It was supposed to be something that would be handled quickly. But South Miami Mayor Phil Stoddard has a way of making everything a three-ring circus.
Just last month, it looked like the Commission on Ethics and the Public Trust case against Stoddard was about to be derailed. The agency’s Executive Director Jose Arojo reached out to Stephen Cody, the man who filed the complaint against Stoddard, to have little “chat.” To hear Cody describe it, it was more like a teenage-breakup speech.
Arojo seemed to say something like: we’ve had fun finding probable cause and all… But it’s over… Except now, it appears it’s not. Michael Murowski, the Advocate for the Ethics Commission, had taken the deposition of both Phil Stoddard and the city attorney.
Benedict Kuehne is back in the case again, at least until the winds change. He sent over a subpoena to the Ethics Commission so he could compel Cody to show up for his deposition. Although attendance has never been an issue – Cody has made himself available to provide his deposition since filing his complaint in January 2018.
Click here to see the official document.
The subpoena shows that both Kuehne and Stoddard are going on a scorched-earth pogrom. They not only want Cody to show up, they want to give him the equivalent of a forensic colposcopy. The subpoena asks Cody to bring 21 separate categories of documents.
Stoddard wants to see Cody’s IRS tax returns, his bank account statements, his social-media postings, all sources of income, and cancelled checks among other things, all without a stated time limit by which to gather up this material.
Cody told me he got his first job as a Publix bagboy in 1974. The subpoena is so broad, it asks for every tax return, meaning he’d have to reveal how many quarter tips he got in high school.
More telling, Stoddard and Kuehne are asking for all cell-phone records, e-mails, texts, and social-media between Cody and Florida Power & Light and its parent, New Era Energy.
Stoddard has created a conspiracy in his own mind that Cody is working for FPL, and is allegedly out to get him because he put solar panels on his roof and is going off the electrical grid.
That’s not all. Stoddard and Kuehne are also demanding to see his communications with former Mayor Horace Feliu, former Commissioner Valerie Newman, Bradley Cassel, and local gadfly Sharon McCain, and an additional 21 people and organizations.
They also want to see all communications between Cody and his lawyer, Rick Yabor. Ben Kuehne was, at one time, a well-respected attorney. He should know that attorney/client communications are privileged. Kuehne is obviously doing this to quell Stoddard’s growing paranoia.
Stoddard is beginning to act like Captain Queeg, portrayed by Humphrey Bogart in The Caine Mutiny. He’s already muttering about a conspiracy. All he needs is start rolling a pair of steel balls in his hands and talking about strawberries.
Rather than give in to Stoddard and Kuehne’s demands, Advocate Murowski is taking a stand and has filed a motion for protective order. He doesn’t want to stop the deposition. Kuehne can ask all the questions he wants about the two times that Stoddard wouldn’t let Cody speak. He just doesn’t think Cody should have to come up with 45 years of tax and banking records.
After all, what Stoddard and Kuehne are doing sets a bad precedent. It would tell other whistleblowers that if they dare to step forward when their rights are violated, they better be prepared to be thrown onto a dissecting table and autopsied.
Without people feeling safe to report unethical public officials, there’s no need for an Ethics Commission. The Ethics Commission needs to grant the protective order. Not to protect Cody, rather, to protect the process and its own mission.
It’s been a year and a half since Cody filed his complaint with the Ethics Commission, a group whose website claims that ethics complaints are handled within 30 days of finding probable cause. Too much time has gone by.
It’s time for the Ethics Commission to finish this.
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