Tag: Jason Kessler

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News

United we stand: Charlottesville says no to hate

Members of the clergy link arms with counterprotesters in front of Emancipation Park Saturday, August 12, as alt-right groups of white nationalists arrive in waves. Photo by Natalie Krovetz

It was the day that kept getting worse. The weekend from hell. Like many of you, C-VILLE Weekly is still processing Saturday’s violation from ill-intentioned visitors with antiquated notions who now believe it’s okay to say in broad daylight what they’ve only uttered in the nether regions of the internet.

The Unite the Right rally left three people dead and countless injured, both physically and psychologically. We, too, share the sorrow, despair and disgust from being slimed by hate.

But here’s one thing we know: Despite the murder, the assaults and the terror inflicted upon this community, Charlottesville said no to hate. And the world, it turns out, has our back.

We sent six reporters and two photographers out to document the August 12 rally at Emancipation Park, the community events taking place around it and the weekend of infamy. Here’s a timeline of what we saw and what we felt. Because this? This is our town.

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News

Unite the Right rally turns violent, three die

Photos by staff, Eze Amos, Hawkins Dale and Aaron Cohen

A 32-year-old woman died following today’s long-anticipated white nationalist assembly in Emancipation Park, and two Virginia State Police pilots perished in a crash late in the afternoon near the Bellair neighborhood.

The Unite the Right rally erupted in violence and was shut down before it ever began when city and county leaders declared a local state of emergency around 11:30am. Police deemed it an unlawful assembly shortly thereafter.

A silver car plowed through a large group of counterprotesters on Fourth Street around 1:30pm, leaving one person dead and 19 injured. According to eyewitness and Charlottesville resident Nic McCarthy, the car hit about a dozen people and backed over at least one before speeding off. It was later found at Monticello Road and Blenheim Avenue.

Police arrested Ohio resident James Alex Field, 20, from Ohio, who was charged with one count of second degree murder,  three counts of malicious wounding and one count of hit and run attended failure to stop with injury.

City officials said nearly 1,000 police officers would be on the scene, yet when fights erupted between alt-righters and antifas outside Emancipation Park—rally organizer Jason Kessler had a judge issue an injunction to keep the city from moving the event the day before—police were not immediately spotted.

Pepper spray, tear gas and bottles of urine were tossed between the two sides an hour before the noon rally was to begin. Around 11:39am, police called the event an unlawful assembly and ordered the park, filled with hundreds of alt-righters, cleared into the surrounding streets filled with counterprotesters.

UVA alum and Unite the Right headliner Richard Spencer pushed up against a line of riot police who were trying to clear the park and was maced twice.

Richard Spencer describes his ordeal of being maced twice by police to supporters at McIntire Park. Staff photo

“I cannot express my absolute outrage at the governor of Virginia and Mayor Mike Signer,” said Spencer around 1:40pm when his followers regrouped at McIntire Park. He said it was the first time he felt like his government was cracking down on him.

“As I was coming in, these antifa assaulted us,” said Spencer. He complained that Charlottesville police would not let him go past barriers, behind which was the stage platform. “We have a permit,” he said.

Virginia State Police in riot gear lined up against the remaining alt-whites still in the park. “They looked like stormtroopers,” said Spencer. “They were in effect pushing us out of Lee Park toward the Communists.”

After crowds dispersed from Emancipation, counterprotesters followed a group of alt-righters up the street to the Market Street Parking Garage where the latter group had vans waiting to take them to McIntire Park to continue their celebration of Western heritage.

Here, police did not intervene as the groups of enemies brawled and an elderly white-rights supporter was knocked to the ground and beaten with what appeared to be a wooden stick. Barricades were dismantled and used as weapons during the melee.

After a fight in the parking garage, a Black Lives Matter supporter emerged with a face full of blood and lay on the porch in front of NBC29 until medics arrived.

Many of those who came from out of town left McIntire Park after hearing Spencer, former KKK head David Duke and Mike Enoch, founder of alt-right media hub the Right Stuff, speak.

Shortly before 5pm, a Virginia State Police helicopter crashed in the woods near Old Farm Road. Lieutenant H. Jay Cullen, 48, of Midlothian, and Trooper-Pilot Berke M.M. Bates, who would have turned 41 August 13, of Quinton, died at the scene.

