This has nothing to do with the Keys being declared a state area of critical concern. It has to do with doing what is right.
Sloan Bashinsky, non-affiliated county commission candidate, District 3 seat
 From yesterday’s Coconut Telegraph page of bigpinekey.com:
[The reason Sloan left Texas] Left Texas? Sloan left this dimension a long time ago and has been living in an alternate reality ever since. It is populated by angels, devils and a local candidate for sheriff. He visits us but does not live here. In fact he doesn’t even qualify as a Monroe county resident. ~arthur_phrain@hotmail.com
Hmmm, as far as I know I never lived in Texas, so I can’t see how I ever left it. Right now I live in Key West, which certainly is an alternate reality. Just ask anyone who lives here 
Meanwhile, here are missives from two prominent Key West women about an alternate reality that needs to come to a screeching halt, and a good place to start the screeching is at the polls today.
Sloan Bashinsky
From Heather Carruthers’s campaign website: VoteHeather2008.com:
R-E-S-P-E-C-T
For the second time in a year, a member of the public was escorted out of the BOCC meeting (though this time it was after the meeting adjourned). And as has frequently been the case, members of the public were spoken to with something well beyond disrespect. From the dais came rude and inappropriate remarks, the phrase “shut up,” and a tone of utter disdain.
It is incomprehensible to me that anyone in a leadership position could be so disrespectful of the individuals who elect them and who pay their salaries. Maybe it’s because I was raised by a teacher who was retired Navy, but I just cannot tolerate such rude antics, and I’m dismayed that the non-offending Commissioners are reluctant to speak out against it.
As my dad used to say (a quote attributed incorrectly, I think, to Voltaire), “I disapprove of what you say but I defend to the death your right to say it.” I believe it is the responsibility of elected officials to respectfully listen to input from constituents, even when they don’t like what they hear — or maybe especially when they don’t like what they hear. The kind of language and remarks that routinely emanate from some at the BOCC are undignified, outrageous, and, if they’d been made in my dad’s classroom, would have been grounds for detention or a “private talk” in the hallway.
It is often difficult for private citizens to take the time and make the drive to attend every meeting. Perhaps the BOCC should consider allowing folks who attend a particular meeting to speak on the agenda item that brought them there, even if the item is then tabled. Their remarks could be cited the next time the item is discussed, or better yet, replayed from a recording. That way, the public is heard and their time is not wasted. And perhaps they should be treated with respect.
From Diane Bureldsen: citizenjane.net
Monroe county is terribly mismanaged and bankrupt. Social services, all non-profit organizations who provide needed services to the community are cut. People have lost their homes in trailer parks to development. Whistle blowers are fired, developers are catered to and us home owners and all citizens will pay for this as they’ve increased our taxes.
This is not just the result of poor judgment, but cronyism, back room deals, favors to friends all made possible by putting key people in key positions to decide, vote and allow for corruption.
At the last BOCC meeting, I stood up to speak against the reappointment of Donna Windle to the planning board. I was clear why she should not be reappointed (you can read what I said on website: citizenajane.net). After speaking, Sonny McCoy relentlessly chastised me for my statements. I disagreed with him and wanted to argue his statements. I was not allowed to speak as Mario DiGennaro told me to keep quiet or else I would be thrown out of the meeting.
I then reminded Mario that Sonny earlier made a sexist remark to Kay Thacker which was inferred to myself and that if he could say those things, then I should have the right to speak the truth.
Sonny had earlier in the meeting stated: “Kay watch where you put your fingers” . I was sitting next to Kay, am a lesbian and interpreted exactly what Sonny’s comment meant. Sonny was crude, unprofessional, discriminatory and disgusting.
Immediately after Sonny made this comment, in the audience we gasped and could not believe what was said. It was clearly heard, yet, Mario continued the meeting ignoring the statement.
The agenda item addressing censuring commissioners came up and was postponed till next meeting. I had sat there for twelve hours, signed up to speak on the item and asked to read into the record what I wanted to say because I didn’t know if I could make the next meeting in Key Largo. This has been done in the past, yet I was not allowed to speak and again denied my rights.
As soon as the meeting was over, I went up to Mario and told him loud and clear: “I will never speak to you again! You let Sonny McCoy slur his sexual remarks in this meeting, yet, denied me the right to speak.”. Then as Sonny McCoy was yelling for me to “shut up”, Mario told the sheriff to escort me out of the room and I was thrown out even though the meeting was officially over.
