Sheriff DAVID BERNARD SHOAR laid an egg.
It was not an Easter Egg.
Sheriff DAVID SHOAR made a colossal misjudgment.
One of historic proportions.
After refusing to face the music and answer questions for the New York Times and PBS Frontline, Sheriff DAVID SHOAR thought he'd hung the moon by following the advice of his handlers, includig JON KANEY, the erstwhile First Amendment lawyer whom SHOAR paid at least nearly $10,000 in tax money to advise him on the crisis of his own creation -- SHOAR's refusal to recuse himself from the homicide investigation of a well-connected deputy, whose girlfriend was shot with the deputy's gun in the deputy's house as she was packing up to leave him on September 2, 2010.
Sheriff SHOAR called Dennis Murphy in Delray Beach, Florida. Mr. Murphy is an on-air corespondent at NBC News Dateline, which had run two prior programs about his cases, by way of hagiography and puff pieces.
If Sheriff SHOAR thought Dateline would favor him, he was wrong.
Dead wrong.
Sheriff SHOAR's "sins have found him out."
In fact, on camera for the first time, SHERIFF SHOAR and Deputies JEREMY BANKS (and Deputy SCOTT O'CONNELL) all looked like liars, blinking excessively, showing deception. A federal grand jury will likely see the video and hear about through body language experts. They were lying. Blinking excessively.
Meanwhile, most (but not all) Facebook commenters thought it was a homicide.
However:
IF I were Tom Shales or Judith Crist and writing a review, I would pan the show.
It's not the New York Times, or even Frontline.
I would quote the Hal Holbrook character in the movie, "All The President's Men": "I hate shallowness." (The Woodward & Bernstein confidential source, known as "Deep Throat" later revealed to be FBI Associate Director Mark Felt, in the Parking Garage scene).
I would rant and rave about commercial TV, which I rarely ever watch.
I would talk about the dumbing-down of investigative reporting by TV, a mortal sin in my eyes.
I would talk about Dennis Murphy's weak, flabby and perhaps even inept questioning.
I might even say that Dennis Murphy needs spinal and testicular implants.
I would say that Dennis Murphy needs a Niemann fellowship and law school classes.
I would talk about his irrelevant and imperintent remark about "above the legal limit" when the victim was packing her belongings to leave Banks when she was shot, not driving a vehicle.
I would talk about how there was nothing about Deputy Banks being drunk, very drunk on September 2, 2014.
I would talk about the three (3) national crime scene experts who said not suicide and the two local experts who said homicide.
I would talk about NBC's seemingly deeply insensitive sexist, misogynist lack of interest in Officer=Involved Domestic Violence (OIDV) as a national crisis.
I would talk about Sheriff SHOAR's self-confessed "eleven major mistakes."
I would talk about the failure to question SHOAR about recusal.
I would talk about the failure to focus on obstruction of justice by the Sheriff, States' Attorneys offices and Medical Examiner.
I would talk about the unethical focus on juvenile court records.
I would talk about Sheriff SHOAR's unprofessional opinions and conduct.
I would impugn the methods, motives and choices of the NBC editors.
I would fondly remember NBC's Huntley and Brinkley of my youth.
I would slyly mention how NBC used a Toll Brothers sample home in Nocatee to film some of the witnesses, questioning whether Sheriff DAVID BERNARD SHOAR helped book it through his developer buddies -- Toll Brothers told me the arrangement was "unique" and would not be repeated, and would not rent the house to me.
I would wonder why none of the key forensic evidence was shown.
I would question the journalistic ethics violations and copyright infringements of NBC in not giving full credit due to The New York Times and PBS Frontline, and acting as if they found the story on their own.
But none of those points are pertinent today.
Not one.
Someone might someday wish to make them in the Columbia Journalism Review, or in a letter to NBC Standards and Practices.
Not me.
Not now.
Not today.
Why?
Despite flaws, the truth shown through.
You could not hide the light of truth under a bushel basket, let alone on commercial TV, separated by those pesky annoying loud commercials during Sweeps Month.
Some 140 Facebook commenters showed people saw the flawed report, and still reached the right conclusion -- it sure looks like homicide.
Even a Sheriff SHOAR-inspired commercial TV story allowed the truth to show.
DAVID BERNARD SHOAR, JEREMY BANKS and SCOTT O'CONNELL look shifty.
Their rapid eye-blinking before answering key questions is a "tell."
Their callousness is a stench in the nostrils of the Nation.
Sheriff SHOAR's lying insistance that he did no wrong is revealing.
Sheriff SHOAR appears to be a sociopath.
When I was sixteen years old and still in high school, my first psychology professor, in my very first college course, in basic psychology at Camden County College, in Blackwood, New Jersey warned us about sociopaths and psychopaths. He said many politicians fit the mold, and they could look you in the eye and lie without remorse. RICHARD NIXON was President, and we saw the evidence every day.
DAVID BERNARD SHOAR is yet another lying politician, in the spirit of RICHARD MILHOUS NIXON.
SHOAR is scarier than NIXON ever was. Why? SHOAR's much more likable than Nixon. SHOAR fools good people, liberals and Democrats included.
Thanks to Thew New York Times, PBS Frontline and now NBC Dateline:
We see right through you, Sheriff DAVID BERNARD SHOAR.
So do the American people, as evidenced by some 140 Facebook comments.
Justice for Michelle O'Connell.
Time for a federal grand jury.
Time for an inquest.
Time for an exhumation.
Time for a new Sheriff.
Be not afraid.
Time for our American President, Vice President, Attorney General, Senators and Congress to speak out and direct a federal grand jury be impannelled and sworn and take action against corruption in St. Johns County.
Time for good and decent people and groups in St. Johns County to speak out.
Time for our elected officials to speak out.
Time for citizens groups to speak out.
Time for a change!
Footnote: I am grateful that NBC Dateline did not make the one (1) mistake that PBS Frontline made (its title, "A Death in St. Augustine").
The O'Connell family told NBC to make sure not to confuse the issue by saying the death was in St. Augustine. We've made too much progress here in St. Augustine to allow our image to be besmirched in the global village by St. Johns County Sheriff DAViD BERNARD SHOAR.
Our St. Augustine City Manager, our St. Augustine Police Chief (and St. Augustine Beach Police Chief) would ALL have recused themselves from investigating one of their own officers.
So would the late Sheriff NEIL PERRY.
Only Sheriff DAVID BERNARD SHOAR, advised by willful men like WILLIAM BRUCE HARRISS, our ex-City Manager, would investigate an OIDV shooting involving one of his own officers.
Justice for Michelle O'Connell.
Now.
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