Guest opinion submitted by David Warren–
Last Thursday night, there was a political lynching at the Citrus Heights City Hall. Four City Councilmembers acting as police, prosecutor, judge, jury and executioner of Councilmember Bret Daniels’ reputation, relying upon a female accuser’s statements that were not provided to the public during the meeting, censured Councilmember Daniels for purported harassment which consisted of an oral conversation, several emails, and an encounter with the accuser’s husband. The censure vote, as indicated by one councilmember’s statement, was based upon a complaint made to the Citrus Heights and Roseville police departments by a woman whom Mr. Daniels had known since high school.
Related: Citrus Heights council votes 4-1 to censure one of its own
I have never aided Mr. Daniels in an election and have only spoken to Mr. Daniels at city council meetings or at election events. On most municipal issues, Mr. Daniels’ positions are the exact opposite of mine. I supported a candidate for council that sought Mr. Daniels’ seat. I have no idea whether or not the accusations are true.
It is for this reason that this “censure” condemnation is of the greatest importance.
Our laws accord Mr. Daniels the presumption that he did nothing wrong, as well as the right to confront this accuser. Because of the accuser’s concern about the objectivity of the CHPD, Police Chief Ron Lawrence’s department appropriately submitted the woman’s complaint to the district attorney, for which Chief Lawrence should be lauded.
The district attorney and the Roseville Police Department investigated the accusation and determined that Mr. Daniels had not committed a crime. There was no indication that the accuser ever initiated a lawsuit against Mr. Daniels for the purported harassment or applied for a civil harassment protective order at which point the accuser would have had to publicly present her evidence against Mr. Daniels — and more importantly, unlike at the council meeting, Mr. Daniels would have been allowed to present evidence that the accuser’s allegations were meritless, both under penalty of perjury.
To assure fairness, we divide government into three parts: the courts, the executive and the legislative branch. When municipal leaders assume all three roles, the councilmembers place our constitutional rights at risk. The “end never justifies the means,” although during the June 7 meeting where Mr. Daniels was censured, it appeared that four of our city council members forgot that.
In 2014, Rolling Stone magazine published a story entitled “A Rape on Campus” describing a sexual assault by University of Virginia fraternity members, which later proved to be false. The accused students, even after Rolling Stone acknowledged that the story was false, still bear the stigma to this day.
The questions to which we all deserve an answer are, first, if the district attorney and the police did not find a crime had been committed, why was the censure vote scheduled at a special meeting instead of a regular meeting of the council, unless the censure motion was politically, instead of factually, motivated. And second, if there is no judicial determination of wrong, how can four individuals untrained in the law impugn Mr. Daniels’ integrity?
Instead of the usual council meeting date and time, the special meeting where Mr. Daniels was censured started at 5 p.m., a time which required a person that wanted to speak to the council to leave work early on a date other than for the usual council meeting.
This author was informed of the meeting time too late to be able to arrive at 5 p.m., for which reason I did not have the opportunity to speak against the censure — not on its merits, because not all facts are available, but rather to assure that backroom deals are not the basis of council action.
Councilmember Albert Fox commented that no action was taken until after the election. Thus, there can only be one explanation for not taking up the censure motion at a regular meeting, the councilmembers wanted to avoid public input and had made their decision before the meeting started.
Shamefully, two councilmembers asked for Mr. Daniels’ resignation after the censure vote. It is for the voters, not the councilmembers, to decide who should be a member of the council. Come November, when three of the councilmembers who voted to censure Mr. Daniels will be up for election, voters will have the opportunity to decide the credibility of the accusations made against Mr. Daniels and the propriety of the councilmembers’ action.
As constituents, the councilmembers who voted for censure owe us an explanation as to why they did not condemn the county sheriff when a sexual harassment judgment was awarded to a deputy, a more egregious matter which was decided after testimony in court, not by last Thursday’s secret backroom political manipulation. Hopefully, the electorate at the ballot box in November will not forget those who foisted the idea upon city residents that secret allegations as a basis to censure a councilmember stands for “truth, justice and the American way.”
David Warren is a Citrus Heights resident and legislative advocate at the State Capitol with Taxpayers for Public Safety. He can be reached at David@forpublicsafety.com.
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