Anyone who has ever watched reruns of the 1965-1971 CBS tv comedy series, "Hogan's Heroes.", will remember the catchphrase of the comedic John Banner character, Sgt. HANS GEORG SCHULTZ "I hear nothing, I see nothing, I know nothing! I know nothing. Nothing!"). Here in St. Johns County, amid massive deforestation, overdevelopment, and corruption, unjust stewards like juvenile joyless "JOY" ANDREWS, our maladroit county Administrator, cats paw Commissioners like SARAH ARNOLD and CHRISTIAN WHITEHURST, and their accomplices, including Deputy County Administrator JESSE DUNN, Growth Management (sic) Director MICHAEL ROBERSON, et al. all remind us of Sgt. HANS GEORG SCHULTZ:
Ask questions. Demand answers. Expect democracy. Come speak out at our next St. Johns County Commission meeting, which will be held at 5 PM, Tuesday May 20, 2025 at our St. Johns County Commission Auditorium, 500 Sebastian View (Taj Mahal).
Be prepared.
Be prepared to address efforts to weaken our County Comprehensive Plan, pushed by developers and their lobbyists. St. Johns County is so other-directed that we don't even have a lobbyist disclosure ordinance, and the job of County Attorney has now been outsourced to a corporate law firm, BRADLEY, GARRISON & KOMANDO, P.A. by 3-2 vote,
BRADLEY, GARRISON & KOMANDO, P.A. is a dodgy corporate law firm that is co-owed by the next Florida House Speaker, SAMUEL PAUL GARRISON, and by former State Senator ROBERT MILNER BRADLEY, JR., a lawyer lobbyist who co-owns OAK STRATEGIES, lobbyist for FOUNTAINEBLEAU DEVELOPMENT, operator of casinos and high-rise complexes.
(more)xxx
52 comments:
Be prepared, be prepared for a suit by a defamed group of citizens. Be prepared to offer actual proof and evidence for "dodgy" and "hiring BECAUSE friends" and"unethical practices." The First Amendment covers lies and defamation? What scoundrel lies about people and hides behind our Constitution? How will you pay the punitive damages?
1. I have a sacred First Amendment right to criticize, editorialize and analyze St. Johns County development decisions. See New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254 (1964) and progeny.
2. The First Amendment, in its majesty, supports our right to speak out about public issues. Florida has a strong anti-SLAPP law. Florida’s Expanded Anti-SLAPP Law: More Protection for Targeted Speakers
Florida’s Expanded Anti-SLAPP Law: More Protection for Targeted Speakers
The 2015 Florida Legislature’s passage of C.S./S.B. 13121 expands the state’s anti-SLAPP provisions giving court...
3. We, the People have a Right to Know about our County government.
4. We have inalienable rights to criticize governments, including domination by developers and hiring a corporate law firm to be our County Attorney
5. We have a. right to report, to comment and to editorialize to criticize and to parody SJC government misfeasance, malfeasance, nonfeasance, flummery, dupery and nincompoopery.
6. "Pete" asserts that he, she or it is not a lawyer.
7. "Pete" claims that is not associated with developers.
8. Who among us believes it?
9. Sock puppets have no standing to sue.
10. "Pete" has never identified anything libelous.
11. Evidently, they don't teach law at Trump University.
12. In 1983, then-Sheriff of Anderson County Tennessee Dennis Owen Trotter once threatened a libel lawsuit against my publisher, Ernest F. Phillips, me and our Appalachian Observer newspaper in Clinton, Tennessee.
13. He did not scare me.
14. "Pete" does not scare ne,
15. Trotter's bail bonding co-felons sued me, serving me with a million dollar libel lawsuit on the morning of my first law school exam (Torts) at Memphis State.
16. It did not go well for them.
17. USDOJ and FBI investigated, indicted, arrested and imprisoned Trotter, his Chief Deputy, four drug dealers, three bail bondsmen and Interstate Bonding Company.
18. Sheriff Trotter was caught red-handed selling drugs from the evidence locker at the Anderson County Jail, including cocaine, quaaludes and synthetic heroin..
19. Interstate Bonding Company and three bail bondsmen admitted in federal court that they bribed Trotter $10,633.50 (10%) to get bail bonding business in Anderson County Jail.
