of his child. i think we should address the dissuasion of witnesses. fourth, i think we should address the issue. the failure to support and encourage victims to come forward. first, the violence against miss lopez. i think it is without dispute that it occurred. the conduct was clearly wrong full and clearly unlawful. i found it disturbing that the share of -- and the sheriff

testified in a way to minimize the conduct. is there a discussion as to whether or not the mayor was able to establish that the sheriff will fully abused his wife on december 31, 2011? >> the evidence shows that a more serious incident occurred than just what has been characterized as an army brat. i think there was a tremendous amount of evidence that shows the severity of the seriousness of the incident that took place. we have the video that was more or less contemporaneous accounts

of what happened. it was corroborated by what miss lopez said. what the own witness and the campaign manager described as domestic violence. i think the evidence shows more serious incidents than what the chef and a modest at the proceedings. >> i think this is in addition to what commissioner lou was saying. thew3 video was also the more credible source as to whether there were previous attacks -- acts of physical abuse to use

your phrase ha. i thought that they were the contemporaneousl and and clearer emotion as to whether physical act had taken and the testimony that we got in this proceeding. >> any other views from the commissioners? >> let me add my views as a layperson. hull and all the legal issues that had been discussed, it is very simple. number one, the video. that we have seen, miss lopez taped with the assistance of her friend and neighbor. there is no way to look at that video. and not believe that something

serious occurred. and an indictment of her husband. she is an actress. was that back? i have no way of knowing. i believe what i saw. number two, in the end, ross mirkarimi made a plea bargain. so he pleaded guilty to perhaps something lesser. i don't know if it would be a lesser or greater in terms of false imprisonment. there is a lot of discussion and perhaps by pleading to this he

avoided a much more serious issue. we did not hear what those discussions were between all the attorneys in coming up with that plea deal. those things are an indictment of what occurred. none of us were there and we don't know what took place. lpsomething serious did take ple in the share of ultimately pleaded guilty -- the share oerf pleaded guilty. >> next, we discuss abuse of office to take away custody of his child from the slope was spirited -- miss lopez. there was evidence about use of the term "powerful" in terms of what the sheriff said to miss lopez. my preliminary view is that

there is not enough to sustain a charge of officialñilp miscondut based on this allegation. i do not think the mayor has proven beyond -- that there was a threat to use the power of his office to take away his child. the allegations are too vague to be proven in this case. i welcome the view of my fellow commissioners. >> i would agree with you. i found the testimony unconvincing. i was not convinced by the explanation that manpower of the custody laws. even if i read that i am a powerful man or that i have power, it was not connected enough to anything else to make

it around for a conduct violation. there may be a number of ways to interpret it. even if i leave aside the unconvincing power of the laws, connections, a financial power. the articulateness, english lemons speaker, whatever it was. i think we would need more of the nexus to think that it was the abuse of office by threatening to use that specific kind of power. >> the next fact i think we should consider is the dissuasion of witnesses. there were two witnesses the mayor identified as being dissuaded.

the first was miss lopez. let's take them one witness at a time. miss madison testifies in her declaration that miss lopez told her the sheriff instructed her not to go to the police or tell anyone about the abuse. the share of chose not to cross- examine ms. madison on this point. i think we need to take it as credible. but subject to the fact that i think it is here say, i did not see any non-hearsay evidence from the mayor's side to show

that the sheriff made attempts to dissuade vessel does from going to the police. -- miss lopez from going to the police. the telephone messages, text messages and e-mail. he instructed her to try to dissuade miss lopez from lptalkg to the police or reporting this incident. that is a plausible reason of the fact.

this is a preponderant of the evidence that those actions occurred. i did not find her testimony with respect to the conversations with miss hanes to be a particularly credible at times. the mayor was not able to sustain this piece of evidence. i welcome the views of my fellow commissioners. >> i take it that you are talking about it as a separate charge of misconduct. because as we get further in discussion, i think there is some relevance to the conclusions i reached about the pattern of phone conversations between miss hanes, lopez, and

the sheriff. and when i pressed her on saying whether discussions about how you strategize, they just want to support ms. lopez. in the real world, the sheriff was facing the fact that this was going to go public. how do you spin it? that is what i think those conversations were probably about. how can we deflect what is going to be obviously our political enemies using it to their advantage? i don't think there is evidence to support a separate charge of misconduct.

