Article IV, Section 7, of our Florida Constitution states:
SECTION 7. Suspensions; filling office during suspensions.—(a) By executive order stating the grounds and filed with the custodian of state records, the governor may suspend from office any state officer not subject to impeachment, any officer of the militia not in the active service of the United States, or any county officer, for malfeasance, misfeasance, neglect of duty, drunkenness, incompetence, permanent inability to perform official duties, or commission of a felony, and may fill the office by appointment for the period of suspension. The suspended officer may at any time before removal be reinstated by the governor.
(b) The senate may, in proceedings prescribed by law, remove from office or reinstate the suspended official and for such purpose the senate may be convened in special session by its president or by a majority of its membership.
(c) By order of the governor any elected municipal officer indicted for crime may be suspended from office until acquitted and the office filled by appointment for the period of suspension, not to extend beyond the term, unless these powers are vested elsewhere by law or the municipal charter.
In 1970, Florida Governor Claude Kirk, Jr. removed corrupt St. Johns County Sheriff LAWRENCE O. DAVIS, and the Florida Senate upheld the removal by vote of 44-2. They did so despite a St. Johns County jury's seven mnute deliberations before finding DAVIS "not guilty." St. Johns County Sheriff DAVID SHOAR's website actually claims the State Senate "exonerated" DAVIS. More lies. Those same lies -- and false statements that Sheriff LAWRENCE DAVIS somehow "held the town together" in 1964 and that Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was arrested here by "federal agents" were on Sheriff DAVID SHOAR's website on August 28, 2013 the fiftieth anniversary of Dr. King's "I have a dream speech." Sheriff DAVID SHOAR's brother-in-law, Commander Charles Mulligan (his press spokesman, natch), wrote me that the SJCSO's "by federal agents" lie was a "typo!" He would not explain. The "federal agents" lie has since been removed. The rest of the sickening paen to DAVIS remains. The paen to DAVS is word-for-word from what former Sheriff NEIL PERRY distributed in an amateurish non-book prepared in 1995. Quick review -- three Sheriff SHOAR website lies about Sheriff DAVIS: One: DAVIS was a crook, he was removed by the Governor, and his removal was upheld by the Florida Senate, which fired him by vote of 44-2. Two: Sheriff DAVIS did not "hold the town together," he was a KKK member and sympathizer who violated civil rights. Three: Dr. King was never arrested anywhere by "federal agents."
Like Governor Claude Kirk before him, who rightly removed corrupt Sheriff LAWRENCE O. DAVIS, Florida Governor RICHARD SCOTT has those same constitutional powers to suspend Sherff DAVID B. SHOAR for misconduct in office, pending invstigation. See Article IV, Section 7, above. Governor SCOTT should use it as a result of the unrebutted New York Times and PBS Frontline revelations about SHOAR's misconduct in office in connection with the Michelle O'Connell shooting case. The Governor could sign a document complying with Article IV, Section 7 of the Florida Constitution, suspending SHOAR for malfeasance, misfeasance, neglect of duty," and "incompetence."
No one among us disagrees: St. Johns County Sheriff DAVID SHOAR should have recused himself on September 2, 2010 when deputies were called to the home of a fellow deputy, whose girlfriend was shot with the deputy's own SJCSO weapon.
Every single thing that happened after that bad decision is the sequelae of bad judgment. The police chiefs of St. Augustine and St. Augustine Beach would both have recused themselves. So would anyone else with any sense of ethics. Or any heart, soul or brains at all.
For the record: Sheriff DAVID SHOAR worked his way college, earning three degrees. He has an M.A. in Public Administration, graduated from two FBI academies, and has a Public Administration award at Flagler College named after him. He's well read. He's not stupid -- smug Sheriff DAVID SHOAR is ethically challenged, like disgraced President RICHARD MILHOUS NIXON. Like NIXON, SHOAR thinks we're stupid. He's wrong.
So, instead of recusing himself, Sheriff SHOAR has embarassed St. Johns County residents in the eyes of the entire world.
To say that Sheriff SHOAR's corruption is bad for tourism is hardly necessary -- it is bad for everyone living in St. Johns County. Do you in the County feel safe knowing such unethical behavior exists?
Sherff DAVID SHOAR aggressively embroiled his own career and his entire department n a full-throated defense of one of his deputies, obstructing justice, attacking FDLE, libelling witnesses, firing truth-tellers, coercing, restraining and chilling First Amendment protected activity, threatening journalists, and generally showing himself to be a narcissistic noisome public nuisance.
