ALC-Litigation Reports Oversight Subcommittee
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Unknown speaker
0:00
Thank you.
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Speaker 2
5:00
We have two issues to take up, one that I anticipate taking a little longer than the other one, and
Speaker 3
5:10
I'll have comments when we take up the second issue, but essentially what I want to say is it's my plan to try to get this thing in and out and done. There's no reason to extend a meeting longer than what it takes to accomplish the issues that we have. And so, anyway, so we're going to first do my co-show. Representative Fyatt, do you have anything? Okay. So the first item is the settlement review of the Alicia Christopher and Department of Human Services.
Honestly, unless there's any questions for DHS, I won't even worry about bringing them up. But if the staff doesn't mind giving a little bit of a summary of what the case is, that'd be great. Okay, Mr. White, if you want to come up, just give us a quick summary of the
Speaker 7
6:04
case. that'd be great. If you don't mind introducing yourself for the record, that'd be great. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mark White with DHS. Yes, this was a former employee of ours. She was terminated from her employment. She filed a claim with EEOC and then later filed a federal
lawsuit making some allegations of racial discrimination in relation to our termination and also connected to some events that happened leading up to our termination. We, defending the case, we think we have a good defense against it. There are some complicating factors, and of course, defending a federal lawsuit is an expensive measure, even when the Attorney General's Office is representing you, as they are in our case. And so based on just the complicating factors, the Attorney General's Office spoke with us, we spoke with our attorneys,
and we jointly thought that probably settlement was in the best interest of the state. And so the settlement is for the individual to return back to work for DHS in a different division, which she is now back in, and in payment of $10,000 for the attorney's fees. And with that, I'll be happy to answer any questions. Any
Speaker 3
7:04
questions from committee? All right. Seeing none without rejection, we'll consider this item reviewed. Thank you. Okay. So we're going to pick up item D. And let me just say this, that when I was
approached about this issue, I was aware that it could be something that could be a little difficult for us to handle, but it is an issue where there was a case that was bought, it was dismissed based on the grounds of immunity, so essentially of an individual that doesn't really have recourse if that essentially is upheld, and so it's an opportunity to present his concerns to the committee. To be completely honest, my two things that I would say, my personal agenda in this, is one, that we would just, he has an opportunity to air whatever
grievance he has against his state government, but two, is that we've become aware of the issues of immunity and how it truly affects citizens and basically removes an ability for them to redress grievances, which is part of their issue. So without any further ado, I'm going to go ahead and call Mr. Monk, and if you have council wants to come with you and let me say this you know we invited everybody to take part all the parties people involved in this and if I were if I were
thinking about this beforehand I would have waited till the appeals process ran before I before we scheduled this on the meeting my problem is before I really thought about that that we had already had the scheduled and I had individuals were planning on coming and so because of the fact that the appeals process has not ran, the defendant in this case and the other parties of the state have been advised by counsel not to come and provide any testimony. And I don't even think that's bad advice. I don't think that we should be offended because they're not here.
That probably is reasonable for them not to be here. So we will see essentially a one-sided presentation unless there's anybody in the audience who wants to provide another side. So if any of us are good legislators, we'll know that every issue oftentimes has many perspectives to that issue, and so we should take that into consideration. The other thing I want to say before we get started, the Executive Summary is something that District Monk provided, so when you look at that and you see the word Executive Summary, don't assume that it was BLR staff that put that together.
It was put together, obviously, while the information may be 100% accurate, it was put together with with from one side of it and then having having said that you know we'll go ahead and move on and mr. monkey you are if you don't mind introducing yourself for the record then we'll move forward my name is Edward okay and so if you if you have a presentation they were in fact if you don't
Speaker 5
9:50
mind everybody at the table if you'll introduce yourself for the record would be great Whit
Speaker 10
9:55
Hyman I'm one of Ed's attorneys okay Joey McCutcheon, also one of Ed's lawyers.
Speaker 3
10:00
Okay. Mr. Monk, you are recognized, and obviously you know, you're represented by counsel here. You know that whatever the
Speaker 12
10:06
ramifications are to whatever case that you may have and so forth, but you're recognized to freely
Ed Monk
Unverified
10:12
speak. Thank you. Good afternoon. Thank you, Senator Ballinger, for the invitation to speak today and to explain and answer any questions about my lawsuit. My name is Ed Monk. I'm an Arkansas native, an Arkansas resident, retired Army officer, former deputy sheriff, a former school teacher, part-time police officer, a business owner, and a community volunteer.
Let me begin with a quote, an excerpt from the cadet prayer at West Point, my alma mater. Make us to choose the harder right instead of the easier wrong, and never to be content with a half-truth when the whole can be one. At age 53, this was the first lawsuit I ever filed. All I ever wanted was for state employees in the Senate, the Capitol Police, and the state police to simply tell the truth about what happened, but they refused. So I saw no option to get to the truth but to file a lawsuit just before the statute of limitations expired.