20. Upon my being sued, in response to their bogus claims of libel, I promptly sued Trotter and the bail bondsmen.
21. Sheriff Trotter, the three bail bondsmen and Interstate Bonding Company all settled with me out of court when I counter-sued them for RICO, Civil Rights violations, malicious prosecution of a civil lawsuit, abuse of civil process and outrageous conduct
22. Sock puppet "Pete," who are you?
23. What is your interest?
24. Why are you so thin-skinned about this blog?
25. In November, 2006, there was thunderous applause by St. Augustine City Commissioners, staff and cronies in a City Commission meeting when the Mayor of St. Augustine read a prepared statement that publicly attacked me for disclosing and reporting to federal officials the City's illegal dumping of a landfill in a lake,
26. As the St. Augustine Record editorialized in my defense on November 19, 2006, "we suggest you get thicker skins." Editorial: Always important to stick to your guns.
27. The City was fined by FDEP.
28. Some 40,000 cubic yards of illegally dumped contaminated solid waste has now been removed from our Old City Reservoir.
29. See the November 19, 2006 St. Augustine Record Editorial: :"Always important to stick to your guns
St. Augustine Record Editorial: Always important to stick to your guns." Supportive letters and columns in the Record defended my rights to speak out here, including those from EPA Inspector General Senior Special Agent Robert E. Tyndall, former U.S. Department of Labor Chief Administrative Law Judge Nahum Litt, Hanford Nuclear Weapons Plant whistleblower Edwin L. Bricker, et al,
30. Nothing that perseverating "Pete" writes in comments on this blog has ever showed any knowledge of First Amendment law, strongly suggesting that he/she/it is a blowhard, utterly uneducated, unsophisticated and uninformed -- a bumptious bigoted bully with a keyboard.
30. Does Anonymouse "Pete" sound like an anti-literate energumen, like the City Hall crowd that applauded and cheered the then-Mayor's attack on November 13, 2006? You tell me. Go away, troll.
Thank you.
With kindest regards, I am,
Sincerely yours,
Ed Slavin
Box 3084
St. Augustine, Florida 32085-3084
www.edslavin.com
http://www.cleanupcityofstaugustine.blogspot.com
http://www.staugustgreen.com
(904) 377-4998
The 2024 Florida Statutes (including 2025 Special Session C)
Title XLV
TORTS
Chapter 768
NEGLIGENCE
View Entire Chapter
768.295 Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation (SLAPP) prohibited.—
(1) It is the intent of the Legislature to protect the right in Florida to exercise the rights of free speech in connection with public issues, and the rights to peacefully assemble, instruct representatives, and petition for redress of grievances before the various governmental entities of this state as protected by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution and s. 5, Art. I of the State Constitution. It is the public policy of this state that a person or governmental entity not engage in SLAPP suits because such actions are inconsistent with the right of persons to exercise such constitutional rights of free speech in connection with public issues. Therefore, the Legislature finds and declares that prohibiting such lawsuits as herein described will preserve this fundamental state policy, preserve the constitutional rights of persons in Florida, and assure the continuation of representative government in this state. It is the intent of the Legislature that such lawsuits be expeditiously disposed of by the courts.
(2) As used in this section, the phrase or term:
(a) “Free speech in connection with public issues” means any written or oral statement that is protected under applicable law and is made before a governmental entity in connection with an issue under consideration or review by a governmental entity, or is made in or in connection with a play, movie, television program, radio broadcast, audiovisual work, book, magazine article, musical work, news report, or other similar work.
(b) “Governmental entity” or “government entity” means the state, including the executive, legislative, and the judicial branches of government and the independent establishments of the state, counties, municipalities, corporations primarily acting as instrumentalities of the state, counties, or municipalities, districts, authorities, boards, commissions, or any agencies thereof.
(3) A person or governmental entity in this state may not file or cause to be filed, through its employees or agents, any lawsuit, cause of action, claim, cross-claim, or counterclaim against another person or entity without merit and primarily because such person or entity has exercised the constitutional right of free speech in connection with a public issue, or right to peacefully assemble, to instruct representatives of government, or to petition for redress of grievances before the various governmental entities of this state, as protected by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution and s. 5, Art. I of the State Constitution.
(4) A person or entity sued by a governmental entity or another person in violation of this section has a right to an expeditious resolution of a claim that the suit is in violation of this section. A person or entity may move the court for an order dismissing the action or granting final judgment in favor of that person or entity. The person or entity may file a motion for summary judgment, together with supplemental affidavits, seeking a determination that the claimant’s or governmental entity’s lawsuit has been brought in violation of this section. The claimant or governmental entity shall thereafter file a response and any supplemental affidavits. As soon as practicable, the court shall set a hearing on the motion, which shall be held at the earliest possible time after the filing of the claimant’s or governmental entity’s response. The court may award, subject to the limitations in s. 768.28, the party sued by a governmental entity actual damages arising from a governmental entity’s violation of this section. The court shall award the prevailing party reasonable attorney fees and costs incurred in connection with a claim that an action was filed in violation of this section.
