There Can Be Only One ….. RC Sheriff’s Race 2022

Posted on November 2, 2022 by Deborah Keller

**OPINION**

11/02/22

Our Sheriff’s race has been quite a roller coaster ride this year. First we had candidate Tony Roberson (former Polk County deputy) throwing his hat in the ring two years ago as a Republican candidate, we also knew that Jason Wease (business owner) was going to run as a Democrat as he has declared he would run each time back in 2013.

The current Sheriff Chris Francis (age 48) who has been in office for twelve years was not ready to retire so he would be running again. Then Steve Theodoropoulis (former Florida HP and Fed Air Marshall) who ran in 2018 announced he would also be running as a Republican candidate.

The man to beat at that time was the incumbent Sheriff Chris Francis. Sheriff Francis had twelve years worth of record to try to defend and in the past few years a lot of questionable things have gone on in his department. This being said between deaths at the jail, officer actions and lawsuits Sheriff Francis decided to pull out of the race.

This action put quite a monkey wrench into the strategy and campaigns of the other two candidates who had been gearing up to run against Francis. Now they had to focus their campaign on who would be the better candidate for the job. As they were trying to change direction there was another development in the race.

NC DMV Officer Aaron Ellenburg put his name in the hat to run in the Republican primary. The other two candidates tried to tie Ellenburg with Francis even though he did not actually work for the Sheriff’s department.

This started the negative campaigning right out of the gate. So many negative things were said and posted on social media about each of the Republican candidates it was hard to keep tract of them. Jason Wease did as he has done in the past and totally stayed away from the negativity surrounding the other candidates.

The Federal government then tossed us a curve ball and moved the primary from February to May trying to make sure all state districts were represented as fair as possible.

Then, Lo and Behold, Republican candidate Tony Roberson decided that the Republican Party was not aligning with his personal beliefs and was being run by Word of Faith Fellowship. He pulled out of the Republican primary race and decided to run as an unaffiliated candidate. This required him to get enough signatures to be put on the final ballot, which he did. He is in fact still a registered Republican but is running independent of their party.

So….whew! (dizzy yet?) The primary was finally held in May with Aaron Ellenburg being chosen as the Republican Party’s candidate for Sheriff. This set up a ballot with Ellenburg (R), Wease (D), and Roberson (U).

As the race went on the negativity just got uglier. One huge point of contention was the fact that Roberson’s pick for Chief Deputy, should he win, was former disgraced Sheriff’s Deputy Jamie Dunn. As you may recall he was fired, charged, and convicted for excessive violence against a restrained person in the jail. (see video here)

It was implied on social media that Ellenburg had no real law enforcement experience and was a “pick” of current Sherriff Francis so nothing would really change. Wease who stayed away from all the negativity just continued to run his campaign for change in his own style.

Now to mention another twist in this race. Roberson had a woman arrested and charged with posting malicious statements on social media. She was pursued for eight months at great personal expense to only have the charges dropped on the day of her hearing.

Then several months later Roberson himself was sued for posting inaccurate things with malicious intent on social media about someone else. (head spinning now?) He stopped posting things after that but his Chief Deputy pick Dunn continued to post things going so far as to dig up old text messages between people from years ago and posting them.

Early voting started on Oct 20^th. It will end on Nov. 5^th with the final election being held on Tuesday Nov. 8^th. You can vote for the candidate of your choice regardless of party (if there is a choice in a race) or not vote for any of them if you choose. It is important to go vote even if you leave some races blank. It sends a message of dissatisfaction to that candidate for sure.

The point however is that the Sheriff’s race is a local election. Whoever wins still will have the taste of that negativity in their mouth after the campaign. Those feelings do not just magically go away the day after the vote comes in. Neighbors, friends, and families remember the hurtful things said and done by each other. These wounds will fester for a long time.

We all are neighbors and members of this community. No matter who wins we all must learn to get along and let the hurts of this election be behind us. I hope that the damage can be repaired and that all can support the winner. This county has serious issues in the Sheriff’s office and especially the jail. Issues that will take everyone’s input and help to try to correct. Hopefully all will support the winner of this race and allow them time to try to correct the problems they will face when they take office.

This is not an episode of Highlander. No one needs to lose their head. No matter how many run for an office there can be only ONE.

“Do Unto Others…” or “What Goes Around Comes Around”….RC Politics 2022 Commentary Updated 10-13-22

Posted on October 10, 2022 by Deborah Keller

**Opinion**

UPDATE: 10-13-22

I still have not heard back from Polk County Sheriff’s office concerning the training and certifications request but did receive an email from Isothermal Community College confirming that Tony Roberson DID complete and pass his BLET on 10-09-1996 there. I will update with the other information if it is made available.

