Commission, Administrator, Duck My Questions on County Administrator HUNTER SINCLAIR CONRAD Conflict of Interest

August 27, 2021 post, lightly updated: November 18, 2024:

Controversial HUNTER SINCLAIR CONRAD,  Johns County Administrator should not have been. a voting member of the County Commission hiring committee involved in picking new County Attorney,

No response yet from St. Johns County Administrator HUNTER SINCLAIR CONRAD, a politician named as unindicted "Clerk E" for taking $8000 in campaign contributions that were intended as a bribe in federal indictment of DONALD DONAGHER, JR. and PENN CREDIT, INC.

All-white, all-male, all-Republican Commissioners hired this ethically-challenged hobbledehoy without his disclosing his $8000 in questionable campaign contributions listed in indictment.  There was NO background check, posting or advertising. No somen or minorities were considered.

This other-directed kid said to me in the men's room, in recess during Budget Hearing on May 25, 2021, "I don't have to answer your questions." How gauche and louche.  His hubristic hauteur led to his abrupt resignation, weeks after being given a contract renewal in 2023. Wonder why?

Call him HUNTER "DUCKS" CONRAD?

Here's the e-mail I sent the members of the Hiring Committeee the morning of August 26:

From: Ed Slavin <easlavin@aol.com>
To: bcc5hdean@sjcfl.us <bcc5hdean@sjcfl.us>; bcc2jsmith@sjcfl.us <bcc2jsmith@sjcfl.us>; hconrad@sjcfl.us <hconrad@sjcfl.us>
Cc: bcc1cwhitehurst@sjcfl.us <bcc1cwhitehurst@sjcfl.us>; bcc3pwaldron@sjcfl.us <bcc3pwaldron@sjcfl.us>; bcc4jblocker@sfjcfl.us <bcc4jblocker@sfjcfl.us>; pmccormack@sjcfl.us <pmccormack@sjcfl.us>; ankersen@law.ufl.edu<ankersen@law.ufl.edu>; little@law.ufl.edu <little@law.ufl.edu>; mills@law.ufl.edu <mills@law.ufl.edu>; tommcfarlandlaw@gmail.com <tommcfarlandlaw@gmail.com>; davihelddmigut@gmail.com <davihelddmigut@gmail.com>; kjsanders@kjslawpa.com <kjsanders@kjslawpa.com>; klancke.caroline@leg.state.fl.us <klancke.caroline@leg.state.fl.us>; staylor@sjcfl.us <staylor@sjcfl.us>; sheltonhull@gmail.com <sheltonhull@gmail.com>; sheldon.gardner@staugustine.com <sheldon.gardner@staugustine.com>; waltbog@aol.com <waltbog@aol.com>
Sent: Thu, Aug 26, 2021 7:28 am
Subject: County Administrator Hunter Sinclair Conrad Should Not Get to Vote on County Attorney Hiring Committee

Dear Commissioners Dean and Smith and Mr. Conrad:

1. The St. Johns County Administrator should not be a violing member of the County Attorney Hiring Committee.
   
2. The County Attorney is a direct report to BoCC.
3. The County Attorney is one of only two direct reports to BOCC, the other being the County Administrator.
4. The new County Attorney must not be beholden to the County Administrator for his job.
5. The County Attorney gives legal advice that can contradict or disagree with the County Administrator, or even result in the Administrator's termination or in his contract not being renewed, e.g., as a result of certain events alleged in a federal criminal indictment in Chicago, where $8000 in campaign contributions to Mr. Conrad ("Clerk E") were allegedly intended as a bribe. The federal criminal case may soon conclude in guilty pleas by Defendants Donald Donagher and Penn Credit, Inc.
6. The County Attorney works for BoCC, not the County Administrator.
7. The new County Attorney's independence and integrity must be zealously protected, ab initio. 
8. 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."   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." 
9. 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 . . . ."
10. The 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, 102 U.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.")
11. 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). 
12. The County Administrator's conflict of interest in being invited to vote on County Attorney hiring is the sort that Anglo-American courts have been protecting us against for some 411 years. since at least 1610. Dr. Bonham's case, supra; Tumey v. Ohio, 273 U.S. 510, 522-24 (1927) (Taft, C.J.).  See also Laird v. Tatum, 409 U.S. 824, 828 (1972) (Rehnquist, J.), holding that it is well-settled that a government official is disqualified from ruling on a case "if [s]he either signs a pleading or brief" or "if he actively participated in any case. 
13. Mr. Conrad has been embroiled by BoCC in an appearance of impropriety and a conflict of interest. He should no longer be involved in choosing a co-equal in our County government. 
14. It is plain wrong. 
15. Being a "team player" is not a bona fide occupational qualification in hiring a County Attorney.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.

Thank you.

With kindest regards, I am,

Sincerely yours,

Ed Slavin

904-377-4998

www.cleanupcityofstaugustine.blogspot.com

www.edslavin.com