Even though the PNJ, with another ominous sounding headline on their front page edition this morning, wants my stolen text messages to be the center of their "story" on a former employee's qui-tam, harassment case against the county--the fact of the matter is that my text messages are irrelevant to this case.
The PNJ's article conspicuously neglects to mention the fact that I am not an operational employee of the county, I am a member of the legislative. I have no day to day management oversight of staff that bill for EMS services, nor do I have any power to direct, discipline, or control county employees. Commissioners are legislative employees. We only supervise, as a body, our attorney and administrator and individually our office assistants and interns. The administrator and his staff do the day to day supervision and management of employees. So the idea that my private thoughts and those of other citizens to whom I may have spoken to on a raft of issues, to include this former employee (who was a disaster in the opinion of many), has any bearing on this case is laughable. It's a joke.
Of course, PNJ knows this but doesn't report it. That would make a boring article, that's why.
The other fatal flaw with their front page piece and this directed attack on me purported to be news is that somehow my text messages are a part of the former employee's case of "harassment." This argument, too, fails. It fails because this former employee also made herself a public figure with public appearances, statements, and assertions to the board over and over about her perceived issues in the EMS department. She made herself a public official when she sued a local private citizen for speaking out against her and cost that citizen hundreds of thousands in legal fees. This former employee made herself a public figure with her statements in the press and other places with wild allegations--the vast majority of which were extreme exaggerations or outright lies. When you are a public figure, you are succeptible to unflattering critique--someone should wake her up and tell her this. Comes with the territory and if the kitchen is too hot, one should consider leaving. She didn't. That said-- Being an elected official and member of the commission, I have the right to ask any questions I want and speak my mind on any topic I want related to county business, including disagreening with an employee's mistreatment of other employees and her dangerous, reckless disregard for due-process rights for county employees which cost the county taxpayers more than $300,000.00 thus far, and counting. I can say and do this according to recent rulings that describe such speech by a sitting commissioner as enjoying absolute immunity under state law. Absolute, unqualified immunity. (Just look up Judge Pitre's ruling in the Underhill case which was also per-curium affirmed at the DCA) Someone should show these rulings to Ryan and Steven Andrews, too.....absolute, unqualified immunity is what we have in these sorts of discussions and comments.
PNJ knows this, too, but they don't bother mentioning it. They want to lionize this former employee,
while demonizing the commission, the county, and especially--me. Partisan, political attack job. It's why the press is no longer trusted------ and the local community in particular doesn't trust the PNJ.So the idea that my personal text messages that were stolen from me and inappropriately, illegally disseminated unredacted in violation of Florida law by a former employee Jonathan Owens who proudly admitted doing this on a podcast that will be the evidence against him--the idea that these messages contain some smoking gun is ridiculous.
These text files do mention this particular employee, Dr. Rayme Edler, a multitude of times, primarily in unflattering texts sent to me about this former employee, (the one that abandoned her job, Rayme Edler), because this former employee, Rayme Edler, was reviled by many. She attempted to destroy the careers of 6 employees---5 of whom were never convicted of anything. The PNJ will not report that fact, either.
So no, the PNJ wants the reader to think the worst. They want the reader to think the county is attempting to shield these stolen, personal, priviedged texts from the trial because there is something in there that is damaging to the county's side in this case. This is untrue. They want the readers to believe the county purposely overcharged the government. This is untrue. They want the reader to think I am involved in that, the idea of which is absolute rubbish and they know it. They just want to go full salacious to sell ads and papers-------and everyone sees it as a political hit job--which is why the other local media outlets don't touch it. But make no mistake--- that's precisely what they (PNJ) want the reader to think, because salacious, scandalous accusations sell papers and ads.
The fact of reality in this matter is not so sexy, though.
The county is acting to shield these messages because they were not produced in this case appropriately, they were stolen. Law enforcement is investigating this, a truth the PNJ glosses over with gobldygook about Jonathan Owens not being charged with any crime, yet. No, the reality of the situation is this: The county is attempting to protect attorney-client privileged conversations as well as personally identifiable information contained within this stolen file, and the county does not want to legitimize the illegal act that led to these messages being stolen by simply standing by, shrugging their collective shoulders, while the entire file is shared unredacted and scrutinized. This is also why additional legal action to protect the county's files and security posture in this matter will be discussed at our next BCC meeting on September 7th. (why not report that, PNJ?)