10-10-22

Well it seems we have another twist in the Tony Roberson for Sheriff social media saga. (Glad I am never running for a political office again….)

To put this in perspective last Jan. a social media post was made on FB about Tony Roberson, RC Sheriff Candidate that made disparaging remarks about his past behavior. A FB post to Roberson’s wife’s account stated “for Mr. Roberson’s wife to ask her husband how faithful he had been because she knew he had messaged her while in Rutherfordton 2012-2013”. It went on to say that “others are saying he was drunk and all over them at Copper Penny, and he was not faithful or loyal and why would he give 2 shakes about the common folk. He was dirty and you just don’t see it.”

Candidate Roberson took great offense at these remarks made to his wife and had Leslie Lewis charged and arrested for cyberstalking. He said she was malicious, vile, and libelous in her remarks. A magistrate actually allowed the charges and D.A. Ted Bell’s office spent eight (8) months pursuing them.

Most of us that saw this play out on Facebook were shocked when they actually charged her, much less arrested her for this Facebook post. The general thought at the time was it must have really upset his wife for him to take it that far. It did make you wonder after the Copper Penny incident he was involved in. (see video here)

In that incident Roberson accused a fellow candidate of “setting him up” even though that candidate was out of town when the incident occurred. (See article here) It just got worse however for Ms. Lewis.

At age 39 she had never been arrested and now she had to obtain an attorney for these charges. She stated “I’ve done nothing wrong. This is my First Amendment right. If a man will have you arrested for speaking out against him what will he do in the office of Sheriff?”

This process of the lawsuit took eight months. There were continuances and a judge recused herself and then the out of town judge they got to come in actually worked at the Polk County DA’s office when Roberson was employed as a deputy there. Ms. Lewis spent thousands of dollars in legal fees and missed work because of this then with just minutes before the trial was to finally start the prosecutors abruptly dropped the case.

Politics gets ugly at times and this seems to be an example of that as well as total misuse of the office and legal system by DA Ted Bell whom Ms. Lewis said lied to her to get her to stop talking negatively about him. (Well, with his past behaviors…no surprise there)

Roberson said “they (the prosecution) were leery about the evidence they could present so he told them to drop it and that he had more important things on his plate.” Ms. Lewis is still talking about pursuing a civil action after the election against Roberson to recoup her losses on this suit.

Now that brings us to last week. I wrote an article about all three candidates running for Sheriff listing their qualifications and length of service. (see article) Candidate Roberson seemed to take offense at the article, which outlined his dates of service with Polk County. He was so upset that he decided to post a Facebook video about it. This is where the story takes another strange turn.

In the video he never mentions my name yet he goes on and on about attorney Andrew LaBreche being the author of this article about him. He then went on a tirade against RC Deputy Brandon Ellenburg for being an “informant”against his fellow officers. He claimed several times to have proof that LaBreche had written my article.

After seeing this I posted another article with all the documents that I had obtained from Polk County concerning his length of service. (see article here) I had asked Polk County Sheriff’s Office for a copy of his BLET certification dates and training/certification records but none have been produced as of yet. (Why they would want to withhold that information I don’t know.)

Mr. LaBreche took great offense at being erroneously signaled out as writing articles about Roberson as he had told him earlier that he did not want to be involved in his “politics” on this campaign. (Roberson implied plagiarism by me in that video but hey I just backed it up with another article containing the documents from Polk County)

When Mr. LaBreche sent a FB message to Roberson about this incident saying if it continued he would seek legal action against him. Roberson replied to him with “Go F*#k Yourself.” Then Roberson put up LaBreche’s private message to him on Facebook but omitted his reply.

Social Media was abuzz with this, with Roberson supporters saying he should sue LaBreche (no mention of for what??) and that LaBreche would never sue him. That was not to be the case however.

Candidate Roberson was served with the lawsuit from LaBreche on Thursday evening. I guess that was better than what happened to Ms. Lewis as at least he was not arrested and taken to jail as Robertson had done to her.

You can’t help but wonder about Karma in this situation. My grandmother always used to say to me “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” and my Mom would say, “What goes around comes around.” In this case it seems that Tony Roberson is coming full circle on both these counts. We will continue to cover this with updates as they happen.

RC Politics 2022 …..Not a dull moment in the house folks!