A brief summary of the evidence shows the following. In response to directives from a state senator, a Senate Sergeant of Arms made up a totally false misconduct allegation about me and reported this fabrication to the Arkansas State Police as fact. The state police then, without investigating, verifying, or confirming, reported this false misconduct allegation as fact to my police chief, my government supervisor. My attempts to have the Senate and the state police publicly identify the sergeant of arms
who made up and reported the false allegations have met with denials, refusals to act, and lies. The evidence includes state police memos, letters, emails, meetings, phone conversations, and deposition testimony. All meetings and phone conversations were audio recorded. I provided each of you with a summary that includes the supporting documents. Here are the details of what the evidence shows. On the morning of February 24, 2017, I was called by my police department in order to report to my chief of police
to make a statement about, quote, what happened at the Capitol yesterday. This was a total surprise to me because I had not been at the Capitol the day before and had not even been in Little Rock for a week. My chief said that the state police captain called him and told him that I had been forcibly removed from the Capitol building by the Capitol police for threatening a senator. This, of course, was completely false. This could not be a simple misunderstanding or an exaggeration.
because nothing even close to this has ever happened. I have never acted inappropriately with any elected official. I have never been removed from any building. The only explanation was that the allegations were an intentional fabricated lie. So I began to investigate to find out who fabricated this lie and their motive for doing so. And this is what I found. On February 21, 2017, two days before the false allegations were made, I sent a polite email to my state senator, Senator Flowers, asking to meet with her to discuss pending legislation.
You have a copy of that email. This was the first communication or interaction I'd had with Senator Flowers in over four years. Four years earlier, in February of 2013, at my request and Senator Flowers' invitation, I had a 20-minute cordial meeting with her in her Capitol office. This meeting was witnessed by a Capitol Police officer who described it in his report as non-threatening and that I left without incident. Four years after that meeting, on February 23, 2017, in response to my one polite email,
Senator Flowers directed Senate Sergeant-at-Arms Al Vernon Rogers to notify the Capitol Police that I was intimidating and harassing her because of one email. Sergeant at Arms Ivernon Rogers also testified in her oath that Senator Flowers told him that, quote, she didn't want Monk contacting her in any way here at the Capitol. Of course, there is no legal or ethical way for a Sergeant at Arms to prevent a constituent from engaging in constitutionally protected, polite communication with his elected official,
but there are unethical ways to attempt to intimidate him. Sergeant-at-Arms Alvin Rogers testified that immediately after receiving this directive from the Senator, he obtained my ACIC photo from Captain Charlie Bryce of the Capitol Police. The Capitol Police giving my ACIC photo to a non-law enforcement employee is a criminal act. The evidence in the form of four state police memos I have provided you shows that immediately after receiving the directive from Senator Flowers,
then illegally obtaining my ACIC photo, Sergeant-at-Arms-Logers stopped three troopers who were working security in the Capitol. He then gave the troopers my photo, identified me as Edward Monk, a Whitehall police officer, told the troopers that I had been in the Capitol that morning, a lie, told the troopers that I had confronted Senator Flowers in her office, a lie, told the troopers that I had acted irate towards Senator Flowers, causing her to feel threatened, a lie,
Told the troopers that I had been forcibly removed from the Capitol by the Capitol Police. A lie. Told the troopers to be on the lookout for me, that I was armed, and that I might try to return to the Capitol building. A lie. One of those three troopers, Trooper First Class Callie Dacus, stated this in her memo dated March 8, 2017, which you have a copy of. While patrolling the Capitol, two sergeant-at-arms assigned to the Senate instructed us to be on the lookout for Edward Monk. They advised us that Monk, who is an officer with the Whitehall Police Department, was
in Senator Flowers' office that morning and had become irate, causing Senator Flowers to feel threatened and have Monk escorted out. One of the other three troopers, Corporal Chuck Lewis, wrote a similar description of receiving the false allegations in his memo, which you have, dated March 3rd. After receiving these false allegations, Corporal Lewis immediately called state police headquarters and reported the fabricated lies as fact to Captain Aramea. As you can see in Captain Aramea's memo, which you have dated March 2nd, Corporal Lewis
told Captain Aramea that, quote, A.V. Rogers had also been involved in the incident. On March 2nd, 2017, I had an office meeting with Deputy Director of the State Police, Lieutenant Colonel Sean Garner about the false allegations the state police reported to my boss as fact. I recorded this meeting. This meeting ended with Lieutenant Colonel Garner telling me the following, quote, all I can promise you is we're going to look into it and we will find out. We will get answers. We'll
dig into it and find out what happened. We will look into it. We will get to the bottom of it. We will get back in touch with you. I assure you we will find out where it came from, where it was initiated, and it will definitely be addressed. Now we need to find out why it occurred. After being promised and assured by Lieutenant Colonel Garner in this meeting that he would identify the source of the false allegation and inform me of the responsible person, I never heard anything from him after this meeting.