>> any other views? i felt that that was the part of the testimony that was not credible. this notion that they get these conversations and the share of -- sheriff was clearly involved. i did not find that incredible. >> in addition to which she testified that she could not remember the substance of many of those phone conversations. there were 20, 30 phone calls? to say you don't remember what you were talking about is not credible. she may believe she does not

remember it but i was not convinced at all. >> i would agree with your conclusion. there is a very plausible or possible chain that would explain better than miss lopez calling someone she did not know very well and hremembering her having something different than the testimony but i don't think we have enough for a separate charge. >> i next think we should discuss the witness dissuasion charges with respect missw3 madison. here i don't think it's close. agianain, it's plausible the sheriff instructed miss hanes to tell miss madison not to cooperate with the police.

i do not think we are close to that kind of evidence we will need to find that sheriff sought to dissuade miss madison from cooperating with the police or reporting the incident. i welcome the view from my fellow commissioners. >> i think there was an unbelievable amount of text and phoen clal -- phone calls. we counted between 20 and 40. over 30 calls a text with miss lopez threw up the day -- throughout the day. in the end, it looks like the campaign manager was at the center of all of the activity that day.

i did not change that there was enough evidence to take that and infer via preponderant of the evidence that the sheriff was orchestrating it. t i thin there was an interesting coincidence -- i think there was some interest in coincidences -- interesting coincidences. she would call miss madison and say, forget everything i told you. i do not think there is enough for the sheriff to orchestrate it. >> i would concur. i want to leave aside the atmosphere that was created later.

the respect or disrespect for the participation of witnesses. there was the conduct and the tone in which a teacher of was engaged. on this point, i agree with you. >> the next issue that i think we should address are the guns. you probably recall that when this first came up in the declaration, i suggested we strike it but it seemed very tangential to what was going on in front of us. frankly, the sheriff didn't help himself and testified and consistently with what he told the inspector. the inspector was not cross-exam and a meeting that we need to take his admissible -- but he

was not cross-examined, meaning that we need to take it as credible. they established that he told the inspector that he sold his gun in 1996 to a fellow cadet. i don't remember the exact individual. the question that is whether that was simply a mistake in a statement or if it was, in fact, a willful attempt to deceive and the inspector. -- deceive the inspector. this was a closer call in my mind that i thought it would be when the evidence came in. i do think that in light of the fact that all the guns were collected at the same time, that

i do not think there is a preponderant of the evidence that the sheriff was willfully attempting toñi deceive the inspector when he suggested that he sold the gun in 1996. both sides of the argument require some -- trying to connect the fact with argument. as with some of these other facts, i do not believe that it was sustained by a preponderant of the evidence. i welcome the views of my fellow commissioners. >> i would be interested in subdividing these pieces related to guns, but the matter of thinking it as a separate question about the matter of providing the guns to returning

the guns to the sheriff's office, not to the police department and the related -- >> i was thinking of them as separate issues. >> ok. >> i wish i had been told if there was another got as to which that description applied. it would have been a mistake about someone that held several licenses, or whether it was -- which would tell me more about whether it was an intentional effort to mislead. but we did not have that. the third gun in this setting. it is hard to connect the dots. >> i think if the gun was not collected at the time of the other guns, i would feel that it was willful. th eye coul see the basis of

the motive for the misstatement -- i could see the basis of the motive for the misstatement it is likel. it is likely with respect to turning over the guns to the police department, again, i -- frankly, i think it was childish. this idea that you are going to have a dispute with the court and between departments about who should have guns is not something i would expect from our sheriff. i would hope that our share of would comply with the letter of the law and would follow the instructions of the court to ensure that the weapons were turned over to police.