At 6pm, Governor Terry McAuliffe and city officials held a press conference. McAuliffe sent a message to the “white supremacists and Nazis who came into Charlottesville today: Go home. You are not wanted in this great commonwealth.”

The night before, the white nationalists held a tiki-torch march through the grounds of UVA, where Kessler is also an alum. Fights broke out with a small group of counterprotesters surrounding, but no one was seriously injured.

This is a developing story and reports of disruptions continue.

Updated August 13.

 

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News

Police expect thousands, closed streets downtown August 12

Captain Victor Mitchell is the man in charge of Saturday's events at Emancipation and McIntire parks. Staff photo

At a press conference today, Charlottesville police Captain Victor Mitchell estimated there would be between 2,000 and 6,000 people here on Saturday and said many downtown streets and sidewalks will be closed for the upcoming Unite the Right rally

Mitchell is incident commander for both McIntire Park, where the city wishes Jason Kessler would take his white nationalist assembly, and Emancipation Park, where Kessler has vowed he will hold his protest, with the ACLU of Virginia and the Rutherford Institute supporting his right to be there,

“We are prepared for multiple possibilities and the Charlottesville Police Department, with assistance from the Virginia State Police, has plans in place to protect citizens in both parks,” says Mitchell.

Police will be present at McIntire, should someone decide to protest or counter-protest there. The entrance to the park from the U.S. 250 Bypass will be closed, and Kessler’s people can park at McIntire, while counter-protesters must park at Charlottesville High, says Mitchell.

But the real action will be downtown, Mitchell acknowledged. “There will be a number of road and sidewalk closures,” he says. “We anticipate large crowds downtown that will necessitate road closures around Emancipation Park.”

Albemarle and University police will handle the city’s 911 calls, and he advised citizens not to be surprised when an officer shows up not wearing the city uniform.

City police have been in touch with many law enforcement agencies, says Mitchell, but the details he released were few.

When asked how police would keep the alt-whites and antifas apart, replies Mitchell, “The best we can.”

He answered a question about whether the city had put police in a difficult position when it said would grant Kessler’s permit if he moved to McIntire Park: “It would be beneficial to us if Mr. Kessler would move. We are in a difficult spot.”

There are no restrictions on weapons at Emancipation, the park formerly known as Lee, but he cautioned those who might be coming to Charlottesville with violent intentions that there would be consequences.

Green indicates road open, blue and red mean no go.

 

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Opinion

Dispatches from the University of Virginia….

UVA's Rotunda. Photo by Karen Blaha

By Bonnie Gordon

It’s getting really noisy here.  In a few days local and national news cameras will capture pictures of a large Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville. Right-wing spokesmen say they demonstrate against a City Council vote to move two statues of confederate generals. But really, the demonstration will transform generalized white resentment into a live operatic display of misogyny, racism, white supremacy and fantasies of world domination.  Local and national groups will resist, bear witness and protest. Officials predict crowds in the thousands on both sides, and they warn of a credible threat of violence.

We don’t need to wait for people to get hurt and arrested to think, reflect and act. The demonstrators coming here want to deny the rights that diversity policies of every public institution in this town are designed to protect and that so many mandatory trainings supposedly ensure. Virginia takes great pride in our place as one of the cradles of democracy.  We also take pride in our public universities, and especially this one.  We at UVA are a natural flashpoint for responding to such expressed malice and we have often found ourselves as the center of a media firestorm. It sometimes feels like the big news outlets have reserved hotel rooms here as they wait for the next eruption. The only option for an institution of higher learning is to fight back, not just on August 12, but every day.

The University of Virginia president distributed a mass email on Friday, August 4, that urged students, faculty and staff avoid the August 12 rally for their own safety. She wrote that “to approach the rally and confront the activists would only satisfy their craving for spectacle. They believe that your counter-protest helps their cause.”  The email goes on to say, “The organizers of this rally want confrontation; do not gratify their desire.”  This will help to cover the university should violence erupt, but it does not speak to our function in society.

