Good Morning Florida Keys

Yesterday’s Mystic.Goodies post introduced what Sandy Downs says is a vigilante group operating within the sheriff office. I recieve a reply to yesterday’s post saying the writer could no long trust anything I write, and what a shame that was. 

Maybe it’s impossible for Keys people to believe the sheriff office is corrupt from top to bottom. Maybe it’s impossible for them to believe night riders operate inside the sheriff office. But they do.

I personally hired an attorney to defend a young woman introduced to me by Sandy Downs, whom I was convinced was stalked and set up by a sheriff deputy, who was known to stalk and set up young women. Until then, she had either been represented, not very well, by the Public Defender’s Office, or by herself. She said the arresting deputy told her that if she caused him problems in the sheriff office, he would blow up her house. A few days before the trial was first set, while she was away, the house burned down. When the lawyer I hired entered an appearance, the case was continued and started moving in a different direction. He destroyed the State Attorney’s case during the trial and the jury brought back a not-guilty verdict. This deputy has received awards from the sheriff office, and raves from Official Sheriff Spokesperson Becky Herrin, for exemplary work as a deputy.

At the behest of the Goodman family, who head up the local Republican party, the night riders took out after Sandy Downs and her family because she had reported the Goodmans to the Florida Department of Environmental Protection for cutting down the mangroves on a state-owned island near their Cud Joe Key home, a couple of hundred yards from Sandy’s home.

The day sandyforsheriff.com went online, the “My experiences with injustice” page about Sandy and her family’s terrifying experiences with the sheriff office was destroyed by a hacker. The same day, the hugely popular Coconut Telegraph page of bigpinekey.com also was destroyed by a hacker. Sandy’s campaign was announced that day on the Coconut Telegraph, along with the fact that the host of that website had built Sandy’s website for her. He had built my websites and I sent her to him so he could build hers.

When the Kelly family objected to Bob Peryam courting and having sex with their daughter in their home, their daughter went to Bob about it and she said he would kick her father’s ass, and right after that her parents were so harassed by sheriff personnel that Mrs. Kelly filed a very long handwritten report with the sheriff office, which Sheriff Roth gave to a private investigator to look into, instead of forwarding the complaint to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement like he was supposed to do. After the harassment stopped, the Kellys said they wanted to drop the complaint.

Sandy told me that Ken Davis’ campaign website was hacked yesterday and went back up after it was repaired.

So I return to what seems to be my critic’s favorite place, the sheriff office: to something Sandy told ten days ago me that really made my eyes bug out.

She said the psychological examinations administered to new sheriff hires by David Rice (under a lucrative no-bid contract let out by his son, Major Mike Rice), are used to screen out applicants who will not be inclined to play along with the bubba way the sheriff office is being operated. Sandy said the psychological exams performed by the Guidance Clinic of the Middle Keys (which David Rice used to own and through which he now has a lucrative consultant contract with the purchaser of that business) are used to justify getting rid of sheriff personnel who are not going along with the bubba crap they discovered after going to work for the sheriff office. Sandy said she is not the only person outside of the sheriff office who knows about this, but I do not have her permission to identify anyone else.

If you are wondering why a county commission candidate is so involved in the sheriff race, ask yourself why you don’t know how this county government is run? How it is run is the County Commission approves the sheriff budget ($44,000,000 last year), which then is funded with taxes paid over by the Tax Collector to the Sheriff. However, before approving the sheriff budget, the County Commission has an affirmative and solemn duty to satisfy itself that the Sheriff is on the up and up. If the County Commission is not satisfied, it is not supposed to approve the sheriff budget. The Sheriff then has to go to Tallahassee to get the money to operate, and while there, explain to the Governor and other high-ranking state officials why the County Commission refused to approve the sheriff budget.

Make no mistake, if I end up on the County Commission, I will vote to approve the sheriff budget only if I am satisfied the Sheriff and sheriff office are on the up and up. Right now, they are anything but that. Keep that in mind when you vote for sheriff.

Happy Halloween.

Sloan Bashinsky, non-affiliated District 3 county commission candidate

Yesterday’s Women.Voters post ended with: “I hear on the coconut telegraph that only deputies who belong to the same Masonic Lodge Bob Peryam belongs to are promoted. My apology if this is not so, but if it is so, I hope this practice stops and is replaced by deputies being promoted on the basis of merit alone, even if they are women.”

I subsequently was pounded in several dreams for not telling it all. I did not tell it all because much of it came from Sandy Downs, who told me the other day that early last winter she was told by a deputy, and later by two other deupties,  that only deputies who are members of the Masonic Lodge to which Bob Peryam belongs are promoted.

Sandy was told there is a group of Masons/Sheriff employees that run a vigilante group after hours and in secret that carry out “details” aimed at “targets”. Their orders are given them by higher ups in the community.  This work might involve sabotage to homes, businesses, automobiles, boats, arsons, or roughing someone up and scaring them, or who knows what…….

Sandy was told that digging into the relationship between the Masons and sheriff personnel might be the one thing that would get her killed.

When Sandy emailed Sheriff Spokesperson Becky Herrin last February, to find out which deputies are Masons, Becky replied that such personnel information could not be revealed.

In an effort to learn about the Masons, Sandy went to Key West City Commissioner Clayton Lopez, whom she knew to be a Mason. Clayton said the Mason Lodge he belongs to in Key West was started by a black man and is made up mostly of black men and comes from a different Mason strain than the Lodge Bob Peryam belongs to in Marathon. Bob’s Lodge is white men.