David and Goliath…….Rutherford County Courthouse 2022

Posted on October 5, 2022 by Deborah Keller

**Opinion**

10-04-22

I went to court this week to watch a case being heard that a local attorney had put forward against several judges, a lawyer and the District Attorney (D.A.). It is a case that has been two years in the making.

I was curious, as this appears to be a classic David and Goliath situation. One young lawyer who went against a judge who was committing sexual offenses in office triggered the “good ole boy” network to come out in force. These judges and the DA knew about their colleague’s misconduct yet they turned a blind eye and let it continue. Once this attorney brought it to light the judge in question resigned.

The offending judge’s colleagues, however, could not let this behavior pass. How dare someone question one of their own? It could not be allowed to continue. They as a group decided to put him out of business according to statements made by witnesses. It appeared no one should dare question a judge’s behavior.

The judges started recusing from hearing his cases. They accused him of writing articles in RC Catalyst about them, yet NO one has presented an article with his name on it. He does admit that he consulted on some of the articles written. Since he was the attorney in question about the Judge Pool case of course he was consulted about the articles concerning the judge. He knew all the details and RC Catalyst wanted to make sure we were correct in their presentation.

Supposedly “a friend” of his who decided to work with the judges, DA, and the other private attorney in this matter showed them emails where he discussed the articles. Yes he was assisting with the technical verbiage of our articles, but so do doctors, engineers, and other professionals when we needed specific guidance on presenting the information in an article.

Did he actually write them….NO. The recusals were all based on this erroneous allegation of him writing articles about them. The defendants also recused from another attorney who was not involved in this at all, based off an incorrect phone number they had obtained. They had to remove his recusals.

They presented this refusal to hear cases in several ways assisted by the District Attorney. Cases were continued multiple times. They did not inform the attorney or his clients that their case would be continued so they continued to have to get off work and show up to court only to be sent home. If they did not show up they were charged with nonappearance even though their case was continued.

One case in particular that was mentioned in the court case was a person who had a DUI whose case had thirteen (13) continuances. (Shameful on the courts part here….)

This recusal matter effectively was shutting his practice down, as people knew his cases were not being heard. The judges and the DA knew this would work in time.

The judges arranged this in a way that it seemed the attorney had no legal recourse. Suing judges is just unheard of. It never occurred to these people in these high positions that anyone would have the audacity to question them and their behaviors.

It did not help that his former “friend” was on a personal social media vendetta against him. She was constantly putting innuendo out about him, his family members, and his motives as an attorney. She admitted on Facebook to working closely with the DA and others in this effort.

All this was being done in a concentrated effort to discredit him not only as an attorney, but also as a person. The “powers that be” wanted him to not only stop investigating them but to go away and disappear. If you are from here then you know the far-reaching powers of the “good ole boy” network. It has been used here for over a hundred years and God help you if you were on the wrong side of them.

Times are changing, however, and people are not tolerating the absolute power and protection these people are afforded. The little people, the unheard, the unprotected are beginning to speak up.

So David went up against Goliath this week in court. The presiding judge was from Mecklenburg County. One humorous note was when the private attorney being sued who was representing himself asked to be compensated for his legal fees to pay himself in this case. Even the judge rolled his eyes at that statement.

The defendant also admitted to receiving confidential attorney/client information on a thumb drive from a deputy sheriff in a hallway on a case in process for a completely unrelated matter because the attorney being sued was mentioned in it. The exact wording in court stated that the deputy said “I got something you would be interested in” when he gave it to him.

It seems they took someone’s cell phone they arrested and made a flash drive of all the conversations with his attorney and distributed them to unauthorized persons. (No conspiracy here…)

The judges, DA, and attorney involved asked for the case to be dismissed. The judges and the DA had someone from the Attorney General’s office in Raleigh representing them. She did everything she could to discredit the young attorney who was representing himself. She leveled insults and innuendoes about his practice and his person.

The young attorney stood his ground against the giants in the room. He calmly explained his claim in court to the presiding judge while not responding to the taunts of the AG office representative. The DA sat alone in the very back of the courtroom watching quietly.

After hearing from both sides the judge took the case and told them all he hoped to have a decision later in the week. The DA looked visibly stunned that it was not thrown out immediately. He left quickly once the judge made his statement.

No one knows how this will play out but regardless of the ruling it will most likely go to the appeals court. Just the very act that someone would finally sue the people of the “good ole boy” network itself for committing conspiracy and denying someone their constitutional rights is hopefully the beginning of the end of their protection and abuse of power. Maybe….

An update will be posted when the judge’s ruling comes in. Regardless this is quite a case and will not be forgotten.

Just like the song says, “The times they are a changing.”