(5) In any case filed by a governmental entity which is found by a court to be in violation of this section, the governmental entity shall report such finding and provide a copy of the court’s order to the Attorney General no later than 30 days after such order is final. The Attorney General shall report any violation of this section by a governmental entity to the Cabinet, the President of the Senate, and the Speaker of the House of Representatives. A copy of such report shall be provided to the affected governmental entity.
History.—s. 1, ch. 2000-174; s. 1, ch. 2015-70.
There is no "right to libel, slander, and defamation." If your statements are untrue and bring damage to an entity then you can be sued period.
First Amendment protected speech and the law covers TRUE INFORMATION...not deliberately disseminated false information that could cause harm to a person or business. That's certainly not protected activity. Your only defense here is mental health my friend. Keep it up. You open yourself up to suit.
Just because the commission hired one guy to do some work for the county doesn't mean the whole firm is part of St Johns County government and you spread false information about them and defame anyone under the roof... that's certainly not protected speech. The First Amendment covers true information, it's not meant to facilitate damaging libel, defamation, and slander.
So who says they were "defamed" by an opinion? Opinions are protected. Editorials are protected. "Pete" sounds like an effete developer fanboy or fangirl. "Pete' has an authoritarian personality, like the City Manager in St. Augustine who deposited a landfill in a lake, and misled the Mayor and Commissioners about it, claiming 40,000 cubic yards of contaminated solid waste was "clean fill." "Clean fill" does not include bed springs. "Clean fill" does not include toilets. Chatty Cathy "Pete" is utterly uninformed, without substance, and and has posted hundreds of times on this blog. What has "Pete" ever done to make our town and our County a better place? He's all over the road, bloviating pomposities. Pray for "Pete" to find peace. Maybe "Pete" needs a hobby.
No false statements have been identified by pestiferous perseverating "Pete." The First Amendment, in its majesty, protects our right to express our opinions. We, the People, have triumphed dozens of times in public interest victories here since 2005. "Pete" makes repeated material false statements accusing me of libel, unadorned by any citation to law or any examples of false statements. "Pete" should read law before expressing opinions about our protected activity. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution
In response to an authoritarian arrogant California Sheriff and prosecutor, Senator Robert F. Kennedy said, "I suggest you read the Constitution of the United States."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G66myWragTg
Says ME because YOU haven't offered actual proof or evidence for your claims.. only simply repeating the claims when asked for actual proof and evidence for them.
Yeah you have. You're accusing them of being puppets and involved in something unethical and saying that people are dodgy and disreputable. Those people did nothing but be tasked by the commission to represent the county if needed. Your qualm is with the commission, not the people who you are taking your frustration out on.
Does the First Amendment cover yelling "bomb" in a theater or defaming people because you don't agree with a decision that they didn't even make? At least this could be considered trash journalism and dishonesty.
Who prepared the violent, bloody imagery depicting four wonderful women (two Commissioners and two citizen activists?
That's not protected activity.
Who raises specious accusations of "libel" and "defamation" without identify itself/himself/herself?
Who threatened criminal prosecution in retaliation for First Amendment protected activity?
Who is this sock puppet, "Pete' who has posted hundreds of times on this blog in defense of the politicians' law firm, hired as County Attorney?
What is the interest of the poster who once called himself "Pete Komando" in the hiring of a corporate law firm by 3-2 vote to be St. Johns County Attorney?
Asked for a list of his non-governmental clients by Commissioner Ann Taylor, then Interim County Attorney RICHARD CHRISTIAN KOMANDO refused to disclose them, with a snooty attitude.
KOMANDO never disclosed clients whose names appear in court dockets. Their identities were not confidential. KOMANDO misled County Commissioner Ann Taylor about legal ethics requirements.
Did KOMANDO brag to people that he already had three votes? Did KOMANDO and the law firm of BRADLEY, GARRISON & KOMANDO, P..A. mislead Commissioners, submitting a contract to hire their law firm, and not KOMANDO, as Interim County Attorney?
On April 15, 2025, KOMANDO told Commissioners that he had never represented a developer.
In fact, the head partner in his BRADLEY, GARRISON & KOMANDO, P.A. law firm is ex-Senator ROBERT MILNER BRADLEY Jr, who owns OAK STRATEGIES, a lobbying firm, which represents developer FOUNTAINEBLEAU DEVELOPMENT, a developer of high-rises and casinos. Ex-Senator BRADLEY is also married to Senator JENNIFER BRADLEY. Ex-Senator Senator BRADLEY is Chair of the St. Johns River Water Management District through 2028.
