Thursday, April 29, 2010

Guy Charged With Disorderly Conduct for Email to Alderman

I disagree with this.

A city resident who threatened in an e-mail to expose that Ald. Steve Bierce failed to pay quarterly sewer and water bills on time for six years unless Bierce dropped out of the April election will receive a $295 disorderly conduct ticket.

Waukesha County District Attorney Brad Schimel said Thursday that he considered the possibility of filing a criminal charge against Timothy Tomann, but noted that proving felony extortion would have been challenging.

He said he also considered a misdemeanor charge, but decided against that because Tomann has no prior record and the likely outcome ultimately would have been similar to an ordinance violation.

Let me be clear (channeling Obama)... Tomann was completely out of line and acted like a foolish jerk.  But I don’t think it should be punished by the law.  Tomann “threatened” Bierce by saying that he would tell people about Bierce’s delinquency in paying some bills - which is true.  Telling someone that you will tell the truth hardly rises to the level of a threat in my mind.  As far as “extortion,” Tomann wasn’t asking for anything personally - money, favors, etc.  He was telling a politician that he would expose a truth if the politician didn’t step down.  Jerk?  Yes.  Immoral?  Yes.  Illegal?  No. 

If Tomann had a higher moral threshold, he would have just revealed the information because the public has a right to know, but what he did shouldn’t be treated as an illegal activity.

(2) Comments
Posted by Owen at 1704 hrs
Law + Politics + Politics - Wisconsin

  1. The whole process of extortion, blackmail, is to hold the threat of exposure over someone else. It is not uncommon for the blackmailer to continue to ask for more.

    It is rightly considered a crime. Tomann got away easy.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on April 29, 2010 at 1919 hrs


  2. Though the thresholds of extortion and blackmail, if in semantics only, may not be crossed, this is certainly a threat. I’m no lawyer, but I believe all three are prosecution worthy.

    Posted by jimspice on April 30, 2010 at 0005 hrs


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