I told Sandy that many conservative Christians view the Masons as a satanic cult. I also said some of our nation’s founding fathers were Masons, and I pulled out a dollar bill and showed her the pyramid with the star over it on the back of the bill and said it is a Mason symbol. Sandy asked how I knew that? I said a lot of people know the pyramid is a Mason symbol.

When I said Masonry is a mystical religion, with secret rites and rituals, Sandy said she had been told they have secret signals and handshakes, and a Mason going before a Mason judge can tell the judge he is a Mason without anyone in the courtroom but another Mason knowing it. I said that is true. She said she figured some of the powerbrokers in the Keys are members of the Marathon Lodge. She said David Rice and Sheriff Rick Roth might be members.

The night after this conversation Sandy had a dream that sure looked to me like a strong warning that she might indeed be killed if she dug into the Masons and sheriff personnel publicly. So I said if it got told, I would tell it because I wasn’t afraid of being killed and, in fact, looked forward to not being on this planet anymore. Subsequently Sandy said she wasn’t afraid to go into it, but had held off because she didn’t have concrete facts to back up what she felt. Then she wrote this to me:

“It is the mission of the Mason’s to guarantee success for their members. And it does not surprise me when told their membership might improve their lot in life, as this is the promise guaranteed by membership. It does not surprise me that Peryam would grant them promotions based on Masonic activities, as this is what they promise. Any secret society that supports themselves contradictory to rules, and is detrimental and unfair to others, is wrong. And if Masonic membership is overriding rules of pay and promotion at the Sheriff’s Office, then it is criminal. And if the Mason’s have a secret group within themselves that are carrying out Mafia/Mason activities, then we have the 2008 version of the KKK right here in Monroe County, right now.”

What I found on the Internet about Masons only added a few details to what I already knew. What I already knew is Mason are supposed to do what they can to develop their own character and help the world be a better place to live. Some Masons attend a Christian church, others do not. Some Masons helped bring about the birth of our nation, while others wanted the Colonies to remain loyal to the King of England.

I imagine Masons helped bring about the end of slavery and women not being able to vote, while other Masons opposed women being able to vote, and even other Masons mutated into the KKK. I am pretty sure from what I read in The Spear of Destiny, by Trevor Ravenscroft, that the Nazis were a twisted offshoot from Masons. President Bush and his father are members of a Mason offshoot: Skull & Bones. Although many people believe Masons date back to England, or even back to the early days of Christianity, they are much older than that.

I told Sandy of a secret society that is the genuine article, which Dan Brown pretended to portray in The Da Vinci Code. The Society of the Holy Grail is nothing like what Brown wrote. One of its members,Trevor Ravenscroft, scribed the Spear of Destiny against a great deal of opposition in that Grail community, because they felt the world still was not ready for that knowledge.

I am not a member of the Grail Society described in The Spear of Destiny. What I am a member of has no secular organization, no worldly meeting halls, no secret gatherings, no secret codes, rituals or rites. It has nothing to do with this world other than living on it. What I belong to is described in the New Testament Letter to the Hebrews, which I have never heard taught in a Christian church. If it was taught, there would be a lot fewer Christians and a lot fewer churches.

Although vague and written for another time, Hebrews is the definitive treatment on this world of the initiation into the Melchizedek Priesthood, an Eternal (angelic) Order in which that Letter says Jesus is High Priest. Hebrews was written by an advanced initiate who had known Jesus better than anyone else, because she was his wife. If she had put her name on the Letter, no one would have respected it because women were not respected in that day – either, maybe I should add.

Magdalene wrote the letter to initiates who were supposed to be teaching neophytes but instead were acting as if they were still neophytes themselves. She warned them of the perilous route they were taking and urged them to return to the training they had abandoned because it was so severe that they wanted nothing more to do with it.

An initiation into which Sandy Downs is being taken by the Order itself: I am just an observer and sometimes am used by the Order to prod her. I wager my life and soul that any Mason would pray to die and fear he would not, if he were dunked into the spiritual life God has given Sandy to experience. Not meaning to pick on Masons, I offer the same wager to any Christian.

I am neither Mason nor Christian. To become either, or both, you sign up, you join. To be in the Order Melchizedek, you are conscripted. Then you are trained. Oh God, you are trained. No one around you knows what has happened to you, unless you are lucky, or maybe unlucky to meet another conscript into this Order whose sacred symbol is what today is known as the Star of David, but it is much older than that. The star represents the interlocking relationship between male and female, between heaven and earth, between God and the angelic realms.

Now you know why Sandy Downs stirs up so much commotion, why she is accused of being crazy, why she is threatened with death, why she sometimes is volatile. She is being trained by Jesus himself, and by Magdalene, and by the Holy Spirit. Keep that in mind when you vote for sheriff.

Sloan Bashinsky, non-affiliated District 3 county commission candidate

Received yesterday from the Upper Keys Professional Business Women’s League about women gaining the right to vote in America. It reminded me of black people gaining the right to be treated as human beings in America.

A few days back, someone posted to the Coconut Telegraph page of bigpinekey.com a question along the lines: Who is the county commission candidate who listens carefully to the answers the other candidates give to questions at candidate forums, then copies the other candidates’ answers?

After racking my brains, I replied to the Coconut Telegraph that it would have been helpful if the poster had identified the copycat candidate by name. I guaranteed I wasn’t copycatting the other county commission candidates, nor were they copycatting me.