We are controlled, denied our freedom of speech, insulted, abused, intimidated in order to silence us. I will be filing a complaint to the Florida Ethics Commission and I will sit down with a civil attorney and as I fight for my rights of freedom of speech, not to be sexually harassed by a public official at a publicly broadcasted meeting, I fight for everyone’s rights and a better government in Monroe County.
Diane Beruldsen
Key West
 Yesterday morning I opened this forwarded email below, which I then forwarded to Jerry Coleman, Dixie Spehar, and perhaps 60 Keys people. After receiving a very upset reply from Jerry, I replied that it apparently was all over the Keys, and I invited him to write a reply and send it to me. Later, I called him, to hear what he had to say. I said that, although I did not want to see Dixie remain on the County Commission, it would not be right for her to lose because of something someone made up that was not true. I again asked him to send me something in writing, explaining Dixie’s situation, which I would publish.
Do not stop with this forwarded email. There is more to this than meets the eye.
Date: Fri, 22 Aug 2008 16:16:54 -0400
From: pcaruso@texas.net
To: oktcraft@terranova.net
Subject: Spehar Bankruptcy Docs Found — Possible violations on Assets DisclosureFOR IMMEDIATE RELEASEUpdated News: As of 3:00 PM Friday, August 22, 2008, the Federal Bankrupt Trustee in charge of Spehar’s proceedings is requesting all documentation
regarding Spehar’s sale and proceeds of the transaction from the sale of her Big Coppitt home in 2005. Stay Tuned.Federal Trustee info
Alan L Goldberg
111 SW 3 Street Ste 701
Miami, FL 33130
305-372-1100
NEF@CRSMGT.com
ASSIGNED: 03/18/2005– Spehar’s Bankruptcy Documents –
– POSSIBLE VIOLATION OF US FEDERAL BANKRUPTCY LAWS –
– Possibly Hiding Assets from the Federal Trustee –
A Brief Overview1. Spehar claims “no assets”.
a) Spehar owned a home at 722 Prado Circle, Big Coppitt.
b) There was no way the creditors could have found it because she used her alias of “McCarty”2. Spehar lists her home address in the Bankruptcy Filing as 201 Front St. Key West
a) That’s Ed Swifts Business Address
b) Her address for her Home sale in Big Coppitt is listed as 6810 Front St, Stock Island — That’s Safe Harbor!
What was Spehar trying to hide from the Creditors? Her payout from the sale of her Home?
That may be a violation of the Federal Bankruptcy Laws. We are checking with the Bankruptcy trustee.
3. Spehar’s Personal Attorney was Jerry Coleman for the sale of Her Home on Big Coppitt Sept 2, 2005
a) Coleman received a High Paying Monroe County Consulting Contract on July 1, 2005. The same day Spehar’s Bankruptcy was discharged.
b) Coleman was the attorney of record for Spehar’s home closing and her personal business on September 2, 2005. Coleman received a
lucrative Consulting Contract with Monroe County on July 1, 2005. Spehar approved the contract. That is a violation of the Conflict of Interest law.
To view all the original documents for Spehar’s Bankruptcy, please go to <http://www.dumpdixie.com>
Updated News: As of 3:00 PM Friday, August 22, 2008, the Federal Bankrupt Trustee is requesting all documentation
regarding Spehar’s sale and proceeds of the transaction. Documents were emailed to the Trustee. – Stay Tuned.
I received nothing in writing from Jerry. He told me on the phone that he had helped Dixie fill out her bankruptcy petition, which she then filed and handled herself. Jerry said he often helps poor people prepare bankruptcy petitions pro bono, for them to file and then go through the bankruptcy pro se. Jerry said Dixie was discharged from Bankruptcy in 2005, meaning her case ended then. Jerry said Dixie’s list of assets accompanying her Bankruptcy Petition showed her home on Big Coppit Key. He said she later moved to Safe Harbor. He said the Front Street address is his law office address, which I know is true. (It also is the address for Historic Tours of America, which Ed Swift owns, along with the building. There are other businesses in the building other than Ed’s and Jerry’s law office.)
What Jerry told me Dixie confirmed last night at the candidate forum on Key Largo. She added that she had taken back her legal name, McCarty, and she’d had her mail forwarded to Jerry’s law office because she was still living with her husband, from whom she was being divorced, and she did not want her mail going to that address. She said the divorce is what triggered her filing for bankruptcy. She briefly described Paul Caruso’s (she did not name him) ongoing attack on her, and, as had Jerry, lamented this new attack on the eve of the primary when she did not have time to make a public response in the newspapers.