Her job may mandate this message.  But the rest of us, especially tenured faculty, do not have that mandate. We can no more tell students, faculty and colleagues what to do on August 12 then we can tell them whom to vote for. But we do have a pedagogical imperative to help them make ethical choices. Some people may feel compelled to direct action against these threats. Some feel morally—or religiously—obliged to bear witness to the hate. Some will feel that to go about their usual business and ignore the hate will constitute resistance. For many at the university that business is, in fact, working on long standing issues of racial injustice in the community. Moreover, for many in this community, as on other college campuses, the simple act of walking down the street the weekend of August 12 will not be safe.

If university community members have convictions driving them to appear and stand against hate, we should applaud, support and stand with them. And university faculty should do everything in our power to help them make educated choices. We could, for example, follow the lead of local clergy leaders who told their readership, “We do NOT recommend that you be in Emancipation Park on August 12 unless you have received training in non-violent, direct action.”

Herein lies a teachable moment about the complexities and challenges of the Constitution’s First Amendment. With freedom of speech comes the responsibility of speech, and those of us who are educators, especially tenured educators, have an obligation to speak out against hate and falsehoods. The University of Virginia will, as it should, go to great lengths to defend reprehensible content. But those who protest the alt-right also deserve to have their speech protected.  

Much of this coming weekend will be about history, and we should not, while working to educate and inform, forget the university’s own history.  The University of Virginia granted degrees to Richard Spencer and Jason Kessler (music and English, and psychology, respectively), the men behind this particular gathering of haters. We also should remember that UVA was built by enslaved labor and that it had deep links to the KKK and eugenics.

UVA is not alone here; most universities have ties to very ugly pasts. It’s much harder, but just as vital, to think about hidden complicity, collusion and promotion of ideas that go against purported ideals of the institution. It’s even harder to acknowledge and think about the racial injustice that existed before, and will exist after, the famous activists from all sides of the war have come and gone.

On Sunday, August 13, we will still live in a town where African-American students are six times more likely to be suspended. We will still teach at a university where many minority students do not feel safe on our campus. We will still have a lot of noise to make.

Bonnie Gordon is an associate professor in the McIntire Department of Music at UVA.

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News

Decision at high noon

Jason Kessler says he will hold his Unite the Right rally in Emancipation Park regardless of the city's decision to approve his permit for McIntire Park. Photo by Eze Amos

The Rutherford Institute and the ACLU of Virginia have given the city of Charlottesville until 12pm today to respond to their letter demanding city leaders allow Jason Kessler to hold his August 12 Unite the Right rally in Emancipation Park.

When city manager Maurice Jones announced August 7 that he approved Kessler’s event permit, but only if he holds it in McIntire Park, the white rights advocate and organizer of the rally threatened a lawsuit, said his freedom of speech was infringed and announced that the show would go on at Emancipation instead of McIntire park.

The Rutherford Institute and the ACLU had his back.

In a joint letter addressed to Jones and all five city councilors, the free speech defenders gave five reasons why Kessler should be able to hold his rally in its original location.

“Opposition can be no basis for government action that would suppress the First Amendment rights of demonstrators, no matter how distasteful those views may be,” the letter says, and adds that a last-minute relocation doesn’t give the demonstrators enough time to effectively plan for the move.

And because the city’s main reason for moving the rally to McIntire Park was to accommodate large crowds, the Rutherford Institute and ACLU say the city must provide evidence to support its attendance estimate. City leaders have forecast that “many thousands” will descend on Charlottesville this Saturday, while Kessler’s permit is for only 400 demonstrators.

“If the city is justifying its relocation of the rally elsewhere based on the presence of counter demonstrators, that constitutes an unconstitutional ‘heckler’s’ veto,’” the letter says, and makes its final point that those governing Charlottesville must act in accordance with the law, no matter how reprehensible that may be to members of the community.

Both organizations have a long history of supporting groups with unpopular speech.

Rutherford Institute founder John Whitehead coached Margie Phelps of the Westboro Baptist Church, best known for showing up at the funerals of American soldiers with signs saying, “God hates fags,” ahead of the 2011 Supreme Court decision that public hate speech can’t be the basis of liability for a tort of emotional distress, even if it’s offensive.

And the ACLU represented Ku Klux Klan member Barry Black, who was arrested after burning a cross on a private citizen’s Carroll County farm in 1999. The case also made its way to the Supreme Court, which ruled in April 2003 that cross-burning, when not used as a direct threat, is protected by the Constitution.

Correction 2:49pm: There are five members of City Council.