A reply to my post said the copycat candidate wasn’t me “who is copycatting other commission candidates, nor is it Carlos, nor is it Sylvia, nor is it Kim, nor is it Bill. Now that everyone else has been eliminated– figure it out.”

So I racked my brains some more, because the poster left out Sal Guiterrez, but then, Sal only attended one forum that I remembered.

I attended all but one candidate forum, maybe a dozen forums in all. The forum I did not attend was at the Ocean Reef Club, because I was the only county commission candidate who wasn’t invited. Sandy Downs wasn’t invited to that forum either. Maybe because she and I had copycatted each other by saying the sheriff substation at Ocean Reef needs to go. As I recall, Ocean Reef is one of the many endorsements Heather Carruthers rattled off in the later forums, to persuade the audience to vote for her. As I recall, Heather had more endorsements than all of the other candidates combined. As I recall, she was the only candidate endorsed by the Gang of Three.

I remember a question we were asked at the last Key Largo forum. Something like: What should be the qualities of a good county commissioner? The other candidates and I answered the question straight up. Heather said she had never heard that question before and was clearly at a loss for words and stumbled around and didn’t say much.

At the last candidate forum, in the Harvey Government Center last week, the county commission candidates were asked: How did we feel about the county appealing the verdict in the Celeste Bruno case? All the candidates gave straight-forward answers, except Heather, who clearly was flustered and said she wished it would go away and she had not seen the valentine card Celeste Bruno had given to Sonny McCoy and could not comment on that. When I spoke, I said the Valentine card had been published in Key West Citizen, and it looked to me like Celeste’s backhand way of telling Sonny to lay off. I then provided a legal perspective of the case, which, I, having practiced law, could do. Not a perspective favorable to the county’s appeal, nor to Sonny. I told the audience what we really need in the county is the right to recall elected officials, and I asked if they really believed the State Ethics Commission would have taken Sonny down, if an ethics complaint had been filed against him? I found myself wondering: If Heather can’t deal with something tough like Celeste Bruno’s case straight up, how in the hell is she going to be the kind of county commissioner this county needs?

Right now, I find myself thinking that, as far as I recall, I’m the only county commission candidate pushing hard for Keys citizens having the right to recall their elected officials. I’m the only candidate saying, as a county commissioner, I would be Mother Nature’s county commissioner, seeing as she does not have one now; and I would be the rank-and-file Keys people’s county commissioner, seeing as they don’t have one now. I’m the only candidate saying I would make developers and their lawyers and county staff miserable with my questions and insights. I’m the only candidate saying I would do all I could to get the Tourist Development Council to shift its advertising to the Keys being a place people from distant places can visit and be who they really are for a little while, instead of who have to be in the stuck up place they now live. I’m the only candidate saying I oppose using our working waterfronts for new and unneeded hotel and residential development, instead of for working waterfront preservation and rejuvenation. I’m the only candidate saying we should push FEMA and whoever else needs to be pushed to permit stilt home owners not only to keep their downstairs enclosures but also to permit the building of new downstairs enclosures for affordable housing, using water tolerant materials. I[m the only candidate saying Trauma Star should be decided by the county commissioners and not be a part of the sheriff operation if it is kept. I’m the only candidate saying the county commission needs to ride hard-herd on the County Manager about what is going on in Growth Management and Code Enforcement. I’m the only candidate saying the State Attorney needs a new head and the Sheriff Office is corrupt and needs shaking up from top to bottom, and the person to do that is Sandy Downs. I’m the only candidate saying all five sitting county commissioners need to be replaced. I’m the only candidate who has no campaign workers, no campaign endorsements, and no campaign contributors, and who doesn’t owe anybody anything and, as far as I know, has no business interests in the Keys to protect or promote. I’m the only candidate who has attended county commission meetings and fought tooth-and-nail with the county commissioners on a broad variety of issues, a fight that will continue if I’m elected. And, well, I can’t think of much of anything about me that Heather or the other county commission candidates are copycatting, and I haven’t even mentioned yet that angels tell me what’s really going on and what to do. Meaning, I copycat the angels.

Too bad the Coconut Telegraph magus who accused Heather of being the copycat candidate didn’t identify him/herself by name. Too bad there are so many copycats in the Keys, who make a lot of noise online and in the Citizen’s Voice section of Key West Citizen, but don’t attach their names to it. Too bad the Sunshine Law doesn’t apply to all Keys people. The angels told me there are no fig leaves in paradise, nor any secrets.

Sloan Bashinsky, non-affiliated District 3 county commission copycat candidate

What I wrote yesterday (State.Attorney) about my experience in the Conch Bridge Club was only part of the story, and was not what I felt I should have written yesterday. Yet it was what I was told to write, so I wrote it. It was accurate as far as it went, but inaccurate because it did not tell on me.

I started playing at the bridge club in the spring of 2004. I had not played bridge since 1994. I had forgotten a lot, and there was a lot that I had never learned. It wasn’t exactly like starting all over, but it was starting all over in the sense that I was going to move into playing bridge using the new methods, which were very different from the old ways of playing I had learned in my youth.

As my game redeveloped, as I improved, there came with it an increasing tendency on my part to speak out about how my partners and other players bid or played their hands. This is simply not done in bridge, yet I did it. I was aware I was doing it, I knew it was inappropriate, and I kept doing it. From time to time I was called on it by the director and told to stop doing it. I knew it was a problem, I didn’t like it, and I frequently wondered if I simply should stop playing bridge, since I didn’t seem inclined, or able, to get a grip on it.