After the forum Sandy Downs told me that word has it that Dixie fears for her life over Paul Caruso and she carries a taser to defend herself. Sandy said it seemed ironic that Dixie must feel like Celeste Bruno felt when she was stalked by County Commissioner Sonny McCoy while she was his aide and after she quit working for him and became Dixie’s aide. Especially ironic, Sandy said, and I agreed, because Dixie did not try to help Celeste, who eventually quit working for Dixie and went into therapy and moved away from the Keys. Later, a friend of Sonny’s was sent to the penitentiary for harassing Celeste, who was given a right to sue letter after the federal agency she went to about it heard her story. The case now is in civil litigation, and Monroe County is paying Sonny’s legal fees because it occurred on the job.
There are two things about Paul Caruso’s email that trouble me. One is his statement about the Federal Bankruptcy Trustee’s recent request for documents pertaining to the sale of Dixie’s home. Jerry Coleman told me that he could not speak to that, because he did not know if the request had been made. Dixie did not speak to this issue at the candidate forum. At her request, I had given Pam Martin, the forum coordinator, a question about it, but it was not asked because, Pam said after the meeting, they did not feel comfortable causing Dixie any more distress. I told them it was the one question that might have cleared this all up, and now it wasn’t cleared up. I said some other things, too, about their needing to be doing something else if they didn’t have the toughness that is needed to put tough questions to candidates, especially to an incumbent candidate.
The second thing that troubles me came to me during the drive back to Key West last night. Jerry Coleman acted in a legal capacity for Dixie, in helping her prepare her bankruptcy petition, in drawing up the deed when she sold her home on Big Coppit Key, and in receiving her mail for her at his law office. Dixie should have disclosed all of this to the County Commission in a public meeting, and then removed herself from any and all further matters concerning Jerry that came before the County Commission. Instead, she continued to participate in hearing and deciding matters Jerry brought to the County Commission.
Jerry told me yesterday that his being hired to advise the County Commission was not Dixie’s doing. He said it came about on motion of County Commissioner George Neugent, seconded by then County Commissioner David Rice. My understanding all along has been that Ed Swift was behind Jerry being hired by the County Commission. Maybe even more changes need to be made on the County Commission come the 2010 election.
Sloan Bashinsky
 Ken Davis, who says he wants to be your sheriff, has launched a crusade for jail reform in the Keys. He has done this to get votes. He has done it without any understanding of the people who live in jails and prisons. I know this, because I have a great deal of understanding of the people who live behind bars, having once in my life had many of them as pen pals. That came about as the result of a prison Chaplin, who had read one of my books, inviting me to do a weekend workshop in his prison, which was a maximum security prison.
I spent the weekend with what started out to be about twenty inmates, which dwindled to three men by Sunday afternoon. Most of these men could have picked me up and broken me in half like a twig, so much physically stronger than me were they from working out. Yet what I had to say to them had them shaking like jello, backed up against the wall in the church chapel, literally. To the point, as I said, that only three of them were there on Sunday afternoon.
From that experience another book came, and when I was unable to sell the 1,000 copies I had self-published, I gave most of them to the Prison Library Project in Clermont, California. This outfit gave books to inmates who wrote in asking for something to read, sometimes specifying a topic that interested them. I also gave the Library Project perhaps two thousand copies of the self-published book that had gotten me the invitation to do the prison workshop, and I gave the Library even more copies of later self-published books. This is how I developed so many pen pals in prisons.
Ken Davis keeps saying at candidate forums that we have many people in our jail who go there to get medical and mental health treatment, who go there to take a vacation. Ken Davis is mistaken. I never met or dealt with one inmate, nor did I hear someone described by any inmates, who went to jail or prison on purpose. Not one. And not one of them wanted to be where they were. Not one of them were happy or enjoying themselves. Not one.
I think before Ken says another word about jail reform, about cutting out television and air conditioning in our local detention centers, about making inmates repay the county for their incarceration, he needs to spend serious time, like maybe a month, living in each of our detention centers. Then he needs to spend maybe a week visiting Florida prisons and talking to prison wardens. Then Ken needs to spend a month with Lynne Vantriglia, who heads up our local Art Behind Bars program. Lynne’s program has a long waiting list in the Key West Detention Center, and it has the lowest recidivism rate of any inmate help program in Florida. Yet Lynne has to spend a great deal of time scratching and begging for money for her program, when what she really needs to be doing is spend her time in the Detention Center working with inmates.