but i do not think that, whether the guns were with the sheriff or with the police could amount to something of official misconduct. there were not in the share of's custody and control so i do not think that the fact that the sheriff's office had the guns rather than the police department can support a charge of official misconduct. >> i would agree with that. i think the testimony was inconclusive and actually pretty confusing on that point. there was some testimony about whether he was supposed to turn it over to his attorneys and who was present when that conversation -- when that conversation took place. at the end of the day, the attorneys are correct that the

mayor testified that he did not think that, in and of itself, could sustain a charge of official misconduct. >> i agree with your result and i also agree with your comment about a way of acting that i find it uncomfortable. i had not thought about childish, but that applies. putting members of the staff of the sheriff's department into the position that the share of did while he was their supervisor, to return the guns to the share of department staff and expect them to hold on to them and not give them to the police department, and the inconsistent instructions we heard in testimony is insensitive to the dilemma that he puts his line officers in. i think that was troubling. but this is not -- we are not

here judging people's judgment, although i think it was poor judgment. ñichairperson hur: the last factual issue that i think could sustain a charge of official misconduct is the effort -- the failure to support and encourage potential victims and witnesses to the domestic violence. i think the standard here for official misconduct with respect to these allegations1 i think the mayor has, in some ways, conceded that the failure caused -- clause requires that the officer fails to perform a duty conjoined to him by law. i do not think that the sheriff was required by law to make

public statements supporting ivory madison. he was, at that point, a criminal defendant. i am not comfortable with suggesting there is some duty that a criminal defendant needs to go out and make public statements supporting someone who is a witness in a criminal matter against them. even aside from the criminal matter, i think it is a dangerous precedent to say that an elected official can be held to have committed official misconduct by failing to support individuals who are, at least from his perspective, attacking him. i do not think that this course of conduct where he failed to encourage and support victims and witnesses can sustain a charge of official misconduct. i welcome the views of my fellow commissioners.

>> i think i would agree with that, particularly with respect to himself being the criminal defendant at that point in the process. i do not know that we would require, that the law would require him to encourage witnesses to come forward against himself in the criminal process where he is the defendant. i think that would be an awkward president to set. -- precedent to set. >> i agree that it is a higher bar and that an individual has a right to mount a defense. that said, this element was not explored as early as some others.

-- as thoroughly as some others. what i'm wondering is how much more aggressive public campaign of criticism was doing so at the direction of the indication of the "i cannot do it, but would you do it" guidance of the sheriff. it was not a pretty picture, but it has led the public to see this in a much more political and aggressive light. then it would have been had commentary about witnesses not taken place. the press has its own attraction to certain stories that you cannot lay at the feet of any of the participants either. but i do not see the steps to the -- to be able to support it

rising to the level of either a failure to perform a duty and joined on the sheriff or falling beneath the standard of decency of faith and right actions required by a public officer, particularly when that person is defending criminal charges. chairperson hur: i appreciate your emphasis on the second clause. it could conceivably fall under that. i agree with your points and i want to echo something that you just said which concern me when i heard the sheriff testified. -- testify. these are really disturbing allegations. the sheriff makes an apology to ms. madison in his plea statement and cannot explain what he is apologizing for. these are the sorts of things that make clear to me that the

conduct was for. -- poor. i do not think it amounts to official misconduct, but i do not want there to be any illusion to my view about whether it was appropriate conduct or not from what i would expect from an elected official. but i do not think it rises to official misconduct. >> you are talking about this item only? >> yes. any other views with respect to the factual allegations? of course, the parties submitted a joint statement which was somewhat helpful in us trying to determine what facts we really need to find and discuss here. we have addressed, i think, the

most salient ones. there are a couple that we may want to address just so that we can ensure that we have established the predicate for our discussion of the law and the application of the law to the facts. i think it is undisputed that the share of -- sheriff was elected on november 8, 2011, and that he was sworn in on january 8, 2012. i also think that there is -- it was proven by a preponderance of the evidence that he did engaged in actions at the sheriff's office that he was getting up to speed on what his duties would be in the interim between november 8 and january 8.