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News

Rally relocation: City okays permit for McIntire Park, Kessler refuses to change

City Manager Maurice Jones, right, explains the change of location for the alt-right assembly at an August 7 press conference. Staff photo

Days before the August 12 Unite the Right rally, City Manager Maurice Jones said the city would issue organizer Jason Kessler a permit—for McIntire Park, not for Emancipation Park, the site formerly known as Lee Park where he requested to protest the removal of the statue of General Robert E. Lee.

And in response, Kessler says, “We didn’t request nor will we accept a permit anywhere other than Lee Park. That is where the Unite the Right demonstration is taking place.”

Where that leaves the city is unclear at press time, particularly as it recently has not required permits for free speech assemblies, such as Mayor Mike Signer’s declaration that Charlottesville was the capital of the resistance in January.

Clay Hansen, executive director of the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression, says free speech cases are fact specific and drawing parallels with a different location and event may not be helpful.

He points to the city regulation that requires permits for demonstrations, unless they involve 50 or fewer people and would not occur in a public right of way. If the city believes any gathering of Unite the Right would require street closings, “it’s likely the city could invoke this section” and limit the demonstration to 50 people at a time, says Hansen. “Logistically that would be a nightmare.”

Jones said at an August 7 press conference that the city had given “considerable thought” to Kessler’s permit application, and “decided to approve it on the date and at the time requested, provided he uses McIntire Park rather than Emancipation Park.”

The city manager affirmed Kessler’s First Amendment right to protest and the “city’s obligation to protect those rights” and to protect public safety. “We have determined we cannot do all these things effectively” at Emancipation Park.

Jones was joined by Police Chief Al Thomas and Mayor Mike Signer, and city councilors Kathy Galvin, Kristin Szakos and Bob Fenwick.

Thomas said McIntire Park was safer because it was large enough to accommodate the anticipated crowd. On his permit application, Kessler estimated 400 attendees, but on social media, between calls for national support from the alt-right, on the left, from Black Lives Matter and from the local clergy, estimates have swollen to thousands.

And if Kessler refuses to budge, and people show up at Emancipation Park, city spokesperson Miriam Dickler says, “The city will take actions deemed necessary to keep the community safe while honoring everyone’s freedom of speech and assembly. [Charlottesville Police Department] will continue to assess and plan for these possibilities as necessary.”

Several attendees at the press conference expressed relief that the city decided to move the event, which lists white nationalists and neo-Nazis as speakers.

Jalane Schmidt with Black Lives Matter says it’s “very fitting” to move the rally to McIntire because Paul Goodloe McIntire, who donated that park, Emancipation and Justice parks to the city, “is a Lost Cause benefactor.”

Cville Solidarity’s Emily Gorcenski, who says she’s gotten death threats, has mixed feelings about the change. “I would obviously like to see the event not happen, given that the people coming want to incite violence.”

She says she’s concerned about the layout of McIntire and its limited egress and ingress, as well as its lack of shade.

Backlash to the event and white-rights extremists coming to town has led to a rash of Airbnb reservation cancellations. The company says those using its services will accept people regardless of race, religion, national origin, ethnicity, disability, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, or age.

“We’re having our civil rights violated left and right,” said Kessler on a video posted on his Twitter account.

Brazos Tacos announced it would close August 12, as have the Central Library, McGuffey Art Center and the Virginia Discovery Museum. Additional downtown business owners were contemplating doing the same at press time.

And the UVA Medical Center says it’s preparing for a mass casualty situation.

“As we routinely do when large events occur in the Charlottesville area, we are preparing for the possibility of incidents that could lead to an influx of patients, using components of our established emergency operations plan,” says UVA health system spokesman Josh Barney. That includes scheduling elective surgeries before or after August 12, having additional care providers at the hospital and on call, and having additional security officers on hand.

“These preparations aim to ensure that we can provide the best possible care to all our patients,” says Barney.

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News

Bad for business: City mobilizes for alt-right rally

Rapture owner Mike Rodi says the mood among downtown businesses owners is somewhat fearful and that they anticipate the August 12 Unite the Right rally could be a “bloodbath.” Eze Amos

As Charlottesville braces for an influx of alt-white nationalists, 43 business owners have demanded the city enforce its regulations for special events, pastors are calling for 1,000 faithful around the nation to stand with them and the Central Library has announced it will close August 12 for the Unite the Right rally in next-door Emancipation Park.