Lynne’s inmates turn out mountains of one-of-a-kind art, much of it in the form of greeting cards, which are given away to public help programs. Ken wants to put inmates to work, get them to repay the cost of their incarceration. Well, Art Behind Bars is a terrific way for imates to do that. If Lynne had the funding and support staff, a lot more inmates could be participating. If Lynne had the funding and support staff. But she doesn’t.
Another thing Ken Davis would need to do, after his time behind bars and with the wardens and with Lynne Vantrigilia, would be to spend time riding around in a Key West police cruiser. If Ken did that, he would learn how many people the Key West police are putting into the Detention Center who are just dying to be there. Ken will learn there are no such people. He might even find that the Key West police, or some of them, still view putting homeless people into the Detention Center as some kind of sporting event. He might also learn that the jail is paid to house inmates for the first twenty-nine days, and that is why homeless people, and others charged with light offenses, are released after twenty nine days.
I used to be homeless in Key West. I lived outside, slept nights on fishing piers, park benches, blankets on the sand, on church properties, in back yards, in outbuildings and unused vehicles, in doorways, tents, in homeless shelters. I got to know a lot of homeless people. I never met one who wanted to live in the Detention Center. Not one. So, yes, my next assignment for Ken Davis is for him to live on the streets of Key West for a month, so he can get to know the people he says want to live in the Detention Center.
When Ken Davis gets up in his pulpit and starts preaching about being hard on criminals in the Detention Center, I am strongly reminded of Elmer Gantry, Jimmy Swaggart and other fire-and-brimstone evangelists I have read about, seen on television or personally met. I always felt they were fakes pointing the finger somewhere more convenient. I am convinced the reason Ken Davis has gone off on his prison reform crusade, and why we are not hearing anything from him about all the bad Keys people he put into jail when he was head of his DEA unit, is because he did not make cases the US Attorney felt were good enough to prosecute. I’m speaking now as a lawyer who has known a few US and Assistant US Attorneys who all seemed very eager to put bad people behind bars.
Despite what he says, people of the Keys, you do not want Ken Davis for your sheriff.
Sloan Bashinsky
 This week’s issue of Key West the Newspaper features Dennis Reeves Cooper’s endorsements for next week’s primary. I had hoped Dennis would not endorse his Republican friend, Sonny McCoy, for another term on the County Commission, but would instead promote Sonny becoming Key West’s ambassador to Cuba, as part of reestablishing ties between those two historical sister cities. I also had hoped Dennis would not endorse Republican Dixie Spehar for another term on the County Commission.
And I had hoped Dennis would not endorse Republican Ken Davis for our Sheriff. Dennis has fought long and hard for Key West’s Citizen Review Board. Only just last week Dennis wrote a front page piece about the KW CRB coming of age. Ken Davis has clearly stated that he does not want a CRB for the Sheriff’s Office, while his Republican opponent, Phil Mandina, whom Dennis has endorsed in previous elections, wants a CRB. To be honest, I was stunned that Dennis did not endorse Phil, and the thought has not left me that Dennis endorsed Ken Davis because that is who Dennis’ friend Sonny McCoy wanted him to endorse.
I wish to say more about the two Republican sheriff candidates.
It wasn’t all that long ago that Ken Davis was claiming that his DEA unit had made a lot of drug cases in the Keys and plenty of heads were going to roll. Yet so far we have not seen one case that Ken made or one head roll. What we have seen is Ken blaming the US Attorney’s Office for not prosecuting what he described to Bill Becker on US 1 Radio as “airtight cases.” This was about the same as accusing the US Attorney’s Office of malpractice and malfeasance. In the face of all of that, it’s hard for me to imagine the US Attorney’s Office wanting to cooperate with Ken Davis if he becomes our Sheriff.
My own personal experience with Ken Davis is that he did not do what he told me he would do: promptly answer any questions I had for him. My sense is that Ken has been persuaded by political influences to be a politician instead of a law enforcement officer. I have come to view him as a chameleon. And I have come to see that he does not seem to have a very good understanding of local law enforcement or jail operations. I came to see this by attending all but one of the candidate forums where Ken spoke. I did not see Dennis Reeves Cooper at any of those forums.