I also found myself growing irritable over how other rules of play, it seemed to me, were being let slide. When away from the Keys, I played in bridge clubs where the rules were followed. For this reason also, I often felt I maybe should stop playing with the club in Key West. Even as it tore my heart to think of quitting, because I’d developed many friends in the club. It was the main social event of my life, playing with them three afternoons a week in the Senior Citizen Center.

So this is what I ‘m struggling with, after being put on a month’s probation the other day by the director of the club. A month of no bridge. A month I deserve. A probation I already was thinking I should impose on myself because of the way I had behaved toward my playing partner last week. Except I was thinking of making it permanent. It may be that I simply do not have it in me to change my behavior. It maybe a thorn in the flesh best left fallow, so it can do no further harm.

Of course, this is me talking: a man who isn’t too happy with himself. If the angels tell me to go back to the club in a month, I will if the club will have me back. After what I wrote yesterday, they might not have me back. I wrote yesterday what I was told to write. It was separate from my own shortcomings. I still feel it should have waited until after I wrote this today, but that was not the order I was given to write it. Upside down from how Jesus would go about it: Hypocrite, first take the beam out of your own eye, then you will see clearly enough to be able to help your brother remove the speck from his eye.

I remember being told in a dream, maybe in 2001, “Your driver’s license was issued upside down.” Indeed, everything about my life with the angels seems to be progress upside down: ass backwards. Years ago, I saw that whenever I did what I was told to do that had to do with someone else, then followed something that had to do with me. Something I usually didn’t want to have to do. Something like this post today. I’m never allowed to get away with anything. Sooner or later, the reckoning comes.

My running for the District 3 seat on the County Commission this year is a reckoning from 2004. In January of that year, I was told to run against Sonny McCoy, as a write-in candidate. I entered the race in that fashion. Then I was given a new way of writing to use in the campaign, a way of writing alien to me. An indirect method, the female approach, as opposed to the male mince-no-words approach.

I kept blowing writing assignments, and the retribution inside of me was terrible and terrifying. I finally became terrified of myself: a Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde. I came to believe I was the most dangerous thing to me. I came to believe I had dreamed up that I was suppose to run against Sony McCoy. When I did not hear otherwise from the angels, I withdrew from the race.

Then came a terrifying dark night of the soul. I lost all sense of traction. I felt every step I took was in slippery mud, and I was sliding backward. This went on for months, until I was told in a dream: “You were the keynote speaker at a homeless conference and you didn’t even show up!” The homeless conference was the District 3 race, and keynote referred to the wonderful Keynoter article Alyson Matley (now Alyson Crean) had written about my entry into the race as a write-in candidate. Shortly afterward, Todd German asked me if he could be my campaign manager. Shortly after that, a Key West man offered to help with the filing fee, so I would not have to run as a write-in candidate. I was homeless, didn’t have much money.

I was enraged over the “you didn’t even show up dream.” Enraged, because the angels knew I was in doubt and was depending on them to keep me on course. Yet they let me run off the road, aground. Then they waited months to let me know how badly I had screwed up. It was unnerving. Hell, it was terrifying. I wanted to die. I’m still pissed off about it, for if I had understood I was to stay in that race, I would have stayed the course, no matter how badly it was going for me personally.

Even so, many times have I looked back and beat myself up for dropping out in 2004. Many times have I wondered might have happened if I had stuck with it. Maybe I would have been spared the reconstruction that followed and took the angels two years. Maybe the Gang of Three would have come to an end in 2004. Maybe I would be doing something else entirely today. But I didn’t stick with it, and here I am running for the District 3 seat because it is what is given to me to do. Hear I am hearing people tell me I would win, or at least be a viable candidate, if I didn’t talk about angels. Here I am writing what I felt should have written yesterday, but it was not given to me yesterday to write. It was given to me today.

In God’s eyes, we all are homeless.

Sloan Bashinsky, District 3 county commission candidate

Jeff Overby is the chief prosecutor in State Attorney Mark Kohl’s office. Jeff also owns the franchise for the Conch Duplicate Bridge Club in Key West, where I started playing bridge in the spring of 2004, after having a dream in which I was told I needed to start learning how to build bridges. The day after that dream, I learned of the bridge club, and soon I was playing there regularly.

Maybe a year passed before I learned Jeff Overby owned the franchise. He didn’t play there more than a few times a year. I heard that mostly he played in big tournaments, where he paid $10,000, or more, to professional bridge players to play with him, so he could win or place high up in those tournaments and thus acquire large numbers of master points, of which it was said he had many. Master points are the way bridge players are ranked by the American Contract Bridge League, which sanctioned Jeff’s franchise of the Conch Bridge Club.

When Jeff played at the Conch Bridge Club, he brought with him a regular playing partner, whom I will call Bill, also was a very good bridge player. When they came, they had the top score for the day or came in second. I’m not a good bridge player by tournament standards, but I started playing when I was fourteen and have played in a few tournaments and in several duplicate bridge clubs. I recognize good players when I play against them. Jeff and Bill were probably better than anyone playing in the Conch Bridge Club, although there were a few players close to their level. I was in the level below those players.

Maybe a year and a half ago, Jeff and I disagreed about something during the play of a hand. What it was I don’t now remember, but I remember he got really mad and I remember wondering then where this Jeff Overby had come from? As I recall, the club director was called over and the matter was resolved in Jeff’s favor, and I was okay with it after it was discussed and resolved.