St. Johns County Commissioner CLAY MURPHY, a former law enforcement officer, was unaware of FOUNTAINEBLEAU DEVELOPMENT being represented by the lobbying firm of Senator BRADLEY, partner in the law firm MURPHY and Commissioners CHRISTIAN WHITEHURST and SARAH ARNOLD selected to be our County Attorney.
In hiring BGK law firm, our County Commissioners were snookered.
Whiny sock puppet "Pete" has repeatedly said their judgment is not to be questioned, as if it were holy writ. I would hope that our Commissioners would engage in an agonizing reappraisal of their rash decision.
Character counts.
Come speak to St. Johns County Commission, Tuesday, May 20, 2025 at 5 PM. Speak out in favor of honesty, ethics and ending and extirpating conflicts of interest in St. Johns County.
As I wrote our St. Johns County Board of County Commissioners on March 17, 2025 (items renumbered):
1. Conflicts of interest must be scrupulously guarded against. See, e.g., United States v. Mississippi Valley Generating Co., 364 U.S. 520, 548 (1961)("the 'Dixon-Yates' case," involving TVA rivals' conflicts of interest in a proposed Memphis coal-fired powerplant), citing Matthew 6:24 -- "no [person] can serve two masters," holding that laws and rules preventing conflicts of interest are aimed "not only at dishonor but at conduct that tempts dishonor."
2. All conflict of interest laws are based upon Matthew 6:24 ("A man cannot serve two masters"), which the unanimous Supreme Court decision by Chief Justice Earl Warren deemed to be both a "moral principle" and a "maxim which is especially pertinent if one of the masters happens to be economic self-interest."
3. {Speaker-elect SAM GARRISON's law partner] Mr. [RICHARD CHRISTIAN] KOMANDO unilaterally refuses to disclose the identity of his law firm clients, not client confidences. His overbearing assertion of privilege is unadorned by any citation to any court or ethics opinions on lawyers who are government employees. This flunks the "laugh test." It also flunks the "smell test." Mr. KOMANDO said he would not apply for the permanent County attorney position. Now, aving applied for the permanent position, Mr. KOMANDO is in no position to withhold information that is materially relevant to his suitability to be our St. Johns County Attorney. Mr. KOMANDO is acting as if he were the judge in his own case. This is so wrong.
4. James Madison wrote in The Federalist No. 10: "No [person] is allowed to be a judge in [his/her] own cause, because his interest would certainly bias his judgment, and, not improbably, corrupt his integrity. With equal, nay with greater reason, a body of men are unfit to be both judges and parties at the same time . . . ."
5. The United States Supreme Court held in In re Murchison, 349 U.S. 133, 136 (1955) (Black, J.), "[O]ur system of law has always endeavored to prevent even the probability of unfairness. To this end no man can be a judge in his own case and no man is permitted to try cases where he has an interest in the outcome." See also TWA v. Civil Aeronautics Board, 102U.S. App. D.C. 391, 392, 254 F.2d 90, 91 (1958). Spencer v. Lapsley, 20 How. 264, 266 (1858); Publius Syrus, Moral Sayings 51 (D. Lyman transl. 1856) ("No one should be judge in his own cause."); Blaise Pascal, Thoughts, Letters and Opuscules 182 (Wight transl. 1859) ("It is not permitted to the most equitable of men to be a judge in his own cause."). As William Blackstone wrote, "[I]t is unreasonable that any man should determine his own quarrel," 1 W. Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England 91 citing Dr. Bonham's Case, 8 Rep. 114a (C.P. 1610); see also City of London v. Wood, 12 Mod. 669, 687 (1701)(Lord Holt)(invalidating fine for refusal to serve as sheriff recovered by the city in its own court of Mayor and Aldermen). See also Aetna Life Ins. Co. v. Lavoie, 475 U.S. 813 (1986)(overruling case where Chief Justice of Alabama Supreme Court wrongfully sat in judgment of case that would set precedent for his own pending case); Ward v. Village of Monroeville, 409 U.S. 57 (1972); Gibson v. Berryhill, 411 U.S. 564 (1973); Withrow v. Larkin, 421 U.S. 35 (1975); Cinderella Career and Finishing Schools, Inc. v. FTC, 425 F.2d 583 (D.C. Cir. 1970); American Cyanamid Co. v. FTC, 363 F.2d 757 (6th Cir. 1966); SCA Services, Inc. v. Morgan, 557 F.2d 110 (7th Cir.1977).
