GOVERNOR RICHARD SCOTT GOOFS, Gives "Citizen" Rep. on Florida Criminal Justice Standards Commission to Former City Manager WILLIAM BARRY HARRISS

Messrs. Charles Jones, David Frisby, Howard Elliott, J. Scott Purdy, Patrick Halperin and Ms. Pauline Robinson all in good faith applied for the job of the one citizen member of the Florida Criminal Justice Standards Commission (CJSTC), out of nineteen (19) members.

Instead, Governor Richard Scott may have inadvertently given the one (1) citizen representative spot to an ineligible appointee, controversial former City of St. Augustine City Manager WILLIAM BARRY HARRISS (whose three references were Commissioners Donald Crichlow, Mayor Joseph Boles, Jr., and City Attorney Ronald Wayne Brown).

WILLIAM BARRY HARRISS stated in his applicatio that he has been a reserve Sheriff Deputy for 24 years and Florida Secretary of State records show that HARRISS is Chairman of the "St. Johns County Sheriff's Office Four Star Association, Inc.," working with and for SHERIFF DAVID SHOAR.

City of St. Augustine records show that HARRISS receives more than $109,000/year in retirement from the City of St. Augustine. WILLIAM BARRY HARRISS now works for Sheriff David Shoar, whom HARRISS mentored and help get elected Sheriff in 2004, helping raise $250,000.

Now both WILLIAM HARRISS and Sheriff DAVID SHOAR both serve on CJSTC -- both are from the St. Johns County Sheriff's Office -- the same employing agency. Thus, it strongly appears that WILLIAM BARRY HARRISS may be ineligible for the Criminal Justice Standards and Training Commission "citizen" position to which Governor Richard Scott appointed him. Why? Under two (2) separate subsections of Florida law, CJSCTC membership is prohbited. There can be only one person per employing agency (except the state prison system) F.S. 943.11(1)(b), and the "citizen" member cannot be a law enforcement officer eligible for appointment as such, F.S. 943.11(1)(a).

I have reported the facts to the Governor's Appointments Office and await comment.

What do you reckon?

Update, September 20, 2013: no response from the Governor's Appointments Office.

Meanwhile, a ululating FDLE lawyer, PHIL LINDLEY, has hung up the telephone on me three (3) times, while the "Anonymice" at FDLE send unsigned letters demanding $300 (or $4500) to search for records between CJSTC (or all of FDLE) since August 2, 2013. LINDLEY is the nastiest, most lugubrious goober I've ever dealt with in government on an Open Records or FOIA request in 39 years (other than WILLIAM BARRY HARRISS himself, who threatened to have me arrested for "disorderly conduct" when I first spoke to St. Augustine City Commissioners April 11, 2005, asking that they stop violating the Fifteenth Amendment by annexing white residential areas, but not annexing the historically African-American areas of West Augustine located outside city limits.

HARRISS' influence still extends to Tallahassee, which we knew during 2006, when he avoided and evaded indictment and trial for illegal dumping of 40,000 cubic yards of solid waste in our Old City Reservoir.

HARRISS and LINDLEY are two of a kind: We wear their scorn as a badge of honor.