With all of this as the real backdrop---setting aside the noise from the PNJ as they put their rank hatred for me, the county, and commissioners on display in their front page garbage articles----the Magistrate Judge in this particular trial made a fair and rational ruling on the protective order motion, granting in part and denying in part, the effect of which will allow for the county to redact all privileged and confidential information not related to this case, along with personal conversations that are not germaine to this litigation.
And when this process is all boiled down, the other side will be ordered to destroy the file. Good. And when only the scant, relevant information is left from this file the people will know the truth:
There is no there there, never was, and these text messages are irrelevant in this qui-tam and harrassment case. Period, end of story.
I wonder if the PNJ will report that when it becomes the reality?
13 comments:
Text messages aside, and towards the meat of her case.
With this last filing, it finally dawned on me that one line she might be trying to pursue is to claim that the people who admitted under oath that at one point or another they had been running on an expired certification--is she going to claim that any ALS billing that happened during the time they said they were actually uncertified (and, btw, well aware of it) was fraudulent?
Here's the real problem you've got, Commissioner Bergosh, and one that is so far out of the gate I don't know that there's any fixing it.
When it was clear what Edler and her cohort were up to--framing good, innocent employees to force them out of their operations in order to cover up for a *plethora* of their own slack ass job performances--THE COUNTY NEVER CLEANED HOUSE ON THE PEOPLE WHO CONSPIRED TO FRAME THEIR COWORKERS, JOIN BATTLE WITH EDLER AGAINST THE BCC, AND HELP INSTITUTE A TOXIC WORKPLACE.
To the best of my understanding, not a *single* one of the people who admitted they had at one point or another run on an expired cert (which, btw, happens ALL the time in EMS organizations all over the country) ever had a DOAH complaint filed. (The list of people who admitted that does *not* include the people Edler et al were attempting to frame on fake allegations.) It's not clear any of the people who admitted this were ever officially reprimanded; disciplined in an appropriate manner within federal, state, or County guidelines and policy; or relieved of their duties. Hell, everybody knew Craig Ammons admitted that he was running on, if memory serves, an expired PALS card, and he was one of the *primary* architects of this mess--his conniving is all over the emails. I stated this *publicly* at the podium. Nonetheless, the County, for some mysterious reason, might as well have given him a ticker tape parade on his way out the door.
Right now--in this very moment--you have a supervisor in the EMS department who was another primary architect paving the way for Edler to game them all while trying to get to her payday, and, in my opinion, use all the bad apples who existed when she hit the County to pump them for information on the weak spots and try to figure out how she could sue the County. And they all fell for it, gullible asses that they were. Why on God's green earth would somebody who was one of the primary contributors to this mess be a current MANAGER in the EMS department?
Because, to be clear: in my opinion, to the best of my understanding, Edler's m.o. out of the gate was to size up the wheat and the chaff. To the best of my understanding, she determined who was by the book and trying to keep the inmates from running the asylum; then partnered with the bad apples and power trippers; convinced them they were part of her Queen tribe; and mommy absolved them of any previous wrongdoing. She then enlisted their help in framing all of the people who were trying to keep the bad actors in line in the wake of Steve White being fired-- because he *dared* to voice in Edler's *illegal* hiring party that it was a *very* bad idea to hire her into the County.
So all these dopes who then admitted under oath that they had slacked off on their certs thought they were contributing to Team Edler, and that she was going to keep them protected in their new regime. Instead, they got played to cough up THEIR OWN FAILURE TO KEEP THEIR CERTS UPDATED, and to the best I am able to make out, she is now using that to try to bring suit against the County.
con.