Organizer Jason Kessler has applied for a permit for his March on Charlottesville, but a lot of questions are unanswered about whether the five-hour demonstration from noon to 5pm to protest the removal of the statue of General Robert E. Lee is an exercise in free speech or a special event that requires insurance—and a place for protesters and counter-protesters to go to the bathroom.

City spokesperson Miriam Dickler says she expects Kessler’s permit to be approved this week, and notes that as a constitutionally protected demonstration, liability insurance is not required.

On his permit application, Kessler said 400 would attend the rally, but in other media, he’s said thousands would attend, and groups like the National Socialist Movement have RSVPed on social media.

Kessler also checked the no-amplification box on his application, but he mocked the KKK for showing up July 8 without amplification. During a press conference surrounded by his security detail, the Warlocks Motorcycle Club, he said there would be music at his event.

“Just having a musician does not make it a special event,” says Dickler.

Downtown business owners sent a letter July 27 to police, fire and parks and rec chiefs, as well as the Virginia Department of Health, saying the event poses a “significant risk to people and property” and will result in a major loss of revenue if the city doesn’t enforce its regulations.

“The mood is somewhat fearful,” says Rapture owner Mike Rodi. “We anticipate this could be a bloodbath.” A lot of businesses are weighing whether to close, and police officers have suggested doing just that to nervous proprietors, according to the letter.

“Most retailers lost $2,000 in revenues from the KKK,” says Escafé owner Todd Howard. “We’re losing money based on choices of Charlottesville administrators.”

“There are a lot of unknowns,” says Rodi. On the Saturday night after the KKK rally, his business lost $4,000, he says.

Rodi is undecided about whether Rapture will be open August 12. “If this summer hadn’t been the worst ever, it would be a good time to go to the beach,” he says. Too many weekends with people posting on Facebook to stay away from downtown have been “heartbreaking,” he says.

Congregate C’Ville issued a call for 1,000 clergy and faith leaders to join them in standing up to hate, and say nationally prominent figures like Cornel West and Traci Blackmon plan to attend.

“I am coming to Charlottesville to stand against white supremacy and bear witness to love and justice,” says West.

At a July 31 press conference, local pastors said those answering the call for direct, nonviolent action realize this is a “critical moment for our country,” says organizer Brittany Caine-Conley.

pastors
Congregate C’ville’s reverends Seth Wispelwey, Elaine Ellis Thomas and Brittany Caine-Conley want to bring in additional prayer power. Staff photo

The religious group is planning prayers throughout the August 11-13 weekend, including a mass interfaith service at 8pm August 11 at St. Paul’s Memorial Church, and 6am and noon prayers in the park.

And the clergy isn’t the only group that’s put out a call for support. Black Lives Matter is urging activists nationwide to say “#NoNewKKK” and Showing Up for Racial Justice wants supporters to #DefendCville.

The National Lawyers Guild has held legal observer training, and Legal Aid Justice Center will have a session on Protests, Police and Your Rights August 7. SURJ has a local attorney advising on Know the Process: Arrest/Court 101 August 8 and scheduled nonviolent direct action training August 10.

Kessler did not respond to C-VILLE’s inquiries about the port-a-let situation, but according to Dickler, three have been requested for the anticipated thousands who will attend the rally.

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News

In brief: Rogue crosswalks, alt-white hot spot and more

Where the sidewalk ends

A young man in cargo shorts and a gray T-shirt sprints across an unofficial crosswalk between Donut Connection and the Standard on West Main Street. He pauses to let a silver car speed in front of him and then darts to the closed sidewalk on the other side to dodge a CAT bus. There, he waits at a bus stop.

Two major construction projects—the Standard and Marriott’s Draftsman Hotel (part of the hotel chain’s Autograph collection)—within two blocks of each other on West Main Street have caused a mess of traffic cones, bike lane merges, detours and closed sidewalks.

Shipping containers are repurposed as pedestrian walkways on construction-heavy West Main. Staff photo

So here are some tips to ensure that you, too, won’t get steamrolled by a bus while playing human Frogger across the streetscape.