The other incident came maybe a few months later. After we finished a hand, Jeff’s partner, Bill, said if we were playing in a tournament, he would have called the director in on me. When I asked why?, he said for underbidding my hand. Confused, I asked for an explanation, for I had never heard of it being against the rules to underbid a hand. Maybe stupid, but not illegal. Bill said if I had bid what I was supposed to have bid, I would have ended up getting set and his side would have gotten a good score.

In duplicate bridge, each team plays the same hands. You play not only against your present opponents but also against all other teams playing your side of a hand. So what Bill really meant was that if I had bid what he felt I should have bid, his side probably would have gotten more points than the other teams. At least that was my take on it. It was maybe the dumbest line of argument I had ever heard at a bridge table, and I was amazed that Jeff sat there and let it go on, as it was his partner making the argument and it was Jeff’s bridge club where it was happening.

What I wanted to do was punch Bill’s lights out, announce to the club why I had done it, and say I was leaving in the middle of the game and wasn’t coming back for so long as Jeff had anything to do with the club. What I did instead was ask Bill if he really would turn me into the director for underbidding a hand? (I wasn’t convinced I had underbid and was happy with how the hand had turned out.) When Bill said yes, I said that was the craziest thing I had ever heard in a bridge game. It’s still the craziest thing I ever heard playing bridge, and I’ve played thousands of hands.

What this all is leading up to is I learned from the director of the Conch Bridge Club the other day that Jeff recently came to him and said I had so much as called him a liar during a hand. This was the first incident described above, from maybe a year ago. I told the director that I recalled a hand where Jeff got really mad, but I didn’t recall the details of the dispute. I also said I recalled another incident (my underbidding a hand), which I described to the director and asked if Jeff had told him about that time I had crossed him as well? No, Jeff had not told him about that incident, the director said. I told the director what I had wanted to do, and what I had done instead.

I then explained what Jeff does for a job, and that I had been pounding his boss, Mark Kohl (photo above), in my blogs, doing all I could to get Mark out of office. I said if Mark’s opponent (Dennis Ward) wins, Jeff’s life in the State Attorney’s office will change, and the lucrative sideline jobs he enjoys will end, or he will be let go from the State Attorney’s office. I said once Jeff had been the Magistrate over Code Enforcement cases, which prevented the State Attorney from being able to prosecute Code Enforcement personnel who were using trumped-up code enforcement violations to harass citizens. I told the Director that he needed to be very careful in his dealings with Jeff, and that Jeff coming to him about me was retaliation for my trying to get Mark Kohl out of office. And I said the angels might have me write about this.

Perhaps coincidence, a couple of days before the director told me of Jeff coming to him, I wrote about how Code Enforcement was harassing the company owned by sheriff candidate Sandy Downs and her husband. I sent “heads-up” copies of that post to Mark Kohl, Sheriff Roth, all five county commissioners, County Administrator Roman Gastesi and the County Attorney Suzanne Hutton. I heard back only from County Mayor Mario DiGennaro. I then sent the email last down below to Mark Kohl, to which I still have heard nothing back.

I find Mark’s silence about as crazy as Jeff Overby’s bridge partner Bill telling me, if it had been a tournament, he would have turned me into the director for underbidding a hand. Perhaps I did underbid. Perhaps I should have done what I felt like doing, instead of what I actually did. Perhaps I’m doing it now.

Good morning, Mark.
 
Sandy Downs told me that she told you yesterday at the KW Chamber candidate forum that I had told her to go to you personally about the code enforcement harassment against Tarzan’s Tree Care, which I described in what I emailed to you yesterday morning. Sandy said you were so nervous that you were about to pop. You said you only handled “statute” crimes, and then you turned tail and ran.
 
Tell me, Mark, if your office will not prosecute the kind of local government corruption Sandy came to you about, then what state or county office will do it? I sure can’t think of one other than your office. Even if the Sheriff makes arrests, what’s the point if you will not prosecute?
 
When Sandy came to you for help yesterday, that was your chance to prove you really are committed to being our District Attorney; that you really are committed to prosecuting criminals in Monroe County, even if they work in our local government, which it seems quite a few do.
 
Sloan

Sloan Bashinsky, non-affiliated District 3 county commission candidate

This morning’s front page of Key West Citizen announces Bob Horan’s withdrawal from the sheriff race and his endorsement of Sandy Downs for your next sheriff. What’s amazing about this announcement is that it is even in the Citizen, because when its Editorial Board (Tom Tuell) wrote its view of the sheriff race and narrow endorsement of Ken Davis, Bob Horan and Sandy Downs were not even mentioned. But then, Tom Tuell once told Sandy that the Citizen (Tom Tuell) prints what it thinks is best for Keys people.

Bob Horan is a hoot, and I wish he had attended all of the candidate forums. Most of his platform was about ridding law enforcement of the hugely important and frighteningly dangerous of job of tracking down, arresting and jailing recreational (mostly marijuana) drug users. Bob also wanted to stop jailing minor non-violent offenders, and using unnecessary force in making arrests.

Me personally, I can’t imagine what putting recreational (mostly marijuana) drug users behind bars has to do with stopping the flow and sale of illegal drugs, including far, far more dangerous substances than marijuana. But then, going after drug traffickers always has been a tad more dangerous than catching and jailing users.

I bet if the Sheriff Office and our county government were to institute random drug testing for all personnel, from the very bottom to the very top, using some of the money Sandy will lop off the sheriff budget (see down below), that would make quite a dent in drug trafficking in the Keys. Quite a dent. Even more of a dent if we use random drug testing top to bottom in our schools. Sandy uses reandom drug testing on her own family.