If I said it once I said it a hundred times: the problem in EMS did not disappear just because it got exposed what Edler had been up to, what Jimmey Maddrey had been up to, what the Jason Whatever His Name Was Janice Public Safety Hire had been up to, what Jana Still had been up to. Because the County was content just to slide the rest of it under the carpet and smooth things over. And because that was the path that was taken after all the work of getting those people removed from the scenario, you've now *still* got an EMS department running on some of the same management that politicked against the Board and conspired against their coworkers to begin with. And it looks to me like Edler played them like fiddles to get whatever absurd tidbits she thought she could use for the payday from the County taxpayers she was after all along.
Don't know how any of that ever gets fixed legally without bringing in bulldog outside counsel who actually has an interest in fighting this mess and has the wherewithal to do it. Because current counsel sure ain't it. But hey, you get what you pay for. Moreover, if nobody on the Board has an interest to protect themselves by retaining their own attorneys, well then, good luck with it.
Per the text messages: the County Attorney's department is *not* responsible for the potentially criminal activities of Jonathan Owens or anybody else in this matter; that should have been rigorously pursued locally in every manner possible from the very beginning. Yes, Jonathan should be brought to justice if he committed a crime, but he's a political side note to all of this, and receiving way more attention than he deserves. The only thing the County attorney's office should be involved with is getting to the bottom of what County employees might have been involved. Theft of private material is not Alison Rogers's job; if a commissioner's wallet got stolen from their office, they wouldn't be working through the County Attorney's office to try to resolve it in civil court.
Now that Hope Cannon has brilliantly diagnosed all of the different strains of this, here's hoping that (a) the criminal stuff--outside any staff involved--per stolen private property stops getting intermingled with County business; and (b) somebody who can navigate the twisted web Edler has woven and continues to weave, and who has a fire in their belly to defend the Board and ultimately the taxpayers' money, joins in counsel on this case.
You can't half-ass it in court with Edler. As we well understood, and so legally out-gunned her, financially out-spent her, and fought harder on principle than she cared to fight for what she thought was going to be an easy pay out. Hopefully at some point the County is going to wake up and figure out that this just gets worse until people start treating this court case--the real civil court case, not the side note of the criminal activity that made its way in--more seriously.
Correction: technically, Steve White resigned under pressure and wasn't terminated. Much the same diff, as happened to so many others during Edler's reign of terror. "You have one of two options: resign or be terminated before you leave this room" was one of Gilley's favorite tactics, as well.
Grow up Jeff and lead without your ego - it’s always in the limelight and it would be so nice if these texts could humble you a bit so you realized just who you work for. And my oh my, your gal pal Melissa Pino has to be the smartest person in Escambia county - she has opined on every county issue that there is. If you don’t believe me, just ask her - she is an expert on every county matter. You allow her to continue to feed your ego every day!
5:13--It is not "ego" or "immaturity" to be enraged about someone stealing confidential files from the county--if you truly feel that way about the improper, illegal dissemination of stolen confidential, priviledged, and private information then you need to understand the bigger picture and I hope this situation never happens to you. For you to hope I am "humbled" by the release of impropertly obtained, private conversations between me and my wife and my children and other private conversations with friends and acquaintances speaks more to your moral compass than it ever will to mine--think deeply about that. I have nothing to hide, there is not smoking gun in those texts that somehow implicates me in any wrongdoing whatsoever--and as I have stated above in my post--the PNJ knows this. This sham lawsuit by a disgruntled former employee is PNJ's (and others') rationale for their series of stories which seek to implicate me in some alleged wrongdoing by the county's billing department. It will not be successful, that's my prediction. And finally, if you think it is immature and ego-driven to defend myself from these false light, malicious half-truths by the PNJ as it relates to me and my texts I'll simply tell you that your're dead wrong. We all have the right to self-defense, and if I am not for me, who will be? Think on that, and have a great Thursday.
In my opinion, you are correct that the PNJ has unfairly attacked you in the past. Some of their past headlines, for example, have been deliberately misleading.
Andy Marlette was devoid of journalistic ethics. People who agreed with Marlette’s opinions conveniently overlooked his unethical methods.
Likewise, the “reporting” performed by your friend, Rick Outzen, is also frequently biased and incredible.
I’m of the opinion that unethical journalists pose the most concerning threat to our great country.