  • Outside of the now-closed Starr Hill Restaurant and Brewery, a sidewalk-closed sign directs walkers to take a detour across the street. It also warns that the bike lane closes here and cyclists will merge with traffic.
  • As you continue walking past businesses such as World of Beer and Donut Connection, you’ll see a makeshift crosswalk that offers a path to a bus stop on the other side of the street, though that sidewalk is technically closed. City spokesperson Miriam Dickler says the city is looking into this and suspects a private citizen created this “crosswalk.” If so, crews will paint over it soon.
  • If you don’t cross and you continue moving forward, outside of the Draftsman Hotel you’ll notice another sidewalk surprise. A ramp leads you through a tunnel of hollow shipping containers and down an exit ramp. Get through here and you’re in the clear.

 

 

Pop-up crosswalk on West Main is just one of the pedestrian perils awaiting. Staff photo

 

 

 

 

Yet another one

The Patriot Movement of Greenville, South Carolina, has decided to support the August 12 alt-right rally with a 1Team1Fight Unity family day at Darden Towe Park. Organizer Chevy Love sends a mixed message that she’ll be there for brothers and sisters in Lee Park, but she says she does “not stand for racism” and would not “promote an event that has anything to do with hate groups,” according to the Daily Progress.

Dubious distinction

The Anti-Defamation League labeled local Jason Kessler a “white supremacist” July 18 in its list of key figures, “From Alt Right to Alt Lite: Naming the Hate.” Kessler responded on Twitter that ADL is a “Jewish supremacist group.”

“If you want to defend the South and Western civilization from the Jew and his dark-skinned allies, be at Charlottesville on 12 August.”—Michael Hill, League of the South president, on Twitter

Most dramatic escape

Matthew Carver. ACPD

Matthew Carver, 26, who made news a couple of weeks ago for a Crozet carjacking, kicked the window out of a moving patrol car while shackled and handcuffed on Route 20 en route to the local jail around 7:20pm July 21. He was on the lam for about 14 hours before being recaptured in Mill Creek.

 

 

Kiosk botch

The auto pay kiosk for Albemarle County taxes went on the fritz and dinged 152 on-time payments made before the June 15 deadline as late, and sent notices with late payment fees. Those have been corrected, reports the Daily Progress, but workers processing the county’s lock box payments also entered the wrong dates, making a similar number of tax-paying citizens late.

Homicide victim ID’d

Two weeks after Albemarle County’s first homicide of the year on July 4, police identified the victim July 20 as Marvin Joel Rivera-Guevara, 24. He was found in Moores Creek, and police held off releasing his name until it was confirmed by the state medical examiner’s office, but a GoFundMe account identified him in trying to raise $10,000 to send his body back to El Salvador.

Pipeline nears project approval

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission released its final environmental impact statement for the Atlantic Coast Pipeline July 21, which said the proposed 600-mile, $5.5 billion natural gas pipeline will have a “less than significant” impact on the environment.

“The [final environmental impact statement] paints a terrifying picture of a bleak future,” says Ernie Reed, president of the anti-pipeline group Friends of Nelson.

According to Reed, the ACP will eliminate almost 5,000 acres of interior forest habitat and destroy 200 acres of national forests and nearly 2,000 waterbody crossings along its path from West Virginia to North Carolina. “And all this to give Dominion and Duke Energy enough gas to burn our way into hell,” he adds.

Dominion Energy and Duke Energy are the major companies backing the ACP.

“Over the last three years, we’ve taken unprecedented steps to protect environmental resources and minimize impacts on landowners,” says Leslie Hartz, Dominion Energy’s vice president of engineering and construction. She says her team has made more than 300 route adjustments to avoid environmentally sensitive areas. “In many areas of the project, we’ve adopted some of the most protective construction methods that have ever been used by the industry.”

FERC could approve pipeline plans as early as this fall.

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News

Draego rebukes Fogel for not recusing himself

Joe Draego chastises commonwealth's attorney candidate Jeff Fogel for not removing himself from a case because Fogel yelled at Jason Kessler, right, who filed charges against Fogel's client. Staff photo

Joe Draego was in court today for a charge that he assaulted Showing Up for Racial Justice activist Sara Tansey when he retrieved a phone she allegedly snatched from white-protest organizer Jason Kessler back in February. The hearing in court was pretty routine, but afterward, Draego accused Tansey’s lawyer—commonwealth’s attorney candidate Jeff Fogel—of not acting “in a principled manner” by representing Tansey and yet yelling last week at Miller’s at Kessler, who filed the complaint against Tansey.

