Tuesday, October 6, 2020

Meanwhile, Back in Toledo

 I left Toledo, Ohio some years ago and shook the dust off my heels as I crossed the county line.  Stumbling around the 'net, I discovered that the authorities have finally caught up to a few of the criminals running the gravel pit.

On Tuesday, July 21, 2020, a Federal grand jury in Cleveland passed out 13 indictments to four sitting Toledo City Council baby kissers and one ambulance chaser, charging them with bribery and extortion.  Read the story here: Five Indicted in Toledo City Council Bribery and Extortion Scheme

From the article:

U.S. Attorney Justin Herdman announced today that a federal grand jury sitting in Cleveland, Ohio, has returned a 13-count indictment charging four sitting Toledo City Council members and one local attorney for their participation in a bribery and extortion scheme that encouraged soliciting and accepting cash, checks, money orders, or other things of value from local business owners in exchange for their votes on City Council.

The four alleged miscreants are:

Tyrone Riley (District 1) (D) (M,B)
A close personal friend of Keith Mitchell, Attorney.

Yvonne Harper (District 4) (D) (F,B)

Garrick “Gary” Johnson (At-Large) (D) (M,W)

Larry Sykes (At-Large) (D) (M,B)

Keith Mitchell
(Attorney, close friend of Tyrone Riley) (D) (M, W)
At the time he was arrested, Mitchell was angling to become party chair for the Democrats.  He's outside the sneezer on a half a million bond.

From the article:

This case was investigated by the Cleveland Division of the FBI and is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Freeman.

Please note that all of these people are Democrats; members of the Democratic Political Party.  Three out of five are black, with the other two being either white or other - so demographics of Toledo (27.04% black) are clearly not being represented here.  But them's the breaks.

Sykes should have been in jail long before this, and has managed to weasel his way out - one way or another.  We'll see what shakes out at trial, but with the FBI involved, I'm thinking his number's up.

Keep in mind that this is in Toledo, Ohio, which is a real gravel pit and has been since the bottom fell out of the rust belt back in the 1970s.  The economic pie isn't all that big, yet there are still politicians scrambling around for a few crumbs.  Well, whatever.  This list is by no means exhaustive.  If the FBI had the manpower to run an excavator or two, they could keep the criminal court system busy for several years - and deplete the political scene to the point that we might get a few honest politicians in office.

Republicans, mainly.  But you never know.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

It won't be any better when city "clowncel" replaces these outstanding representatives of the people and great minds such as Julian Mack gets elected to a seat at the table. Toledo is doomed as it has been for some time. It's a pension filled union city with many welfare supported neighborhoods. The county commissioners aren't any more productive.

As Einstein said "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results"

Dino

Mad Jack said...

Do you see me arguing?

The Lucas County Commissioners are supposed to take a concerned interest in this kind of thing - you know, corruption, bribery, threats by local politicos. I wouldn't be surprised if they're remaining quiet in hopes those who got busted don't start to sing.

Nice to hear from you, Dino.

Anonymous said...

Fred of wspd recently regurgitated some of Pete Gerken's comments about Trump....in a nut shell, Pete said Trump has failed Toledo and Ohio. I would have thought that after the debacle that Pete, Marcy, ect embarrassed themselves when they instructed Trump to mind his manners when he visited Toledo a few yrs ago that he would have got the point that he looked foolish. And do I need to mention the insincurities Pete's daughter has with her daddy? She made national news...what an embarrassment. I told my friends months ago that if one has a screw loose, its only going to get looser. The time is here. Get your bourbon ready Jack, I'll sit back with a glass of good ol' Jack Daniels. Cheers to you sir, Dino