Since Marlette’s departure, the PNJ has been improving. I’ve been favorably impressed with Tom McLaughlin’s reporting of Santa Rosa County. And I’m pleased that Molley Barrows is reporting for the PNJ.
I disagree with your assertion that your texts regarding the Elder case are irrelevant because “you are part of the legislature”.
The Commission is THE governing body of Escambia County. We don’t have an executive branch and a judicial branch to balance the authority of our commissioners.
A commissioner is certainly capable of creating a hostile workplace for a county employee.
Your texts regarding county business are certainly relevant and should be divulged to the great citizens of Escambia County who pay your salary.
Tom Jardine: A couple of things. First, I agree with your assessment of Marlette and the PNJ. You are correct. They are horrible, partisan, and biased. To your point that we are the sole controllers of the county--that is completely incorrect. We have an executive, the county administrator. We hire him/her--and they run the county and those powers and duties are delineated in florida statutes, as are the powers and duties of the elected commissioners. And to your assertion that a commissioner can create a hostile work environment--I disagree. Commissioners do what they do, and when they stay in their lanes, the commissioners have no sway, whatsoever, in day to day employee actions and work. It is only when a commissioner crosses the line and attempts to utilize his position to force issues (think Grady Albritton and/or Doug Underhill) and control day to day employee operations in contravention to statute that such a situation could occur. As it pertains to my particular scenario--I HATE bullies. In this instance I stood up to the bully who was making wild and unfounded, unproven, and inaccurate accusations to try to ruin good employees' careers. And I did it in a way that I never spoke to the employee that was engaged in inappropriate conduct, and I never pressured the administrator. I followed the processes, we went through the court cases, investigations, and everything else--and the outcome speaks for itself. The accuser was wrong, she abandoned her job, she attempted ruination of 6 careers, 5 of whom were never convicted of anything. I would assert, if you take the time to dive into this situation in particular, you will find everything I say is true----thus the huge payouts we have had to make to clean up the mess created by the employee, not the commissioner(s) that DID create a toxic, hostile workplace.
Well, I disagree with you totally. The Administrator is both hired and fired at the pleasure of the commissioners.
And the commissioners are capricious. For years, Janice Gilley was Barry’s appointed Island Authority Board member. Then, two years into her three-year contract as administrator; Barry led the campaign for her removal.
You voted for Ms. Gilley’s termination. And I believe that your main motivation was that you disagreed with how she handled this very same Elder/Sellers issue.
So, it doesn’t appear that you have stayed in your lane on that issue. And every Administrator recognizes that if they don’t capitulate to you commissioners; they might lose their job.
The commissioners frequently get involved in issues well beyond legislation. And the commissioners’ power is largely unchecked. Escambia County’s executive branch is undeniably subordinate to the Commission.
If I were a judge, I would not withhold your text messages from Elder’s legal team.
The beautiful thing about America is we can agree to disagree, Tom. You state, broad brush, that the commissioners are "capricious" as if that is a fact. It's not, it is your opinion only. Yes, Janice Gilley was fired. For my vote to terminate her, it was solely about her rank failure to follow Board policy and collective bargaining mandates with respect to due process for employees. I have nothing against her personally at all--but she failed to follow policy and there were some stark consequences ($300K and counting in settlements and legal bills to date) to that for which I felt a vote to terminate was appropriate when Steve brought that forward. I suspect each commissioner that voted for her termination had their own reasons. And the other thing you and I disagree on is that we have unchecked power. Totally untrue. We face the voters in staggered four year terms so every two years voters get a crack at us and every election is competitive lately and nobody is guaranteed a win ever. Add to that the statutes which limit our power in directing staff and there is a check and balance system that works -- even if you don't recognize it. Here is an example: one commissioner attempted to threaten and intimidate our attorney. She brought it to the board's attention and we protected her and censured that one commissioner. And finally, Dr. Edler is a public figure and she received scrutiny from the board and citizens alike, as well as from employees under her, for things that were going sideways in her department under her watch. When she sued a citizen, when she dumped on us at meetings and in the press, she made herself a public figure. And as you know, Tom, public figures are ripe for critique and sometimes it is ugly. Trust me, I know. Doesn't mean it was harassment or a "hostile work environment." So yes, you and I disagree totally, and that is fine, because we live in America where we are free to disagree. :)