Fogel should have recused himself after that, says Draego. “Jeff has called Jason a ‘crybaby.’ The fact he was [at Miller’s] hollering at Jason may have violated ethical standards.” Draego says his lawyer is reviewing the video to see if Fogel acted appropriately and if not, he will ask to have him removed from the case.

In the small world that is Charlottesville, Fogel represented Draego last year when Draego sued City Council for its public comment procedures after he was dragged out of council chambers for calling Muslims “monstrous maniacs.” Draego complimented Fogel for a brief he wrote in the case, and a federal judge ruled council’s rules were unconstitutional. Before the ruling, Fogel asked to be removed as Draego’s attorney.

The hearing today in Charlottesville General District Court was to continue the Draego/Tansey cases until a new special prosecutor can be found. Fluvanna Commonwealth’s Attorney Jeff Haislip had been assigned that task, but had to step aside after he talked to Tansey without her lawyer.

“The court did not advise him Ms. Tansey was represented by counsel,” said Fogel outside the courthouse.

That’s where Draego chastised Fogel for harassing Kessler while representing a party in the case.

Draego also admonished Fogel for not speaking out against SURJ’s in-your-face tactics, and pointed out that when Kessler associate Caleb Norris got in Fogel’s face last week at Miller’s, Fogel pushed him away, resulting in Fogel being charged with assault.

“Why doesn’t he come out and say no one should do that?” asks Draego.

Fogel, who was endorsed by SURJ,  says, “I have seen Kessler going around in that same fashion. I don’t tell my clients what to do.” He adds, “People in SURJ have stood up with principled action for African-American community members.”

Kessler also attended today’s hearing. He was involved in another confrontation with SURJ last night on the Downtown Mall. He says some of his friends were eating at Miller’s and “SURJ mobbed us again. They kept harassing them.” Kessler was banned from Miller’s after last week’s shout fest.

Draego says he will be at the upcoming Ku Klux Klan rally July 8 “to protest them coming here. I stand against racism.”

He suggested he and Fogel do a community response about the KKK coming to Charlottesville, but seemed unconvinced that would happen.

“We can all protest without violence,” says Draego. “That’s how it’s supposed to work.”

Draego and Tansey’s next court date is June 23.

 

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News Uncategorized

Judge considers Bellamy’s attorney fees

Special prosecutor Mike Doucette and attorney Pam Starsia leave court as a judge mulls Wes Bellamy's legal fees. Staff photo

One thing Judge Richard Moore and Vice-Mayor Wes Bellamy’s attorney agreed upon: “If it was possible under the law and there was one person who should pay on this meritless claim, it would be Jason Kessler,” said Pam Starsia, who represented Bellamy when Kessler petitioned to remove him from office for offensive tweets Bellamy made before taking office.

Kessler’s petition was thrown out March 8 after Lynchburg Commonwealth’s Attorney Mike Doucette determined it had an insufficient number of valid signatures.

Starsia is seeking $7,588 in legal fees for nearly 30 hours of work at $250 an hour for representing Bellamy, and she had a court hearing today about her bill.

She cited state code that allows public officials to seek attorney’s fees in cases that are “dismissed in favor of the respondent,” and she said the statute was important public policy because it allows elected officials to fulfill their duties without intimidation and the distraction of unsubstantiated removal proceedings.

Doucette didn’t disagree with Starsia on the public policy aspect, but he did on whether Bellamy was the prevailing party in a nonsuit. “We would submit that since there was no judgment in favor of the respondent—” and because Kessler could refile his petition—there is no provision to provide attorney fees in nonsuits, he said.

Starsia argued that the nonsuit was indeed in Bellamy’s favor, and to not award his legal fees “undermines the purpose of the statute.”

Judge Moore said at least three times in Charlottesville Circuit Court that if he could assess Kessler for attorney fees, he would. “Mr. Kessler gets a free ride and the city is held responsible,” Moore said. That protection for petition filers “encourages reckless behavior if he doesn’t have to pay,” he added.

Moore said he would read other court rulings before making a ruling.