Phil Mandina has over three decades of local law enforcement experience in the Keys and south Florida. He has lived in the Keys thirty years. He knows the Keys scene. He has lots of hours in helicopters, including the Trauma Star kind of whirlybird. He probably has forgotten more about local law enforcement that Ken Davis even knows exists. You can tell this by listening to Phil at candidate forums. And, as was said above, Phil wants a CRB looking over the Sheriff Office.
I have gotten to know Phil Mandina. I learned that he painfully lost a son to drugs, and I know he will be tough on drug dealers. I know he will not tolerate drug usage inside of the Sheriff Office. I know he will do something about what a deputy recently told Sandy Downs about the contract the Sheriff Office has with its employees. It requires them to be drug tested once a year, but they are given plenty of advance notice, which allows them to clean out their systems before they are tested.
I have learned that Phil Mandina is a straight shooter. He is a law enforcement officer from the old school, a law enforcement officer’s law enforcement officer. He has sources who report only to him and only he knows who they are. He is not part of the current regime at the Sheriff Office. He is not backed by the local political machine that is backing Sonny McCoy, Dixie Spehar and Ken Davis. His own man, Phil Mandina is clearly the best Republican candidate for our Sheriff.
Sloan Bashinsky
 I suppose wonders never cease. I suppose I’m glad I missed it. Mayor Mario had a deputy sheriff throw Diane Bureldsen out of the last County Commission. Actually, the meeting had already been adjourned.
Here’s what led up to Diane being ejected. I heard this from Kay Thacker, who was there, from Key West Attorney Robert Cintron, who watched the meeting online, from Diane Bureldsen, when she told it to Bill Becker on US 1 Radio this morning, and from Diane when she called me after the radio interview.
It began when Diane spoke very strongly and critically against the re-appointment of Donna Wendell, a Realtor, to the County Planning Board. Very strongly. Like Donna had a conflict of interest, like Donna had never seen a development deal she didn’t like, like Donna didn’t have the sharpest tool in the tool box, and so forth. Commissioner McCoy blasted Diane for her remarks. Daine’s objection from her seat was slammed by Sonny and Mario, even though she had a right to respond after being singled out from the Dias. Somewhere in here Sonny said from the Dias to Kay, who was sitting beside Diane, to be careful where she put her fingers. A clear reference to Diane being a lesbian.
The last item on the meeting agenda was Mario’s motion to censure Commissioner George Neugent over his publishing online, though his county email address, photos of topless nude women from Hollywood films. Mario moved to table the motion until a later meeting, because it was late and everyone was tired. Diane objected from the floor to not being allowed to speak to this item, because in the past, when an item was tabled and passed over, the citizens who had come to the meeting were allowed to speak to it for the record, because they might not be able to attend the later meeting when it came up again.
After the meeting was adjourned , Diane walked over to Mario, who was standing beside Sonny, and she told Mario never to speak to her again, and she would never speak to him. She blasted him for standing there doing nothing, while Sonny made sexual slurs toward her, a lesbian. Even as Sonny kept criticizing her.
It was now, after the meeting was over, that Mario told the sheriff deputy at the meeting to escort Diane out of the meeting room. After the meeting was already over, Mario did this, and the deputy complied, as if Mario was the Sheriff himself. What do I know? Maybe Mario thinks he is the Sheriff. What do I know? Maybe Sheriff Roth tells his deputies to do whatever Mario tells them to do. What do I know? Maybe Sheriff Roth and his deputies never heard of the First Amendment, which they swore a solemn oath to defend.
As did Mario, Sonny, and the other three county commissioners, when they were sworn into office. And not one of them came to Diane’s side. Not one of them told the deputy to stand down. Not one of them.
The irony here is that Mario had every intention of publicly hanging George Neugent for publishing online boob photos made in Hollywood.
The irony here is that Sonny McCoy drove his own aide, Celeste Bruno, nearly out of her mind with his sexual advances when she worked for him, and later, when she changed over to being Commissioner Dixie Spehar’s aide.
The irony here is that, instead of calling Mario and Sonny down, Dixie acts as if she is their consort.
The irony here is that there are people in the Keys who actually want Mario, Sonny and Dixie on the County Commission. More than want, they have these three up on pedestals. They worship them, apparently.
Well, citizens of the Keys, you have a chance next week to take Sonny and Dixie off the County Commission.
Sloan Bashinsky
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Here is an email exchange with Heather Carruthers, prompted by my “District.3″ post yesterday. Below it are related develpments and musings. Sloan