The emperor has no clothes 😂😂😂
6:21-Very Apropos--if you are really going to elevate a guy like Jonathan Owens to "Emperor" status, I guess it works. Kind of. Because he is the emperor walking around naked as it pertains to his proud and strident ADMISSION that he unlawfully possesses a file chok-full of confidential, priviledged, confidential and exempt from disclosure information. He not only freely admits to possessing it, he admitted to giving it to at least one other entity unredacted. So no, he's not walking--he is the emperor "strutting" around in the nude, blissfully ignorant and unaware, apparently, as HE admitted on Tallman McKay's podcast he is in possession of files for which he has no authorization to possess and that he knows contain specific, personal priviledged medical records describing specific diagnoses, prognoses, and even specific medicines prescribed on more than a dozen individual local citizens (not just my family members, but from other employees, their dependents, and other local citizens in the Pensacola community). So he is not just naked, and walking forward nude as in Hans Christian Andersen's trope, he (Jonathan Owens) is strutting not unlike John Travolta strutting up a York Street with a can of paint in one hand in the opening sequence of Saturday Night Fever. Jonathan is strutting. LOL. In addition to that, this file that was stolen from the county and that Jonathan Owens possesses without authorization ------he, Jonathan Owens--- also told Tallman McKay on that same podcast that he (Jonathan) read and kept and gave this file to a third party--- -- that same file that in addition to cofidential medical information has multiple persons' social security numbers, bank account numbers, loan numbers, and other financial documents for which Florida law (Fla. Stat. § 817.5685), determines such knowing possession of such information pertainint to even only one (1) citizen improperly (which this is, by the way) is a misdemeanor. If such information is improperly possessed by a person and the information pertains to five or more individuals--this is a Felony. Don't believe me, just go read the relevant statute, here. http://www.leg.state.fl.us/Statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&URL=0800-0899/0817/Sections/0817.5685.html Trust me, I've read it. It's not good. I wonder If Jonathan Owens read it before he admitted what he did on Tallman's Podcast, here? https://www.newsradio923.com/pmn/episode/278b29a0/080723-jonathon-owens-responds-to-jim-little-article-in-pnj-re-flash-drive-jeff-bergosh-cell-phone
Wow! If Jonathan is your emperor with no clothes, Anonymous 6:21, he is not only walking forward naked, he is dancing, strutting, break dancing, and jumping rope naked.
If you’re under Federal Investigation, it. Doesn’t matter who has them at this point lol. Fraudzilla!!!!
8:22 - You obviously are not keeping up, so let me help you. #1--I was contacted by law enforcement, by them, and I am not the subject of any investigation. They are looking into the theft of government property from the county's IT department and I am cooperating completely because the county/my files were hacked by someone. That is number 1. Number two is this: these stolen/hacked files purported to be mine have been possessed by former employee and disgraced former commissioner Doug Underhill's secretery, Jonathan Owens, who himself who has no authority to possess these files. Jonathan Owens has now admitted this in the media, admitted that he not only possessed these exempt, privileged and confidential files without authorization but then he's subsequently given this same file to other parties unredacted apparently in violation of § 817.5685. So I know you're probably not aware-or you are and simply are a kool-aide chugging ECW sycophantic, lobotomized zombie just attempting to muddy the waters--so I get that and you're probably reading the compromised, weak and biased reporting coming from the PNJ and so you might think something entireley different---I get that you are meek and unsophisticated. It's okay, though. Read what I have written above, then re-read it slowly. Read it a third time if you need to, but understand this--everything I have said above in this comment and here:
https://jeffbergoshblog.blogspot.com/2023/09/so-what-does-fla-stat-8175685-say-and.html
is 100% the truth. Folks that flagrantly violate the law then strut like proud, strident peacocks--sometimes these folks walk themselves right into piles and piles of steaming, reaking dog excrement. So never believe what they are feeding you and you are lapping up...it is the same stuff they are walking into without even realizing they've done it.
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