Meanwhile, here’s a question posed by The Weekly Newspaper in Marathon to the sheriff candidates, followed by Sandy’s reply:

We are budgeting for 200 words per candidate in this final election coverage issue. Is there any additional information you would like to add or a final message you would like to send to voters? Please advise via email to blair@keysweekly.com or I can be reached on my cell at 646.468.7699.

Blair ShiverThe Weekly Newspapers
blair@keysweekly.com
646.468.7699

Subject: Re: Candidate Profile for The Weekly Newspapers
From: sandy@sandyforsheriff.com
Date: Fri, October 24, 2008 6:14 pm
 
Sandra (Sandy) Downs:
 
 I will effect real change in a corrupted Sheriff’s Office and taxpayer burden. Insatiable appetites saddled us with unnecessary staff, contracts, cars, boats, helicopters, jet skis and dune buggies; costs of this “gluttony” hidden in an undecipherable budget.

Selective, over-reaching enforcement is grievously borne by some, while others enjoy privileged treatment.

I will “undo” ALL of this, because I am beholden to no one.

I will replace I.A. Director handling Citizens Complaints (wife of Captain Peryam) with someone who has no conflict of interest, and install a Citizen’s Review Board as oversight.

Shave $12,000,000.00 from budget by ELIMINATING:
1. 100 administrative positions
2. 125 “perk cars”
3. 8 deputies at Ocean Reef
4. David Rice’s $500,000.00 No-Bid contract secured from son, Bureau Chief
Mike Rice.
5. Misdemeanor offenders
(**post bond/receive Notice to Appear, instead of jailing)
 
Morale Boosters:
1. $10,000 yr deputy raise (equals schoolteachers’ pay)
2. MCSO parents /transform extra space into daycare.
3. Hire minorities, women, locals
4. Retain employees/implement fair advancement system
5. Retrain deputies and detectives
6. Improve 15% crime solving rate

Integrity is more important than experience. Consider Congressman RonPaul and Governor Schwarzenegger. I am the uncompromised candidate who will restore the Office to its original intent: Enforce Laws and Protect Citizen’s Rights.

Sandra Downs

Sloan Bashinsky, non-affiliated District 3 county commission candidate

I received an email yesterday from someone I know somewhat in Key West, saying he didn’t know much about the candidates and would I get a sample ballot and go down it and type in just my votes. I replied that I would sleep on it because I might publish my reply. Maybe not necessary to read on (eyes-left), but if you insist . . .

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Okay, here’s how I will vote. I give explanation when I feel I owe one.

President of the United States: Jimmy Carter, write-in. He remains God’s choice, according to several dreams I’ve had since early 2004.

Congressional Representative: Annette Taddeo

State Attorney: Dennis Ward

State Representative: Ron Saunders

Sheriff: The Sheriff Office is corrupt and mismanaged. Bob Peryam is corrupt and already at the top of his management capability (Peter Principle). I do not believe Ken Davis has the guts to do what needs to be done, he seems to have very little understanding of our jails, and he opposes a Citizens Review Board. Sandy Downs will trim the fat and turn the Sheriff Office around. It will be painful. It will be resented. But it needs to be done, and the good sheriff personnel will be glad for it. Sandy Downs

Property Appraiser: The appraised value of my one acre of land with a single-wide trailer on Little Torch Key went down and my taxes went up. Something ain’t okay about that. I hate changing the helm of this critical office during the turbulent economic crunch. Tough choice. I’d much rather see Chris Sante on the County Commission in 2010, so I’m going with Erwin Higgs.

Superintendent of Schools: Another tough choice. I’m troubled by Fred Colvard’s short tenures in many school jobs. Randy Acevedo seems good with numbers and state guidelines for schools, but he is not a teacher and has never taught school. And he seems in favor of putting “affordable housing” on school properties. It looks to me that our schools are too top heavy in office staff and not heavy enough in classroom teachers. Fred Colvard.

Supervisor of Elections: This is the fourth time I’ve run for office and with one exception my dealings with Harry Sawyer and the Elections Office have been excellent. The exception: Harry disqualified a lot of Sandy Downs’ petitions and some of Carlos Rojos’ (and I later heard other candidates’ petitions) over an obscure rule that was not explained to the candidates when they set out to get their petitions signed by registered voters. When Sandy and I asked the Elections Office to let us see the other candidates’ petitions, so we could determine if the rule had been applied to everyone, we were told we could not see the other candidates’ petitions. When I said this wasn’t right, I got stony looks. When I appealed to Harry, I got nowhere. I was pretty sure this violated the transparency provisions of the State Election Laws, and Sandy said she was told by Tallahassee that it was a violation. Henry Woods has done an excellent job of educating me and the public about the mostly confusing constitutional amendments on the ballot, for which Harry has strongly criticized Henry at candidate forums, saying it could get the Elections Office sued. I don’t see anything wrong with what Henry did, and as for getting the Elections Office sued, Harry came very close when he denied Sandy and me a view of the other candidates’ petitions. I believe Harry knew it was a violation of the State Elections Laws. Therefore, I’m voting for Henry Woods.

County Commissioner, District 1: I really like Bill Estes and feel his heart is in the right place. Kim Wigington has broader experience as an activist for better county government. Tough choice. Kim Wigington.

