Blackwell protected coke-snortin', armed-robbin' felon on his staff
Submitted by bryan on Tue, 10/24/2006 - 6:52am.
Kenny “Belt-buckle” Blackwell protected a Treasurer’s office employee who was arrested multiple times for cocaine possession and armed robbery.
The situation couldn’t be more unlike the Strickland situation, where a nasty anonymous letter at the end of a campaign attempted to “out” his campaign manager. Strickland confronted the campaign manager and was assured the charges were false. The staffer left the following year.
Blackwell, on the other hand, was told by his human resources director that the staffer was a felon and should be fired.
Blackwell said he opted not to fire Toomer on the recommendation of Gilger [his human resources director] and the treasurer’s office legal counsel. Blackwell said Toomer was an admitted drug addict who, after completing a Florida treatment program and passing treasurer’s office drug tests, showed no signs of drug usage.
Yep, Blackwell was told to fire a coke-snortin, armed robbin felon and he refused.  Guess what happened to the guy after this?!
In May 2002, about three months after leaving the treasurer’s office, Toomer was sentenced to four years in prison after pleading guilty to sexually abusing a girl, beginning in September 1994 when she was 7 and continuing until 2001.
Sick.  Sick.  Sick. 
In a republican administration
Submitted by tjqhzonff on Tue, 10/24/2006 - 8:17am.
"Felon" is regarded as relevant job experience.
Pathetic...
Predictably, NixGuy is in full spin mode and trying to say just how unfair this is and how completely different.  That's kind of hard to do given this paragraph:
What?  Blackwell didn't do any further follow up?  He didn't check the available public court records?  Isn't that the exact line of attack they've been using on Strickland for the past two weeks.
Now, it's, well procedures were followed?  Well, Deters apparently doesn't think so, because his procedure would be to fire the guy!
They made a big deal about a guy who was convicted of a fourth-degree misdemeanor (one degree higher than a parking ticket), but a man with a record of multiple FELONIES who, by the way, just happened to also be repeatedly molesting a girl.  Well, that's just unfair to compare the two!
What lyin' sacks...