Sheriff SHOAR is a stench in the nostrils of our Nation.
As seen in the PBS Frontline story's conclusion, Sheriff SHOAR actually asked deputies to give a standing ovation to the deputy in quo -- and had himself videotaped doing so. "Let's give these two guys a hand," indeed!
This DAVID B. SHOAR "selfie" is rank and fetid. It ranks among the rank and fetid down there with RICHARD MILHOUS NIXON's own self-tape recorded White House depravities, which Nixon's disgraced Attorney General JOHN NEWTON MITCHELL (a convicted felon) rightly called "White House horrors."
So, what is to be done? What do we do about Sheriff's Department "horrors?"
First, we must ask Sheriff SHOAR, in the words of lawyer Joseph Welch during the Army-McCarthy hearings, "At long last sir, have you no sense of decency?" Will he resign? I doubt it.
Second, the Justice Department needs to subpoena SHOAR before a Federal Grand Jury.
The FBI and Justice Department have the power to investigate criminal civil rights violations, as they have done in the Los Angeles County, California Sheriff's Department, indicting officers for obstruction of justice and brutality.
The FBI and Justice Department have the power to investigate materially false statements to law enforcement, as they did in the case of Martha Stewart. Sheriff SHOAR sent his materially false and misleading attacks on witnesses and FDLE to the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department, with the intention of causing harm to FDLE agents for doing their job.
The FBI and Justice Department must get to work.
False statements to federal officials are serious felonies. So are civil rights voilations under color of state law. So is obstruction of justice.
The Florida Times-Union editorial (reprinted below), "Too many questions remain in death of deputy's girlfried (sic)," complete with headline typo, nearly hits the mark.
"Too many questions....?" That's an understatement. An investigation and inquest are both required. But that's not all, folks. Federal investigation is mandatory.
Further state investigations could be a snare and a delusion -- Sheriff SHOAR has requested one of the FDLE agents, remember, T-U?
So we're expecting what from the State now, T-U?
T-U to the contrry, I seriously doubt that anything will ever be done about SHERIFF SHOAR by our disreputable "Fifth Amendment" Florida Governor RICHARD SCOTT.
Again, SCOTT has appointed to the Florida Criminal Justice Standards and Training Commission BOTH DAVID B. SHOR AND SHOAR's mendacious mentor, tatterdemalion former St. Augustine Ciy Manager WILLIAM B. HARRISS (supposedly the only citizen representative out of nineteen members, he actually works for SJCSCO).
I do so hope I'm wrong about SCOTT's response on Sheriff SHOAR. But I would not heavily mortgage my time looking for Governor RICHARD SCOTT to do much of anything about SHOAR -- he is "all hat and no cattle."
Our corrupt Sunshine state government's longstanding one-party misrule (first by segregationist Democrats, now by corporativist Republicans) after all these yearsssis still centered on electoral gerrymandering, voter suppression, and developer cash. Florida is still run by narcissistic super-sized egos (like the maladroit, ethically impaired RICHARD SCOTT, and DAVID SHOAR).
Expecting one other-directed Florida Republican politican to attack another is not unlike expecting rattlesnakes to bite each other -- wouldn't that be a violation of poitical norms and "professional courtesy?"
Two Florida State's Attorneys have been part of the O'Connell case bungling and coverup. Shall we try for a third? Why bother? This is like Mississipi in 1963-64, as popularized in Mississippi Burning (and Ghosts of Mississippi).
To remedy St. Johns County's "Wild West" corruption and vile, retaliatory, sexist, misogynist racist hostile working environment of the St. Johns County Sheriff's Department requires federal action.
Possible federal crimes are at issue.
Federal action was required in 1964 in Mississippi and here, where Sheriff LAWRENCE O. DAVIS (praised on SHOAR's website for his racist actions in 1964, which SHOAR says somehow "held the town together") handed out deputy badges to HOSS MANUCY and other KKK members (and his deputies formed a considerble corps of KKK support here). Courageous United States District Judge BRYAN SIMPSON ordered deputies fired and KKK members were outed and ousted.
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder must convene a Federal Grand Jury pursuant to Rule 6 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, subpoena witnessese, obtain evidence and find and publish the truth about the St. JOHNS COUNTY SHERIFF.
Expect sweeping indictments.
Let justice be done.
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