County Commissioner, District 3. Heather Carruthers really disappointed me by not taking clear public stands on some of the very tough campaign issues (the Gang of Three, corruption in our county government, Sonny McCoy and Celeste Bruno). Carlos Rojos seems, rightly so, very concerned about his family’s safety if he publicly says what he really knows. That leaves me. Sloan Bashinsky

County Commissioner, District 5: Sylvia Murphy’s opponent, Sal Gutierrez, seems only to be running because he is dissatisfied with not being able to develop land he owns in the Keys, and he has attended only one candidate forum. At the candidate forum in the Harvey Government Center in Key West last night, Sylvia attacked Citizens Not Serfs, which wants to keep the Area of Critical Concern designation and for people with downstairs enclosures to be allowed to keep them. As far as I’m concerned, attacking Citizens Not Serfs was equivalent to attacking Mother Nature and FIRM at the same time. At the previous candidate forum in Marathon, Sylvia said she no longer gave thought to affordable housing as an issue in the Keys. At an informal gathering after the last county commission meeting in Key West, Sylvia adamantly told me that what goes on in Growth Management is not her concern or responsibility. Pass.

Mosquito Control Board, District 1: Joan Lord-Pappy

Mosquito Control Board, District 4: Daniel Zieg, because he seems committed to a far tighter MCB budget.

State Judges: Pass. I don’t know enough to have an opinion.

16^th Circuit Judge: Tegan Slaton would make a good judge but my choice is Mary Vanden Brook.

Key Largo Wastewater Treatment Board: Pass. I don’t know enough about the candidates and it’s a Key Largo issue.

Constitutional Amendments:

No 1: No

No 2: No

No 3: Yes

No 4: No

No 6: Yes

No 8: No.

Special Referendum: No. Trauma Star should be decided by the County Commission.

If I left out something on the ballot, it was unintentional.

General comment: If you don’t attend candidate forums, or watch the ones that are televised, and actually listen to what candidates say and watch their demeanor; if you only rely on what you read in the press, hear on radio and/or are told by other people; if you don’t attend government meetings and observe and participate in what goes on, then there is no way in heaven or hell to know what you really need to know about your government and the candidates.

Sloan Bashinsky, non-affiliated District 3 county commission candidate

Yesterday evening brought a meet-and-greet for candidates at Keys Fisheries in Marathon. When time came for my brief dog-and-pony show, I said way back when I was psychotic about fishing the flats for bonefish, we all knew if you messed with a lobster fisherman’s traps and he caught you, he could kill you and nothing would come of it. I said I thought that was still a pretty good law.

I had planned to say that even before I heard a story after arriving early about a fellow who loaned or rented out a boat to three other fellows, who then went out and robbed fishermen’s traps of 800 lobsters and got caught. The robbers got out on bail and the boat owner got his boat back because he wasn’t on the boat when the robbers stole the lobsters. There was no disagreement last night that the owner should have lost his boat, and, other than maybe a puzzled look on State Attorney Mark Kohl’s face, there didn’t seem to be any disagreement that robbing fishermen’s traps should still be a capital offense.

Before driving up to the meet-and-greet, I chanced into a fellow in Key West, who was born and raised in Marathon. He pulled a copy of this week’s issue of Conch Color and showed me the inside spread about retiring Sheriff Rick Roth’s commemoration party. He pointed out members of what he called the Marathon Mafia, which he said was formed to try to wrest control of the Keys away from Key West. David Rice, Brian Schmidt, Tom Tuell, Rick Roth and George Neugent were mentioned. The Marathon native said the Marathon Mafia was behind the creation of two county commission districts in Marathon, and Marine Bank was started to compete with First State Bank, which the Spottswoods in Key West owned.

When I mentioned the Marine Bank startup to a fellow at the meet-and-greet, he said there was a lot of drug money floating around back in those days. The Marathon native earlier yesterday did not seem surprised when I said Sandy Downs told me she is pretty well convinced the Marathon Mafia is in the drug business. When I included County Commissioner Mario DiGennaro in the Marathon Mafia, the Marathon native said Mario is not a member; they don’t like or want him around. Sandy says she is pretty well convinced Mario is tied into gambling interests in New Jersey and Europe, and they sent him down here to pave the way for them to bring casinos into the Keys.

Although there wasn’t time to talk about that skullduggery during my dog-and-pony show, I slid toward some of it when I said I was not in favor of taxing fishing docks and working waterfronts at the rates waterfront hotels and condominium developments are taxed. Which led me to say the proposed hotel and condominium waterfront development on Stock Island is a Trojan Horse.

Maybe it would have been more effective if I’d then said the developers probably have no idea how to tie a Bimini twist or a bowline. But that slipped my mind. What I did say was the developers have no interest in preserving marine industries. All they want that waterfront on Stock Island for is to build hotels, probably casino hotels, and condominiums on a waterfront, and they will leave for others to preserve the marine industry there. I closed by saying if the Stock Island development gets approved, it will open the door for a developer trying to put a casino hotel right where we were having our meet-and-greet last night.

After I was done, the fellow who’d told me about the drug money floating around back when Marine Bank got started pointed across the harbor and said a developer had bought all of that land up and closed the businesses, and then had not moved forward. I said, yeah, I had heard about that one, and other stories like it, when the City Council candidates all spoke at a candidate forum in Marathon.

I dunno, maybe I looked stupid saying some day a developer will try to put a casino hotel on that beautiful harbor property where Keys Fisheries now is. But then, maybe I hit a really sore nerve, because I didn’t see any members of the Marathon Mafia there last night; nor did I see Mario. The only journalist I saw was Jason Kohler, Editor of the Keys Weekly in Marathon.