6. Being a secretive developer "team player" is not a bona fide occupational qualification in hiring a County Attorney.
7. No "team players" are desired or required here. "Team player" is freighted with the speech-chilling implication that one is willing to "go along to get along," say what management wants to hear, and do what one is told by managers, no matter what the ethics or legality of the situation. In the political corruption case of United States v. Salvatti, 451 F.Supp. 195, 197-98 (E.D. Pa. 1978), one witness testified that "when she complained to the Mayor about Mr. Carroll's pressure, and advised him that the proposed payment to the Sylks would be totally improper and probably illegal, the Mayor chided her for not being a team player." See also Fitzgerald v. Seamans, 384 F.Supp. 688,697n7 (D.D.C. 1974), affirmed, 553 F.2d 220, 224 (D.C. Cir. 1977), reversed, Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800 (1982); Nixon v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 731 (1982) (remarks of President Nixon et al. on need to fire heroic Department of Defense whistleblower A. Ernest Fitzgerald after he testified truthfully before Congress on C-5A transport cost overruns, with Nixon saying Mr. Fitzgerald was "not a team player"); Broderick v. Ruder, 685 F.Supp. 1269 (D.D.C. 1988)(sexual harassment at Securities and Exchange Commission); Tomsic v. State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Co, 85 F.3d 1472, 1474 (10th Cir. 1996); Geddes v. Benefits Review Board, 735 F.2d 1412, 1416, 1420 (D.C. Cir. 1984) (Washington Metropolitan Transportation Authority considered workers' compensation claimant not a "team player"); Davis v. California, 1996 WL 271001 (E.D.Cal.1996); Schloesser v. Kansas Dept. of Health & Environment, 766 F.Supp. 984 (D. Kansas 1991); Stradford v. Rockwell International, 48 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. (BNA) 697, 49 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 38,828,1988 WL 159939 (S.D.Ohio); Seymour M. Hersh, "Annals of National Security: The Intelligence Gap -- How the digital age left our spies out in the cold," The New Yorker, December 6, 1999 at 58, 62.
8. Commissioners, please feel free to call me to discuss.
You're only posting your own comments Slavin. I've posted responses and you're not posting them only your own babbling nonsense over and over again. You've defamed people and won't own up. Just no insight.
You aren't being honest here and you won't be there either. I've asked you for proof and evidence for what you're talking about and you've not given me one single bit.
He doesn't have to give his attorney client privileged information to you or anyone else to get a job working for the county. In fact, he did get the job and it's over and done with. Get over it... move to Afghanistan if you don't like democracy man.
Yes character counts. Tell me what sort of character tries to shield libel and defamation with the Constitution. I tell you a scoundrel does that. Give proof and evidence for your claims NOW!!!!!
Not "privileged."
The names of BGK's corporate clients are not classified, not UCNI and not privileged.
Their names appear in Courthouse records and docket sheets, like KOMANDO's corporate criminal clients, the SLAUGHTER BROTHERS, convicted of tax fraud and workers' compensation fraud, reported in the Times-Union. At the same time KOMANDO was our County Attorney, he was representing corporate criminal fraudfeasors.
On behalf of BGK, "Pete" is overbearing.
Who is "Pete?"
Crickets.
Who is "Pete?" What is his relationship with BGK? What is his interest? What is his "expertise? What agreements, understandings and relationships does his petty, pestilential, perseverating poster have? Why so chauvinistic as to tell me, repeatedly where to move? "Why do the heathen rage?" (Psalm 2). Pray for "Pete" to try tolerance. His hatred of criticism of SJC and BGK is a stench in the nostrils of our Nation.
I will continue to speak out against this outrageous SJC BGK hiring decision. It contaminates all of the good work that our County Commissioners try to do.
To perseverating unpersuasive pitiful poltooonish "Pete": you "get over it, troll!
Troll my ass. You're making exaggerated and bogus claims on the internet. You are the troll and calling defamation "free speech" while not posting comments on this website. You're a confused man with degraded insight.
Crickets my ass you're a liar. You're not posting my comments. Are you incompetent or just mentally unwell? Are you drinking?
"Pete" his kind have only one value -- "the love of money," which is "the root of all evil." (1 Timothy 6:10)
"Pete" and his cruel kind have only one "value" -- "the love of money," which is "the root of all evil." (1 Timothy 6:10). Pray for them.
Voltaire said, "Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities." Enough atrocities. Enough corruption. Enough clear-cutting. Let's register lobbyists. Let's record all meetings between Commissioners and landowners. "Say goodnight,": graceless.
Absurdity like walking on water, virgin birth, and resurrection with ascension into the sky? How many people do you know who believe in that nonsense? Give them the quote you just gave me. Or would that be "bigotry."🤡
Post a Comment