By Craig Fox
The Watertown Daily Times
WATERTOWN, N.Y. — City police are conducting a criminal investigation into who posted confidential employment information in the comment section of Mayor Jeffrey E. Graham’s blog last week about City Council candidate Todd R. DeMar.
City Detective Lt. Joseph R. Donoghue Sr. confirmed police have initiated a criminal investigation into the blog comment that indicated Mr. DeMar was thrown off Civil Service lists for him to be eligible for promotions to deputy fire chief and city code enforcement supervisor last November.
The investigation will look specifically at who posted the information because it contained confidential information about Mr. DeMar’s employment history with the city, Lt. Donoghue said. While he’s running for City Council, Mr. DeMar also serves as a captain in the Watertown Fire Department.
“We’re conducting a criminal investigation. Anything else is evidentiary, so I can’t really talk about it,” Lt. Donoghue said.
If it ends up either a city employee or a public official posted it, the person could be charged with official misconduct, a Class-A misdemeanor, he said.
A public servant is guilty of official misconduct when, with intent to obtain a benefit or deprive another person of a benefit, the person commits an act relating to his office but constituting an unauthorized exercise of his official functions, knowing that the act is unauthorized.
After seeing the anonymous comment, Mr. DeMar filed a complaint on Monday with the city’s Ethics Committee, claiming that Mr. Graham allowed information in his personnel history to become public on his blog, The Mayor’s View.
Mr. DeMar claimed that information about his personnel history -- specifically, deliberations in a closed Civil Service appeal hearing -- should not have been made public and should not have appeared on the mayor’s blog. The comment was put up Thursday and taken down following Mr. DeMar’s request to remove it that day, he said.
Mr. Graham said Tuesday that while he moderates all comments before they are posted, he “does not recall” reading the offending comment. On Monday, Mr. Graham said he didn’t know anything about the comment, referring all other questions to City Manager Sharon A. Addison.
Mr. DeMar said he did not know the police are conducting the investigation. So far, he has not been contacted by police.
“I’m kind of surprised it’s been taken to that level,” he said, adding he’s glad that police are looking into it.
When he became aware of the comment last week, City Attorney Robert J. Slye immediately called the police because of the seriousness of the situation of making a city employee’s work history public, he said.
“We take this very seriously,” he said, adding it would be wrong for a city employee or public official to make that kind of information public.
As far as Mr. DeMar knew, only six people knew about the issue: the three members of the Civil Service board, the civil service secretary, Mr. Slye and a stenographer who attended the Nov. 21, 2014, hearing to revoke him from the eligibility lists. The three Civil Service board members who participated in the hearing are Charles F. Ruggiero Jr., Rose Frattali and Margaret Ryan, and the secretary is Amie L. Davis.
Saying he “was embarrassed” that it happened, Mr. DeMar said the only person he told was his fiancee, Amanda Lewis, the deputy city clerk in City Hall. He did not tell his coworkers or family members about it.
He could have appealed the Civil Service Board’s decision, but decided not to fight it because it would have cost about $8,000 in legal bills to do so. He also figured he would never be promoted to either position, so he dropped the issue.
Also on Monday, Mr. DeMar learned he was being transferred out of the city code enforcement office, causing him to claim that the city was retaliating against him for filing the ethics complaint.
Fire Chief Dale C. Herman said he reassigned Mr. DeMar “in the purview of what’s best for the fire department,” stressing it had nothing to do with Mr. DeMar’s candidacy.
Mr. DeMar questioned the timing of his transfer to the fire station after he filed the ethics complaint earlier in the day.
On Tuesday morning, Chief Herman assigned Mr. DeMar to ride on Engine 1 out of the Massey Street fire station, even though there are no actual spots for Mr. DeMar on the firetruck. Instructed that he would not be allowed to fight fires, Mr. DeMar was told he would only be “an observer.”
“I’m like any civilian who goes on a ride-along,” he said. “I’m a rider.”
With the initiation of a criminal investigation, the city ethics committee will not pursue Mr. DeMar’s complaint until police are finished, Mr. Slye said.
The Board of Ethics renders advisory opinions and makes recommendations regarding such issues as conflicts of interest, acceptance of gifts and the disclosure of confidential information.
The five members are Police Chief Charles P. “Chip” Donoghue, Rande S. Richardson, James D. St. Croix, Arthur C. Stever III and Jean A. Bilow.
Ms. Addison declined to comment on the situation.
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(c)2015 Watertown Daily Times (Watertown, N.Y.)
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