Maybe Jason needs to write an editorial about applying the same penalty for robbing fishermen’s traps to developers and government officials who steal fishing docks and working waterfronts. Gosh, wish I’d thought to say that last night.

Meanwhile, as I drove back to Key West last night, I wondered if the angels would tell me to write about the meet-and-greet, or if it would be about this email exchange I had yesterday with Tom Stump’s mother? Both, it turned out.

Hi, Rose. I’ve tangled with a whole lot of people down here. I never had Bill’s backing. Nor, after learning that he and Bernie, and perhaps Bob Peryam and Mark Rippin, were drinking champagne out of a bottle wrapped in black ribbon within hours (or less) after Tom Stump disappeared, do I feel I would care to have Bill in my camp. I would never be able to forget that black ribbon. Sloan

Sloan Bashinsky, non-affiliated District 3 county commission candidate

Yesterday’s Angels.Resistance post ended with a “stay tuned” about sheriff candidate Sandy Downs’ new campaign sign, which I wrote leaves nothing to the imagination. What you see here is the layout sent to Sandy by email from the sign designer. The actual sign will not have the fill-in-the-blanks at the bottom.

Sandy aims to place the sign on Tarzan’s Tree Care’s rented property just off US 1 on Cud Joe Key, where she has permitted other candidates to place their campaign signs. She said she permitted this to see if Code Enforcement would object, which it did not. She now wants to see if Code Enforcement will object after she places her own campaign sign there.

Sandy has good reason to wonder what Code Enforcement will do, because it has been trying very hard to shut down Tarzan’s Tree Care, which she and her husband, Nick (Tarzan), own.

For example, not long ago, Sandy received a phone call from a Keys contractor who sometimes has used Tarzan’s, to let her know that Code Enforcement had been all over Hawk’s Cay/Duck Key asking people stuff about work Tarzan’s did there, in an effort to cite Tarzan’s with code violations and put it out of business.

For example, Code Enforcement cited Tarzan’s for not having business permit and insurance numbers on one of its vehicles, which, in fact, did have the numbers.

For example, Code Enforcement cited Tarzan’s for a parked trailer not in use, on which Sandy is painting Keys and ocean scenes.

One code enforcement officer involved in the harassment just happens to be with a man who works for Tarzan’s. When he asked her what was going on?, she said she had been sicced onto Tarzans. When he asked who did the siccing?, she refused to give them up.

Sandy told me last night that when she told County Commissioner Mario DiGennaro about the Code Enforcement harassment yesterday at a Citizens Not Serfs meeting on Summerland Key, he got really nervous and said she’d have to make an appointment to come into his office to talk about it. When she called him later yesterday on his cell phone and said this needed to be dealt with now, he gave her the same spiel.

Sandy told me what may have set this all up goes back to when she was deposed by Keys Energy Service’s lawyers a while back, in the lawsuit filed by the estate of her deceased son, Preston. She said she was asked many questions that had nothing to do with the lawsuit: questions about her accusations against the sheriff office and its personnel; questions about her accusations against the Goodman family, who head up the local Republican Party. She told them about the reign of terror conducted by the Sheriff Office after she reported the Goodmans to the Deparment of Environmental Protection for slaughtering the mangroves on an offshore state-owned island near their and Sandy’s home on Cud Joe Key. They asked her in the deposition if she blamed Bob Peryam specifically for Preston’s death. She told them no, but she felt Bob, who sits on one the Keys Energy’s boards, had something to do with the difficulty she’d had getting information out of Keys Energy about its electrical lines where Preston was electrocuted.

Sandy has boxes and filing cabinets of files about the persecution her and other families have suffered at the hands of our local government and influential Keys people. I told someone yesterday, before I learned of the Code Enforcement harassment, that there are people in the Keys who might jump off buildings if Sandy is elected sheriff.

Meanwhile, here’s what I would do if I were on the County Commission and a citizen came to me with a Code Enforcement story like Sandy’s.

I would call County Administrator Roman Gastesi and tell him to set up an appointment yesterday with the head of Code Enforcement and the code enforcement officers who issued the citations. At this meeting we would have a prayer meeting with Jesus, and we would find out who was behind the siccing.

I would tell Roman to immediately terminate, for cause, Code Enforcement personnel involved in the harassment, from top to bottom. If he declined, his continued employment for Monroe County would become an item on the next county commission meeting agenda.

I would leave the meeting and head bodily to the State Attorney himself and demand prosecution to the full extent of the law of everyone involved, from the top all the way down to the lowly code enforcement officers who “were just following orders.”

I then would bodily go the Sheriff and tell him/her to arrest and jail everyone involved in the harassment, and I would sign the warrant.

I would file an ethics complaint against the State Attorney, if he declined to prosecute.

I would file an ethics complaint against the Sheriff, if he/she declined to arrest and jail.

I would file ethics complaints against any county commissioner I felt was involved in or knew of the harassment and failed to take action. The buck for running this county’s government stops at the County Commission.

Among many Keys people receiving a copy of this post are State Attorney Mark Kohl, Sheriff Rick Roth, County Administrator Roman Gastesi, County Attorney Suzanne Hutton, and all five county commissioners: DiGennaro, Nugent, Spehar, McCoy and Murphy. I am keenly interested in seeing how they respond to the harassment.

Sloan Bashinsky, non-affiliated District 3 county commission candidate