So on April 6th, I wrote a letter to Colonel Bill Bryant, Director of the State Police, requesting his assistance in identifying who gave the state police the fabricated allegation that they then reported to my chief of police. In his response letter dated April 17th, which you have, Colonel Byron stated that the three troopers who received the false allegations could not identify who gave them the fabricated misconduct report about me because the troopers, quote, are not familiar with the personnel of the Senate Sergeant-at-Arms staff.
That statement is a lie. Captain Aramia's memo, mentioned earlier, already stated that Corporal Lewis named A.V. Rogers a Sergeant-at-Arms as being involved in giving the false allegations to him and the other two troopers. On March 9th, in a March 9th recorded phone conversation, Corporal Lewis named Al Vernon Rogers as the Sergeant-at-Arms who provided the three troopers with the false allegations about me. Lewis also stated several times that he knew Al Vernon Rogers.
In his deposition testimony, Sergeant-at-Arms Al. Bernie Rogers stated that he knew all three of the troopers by sight and name and that he served as a drill instructor for one of the troopers, Corporal Lewis. Yet Colonel Bryant signed a letter stating that the troopers did not know anyone in the Senate Sergeant-at-Arms staff. Lieutenant Governor Tim Griffin told me in a phone conversation that Colonel Bryant told the same lie to him, that the three troopers could not identify which sergeant-at-arms gave them the false allegations
because none of them knew any of the sergeants-at-arms. In a recorded phone conversation on March 18th, Doug Smith, the governor's law enforcement liaison, told me that Arkansas State Police Deputy Director, Lieutenant Colonel Sean Garner, the same lieutenant colonel I had had a meeting with, told him the same lie, that the three troopers who received the false allegations were unable to name who gave them the fabricated report because the troopers did not know any of the sergeants at arms. I hope that legislators are concerned about such high-ranking state law enforcement
officers lying not only to me but to the lieutenant governor and a member of the governor's staff. In August of last year, my state representative, Ken Bragg, sent a letter to Colonel Bryant asking for answers to very specific questions concerning multiple instances of unethical conduct by members of the state police in this matter. You have a copy of Representative Bragg's letter, and you have a copy of Colonel Bryant's response letter, in which he states that he refuses to answer Representative Bragg's
questions. On April 18th, I attended a meeting with Ann Cornwell, Director of the Senate. I explained the false allegations and provided her with copies of the four state police memos I've given to you. She promised to look into the matter. Mrs. Cornwell then held a meeting with the state employees who were involved with the false allegations. Attendees included Al Vernon Rogers, he was the only Sergeant-at-Arms out of ten asked to attend this meeting, Corporal Lewis, one of three troopers who witnessed and reported
the fabricated allegations, and Captain Bryce, the Capitol Police officer who illegally provided my ACIC photo to Al Vernon Rogers. This meeting should have revealed the truth about what happened. But Ms. Cornwell then signed a letter she sent to me, which you have, dated May 2, 2017, which stated that after meeting with all people involved with the false allegations, she found that, quote, proper protocol was followed, and that, quote, there was no intent to deliberately
misrepresent the facts. In a recorded phone conversation on May 4, after receiving her letter, Ms. Cornwell told me that no one in her meeting was able to identify who gave the three troopers the false allegations. She said this even though Corporal Lewis, an attendee at the meeting, had already told Captain Aramia that A.B. Rogers was involved in reporting the false allegations and telling me in a recorded phone conversation that Al Vernon Rogers was the Senate Sergeant of Arms who gave him and the other two troopers the false allegations. Corporal Lewis also
told me that he was absolutely certain that he heard the allegations correctly. I asked Ms. Cornwell if she would interview all 10 sergeants at arms and ask each what they knew about the false allegations. She refused to do this. I now knew that the Senate staff, the Capitol Police, and the State Police were all cooperating in an attempt to hide the identity of their employees who had acted unethically. on February 23rd 2017 the day the false allegations were given to the three troopers
Senator Flowers also directed Sergeant at Arms Al Vernon Rogers to get her the phone number for the state police officer in charge of the concealed handgun carry license office Rogers testified that he gave her the phone number for Lieutenant Cora Gentry who oversees the carry License Office for the State Police, including the power to certify and the power to decertify instructors for the license. Senator Flowers then called Lieutenant Gentry. The following day, February 24th, Lieutenant Gentry called
my brother, who was an instructor certified by her. Her call was not to speak about official business, it was to speak on behalf of Senator Flowers, explaining that the senator was, quote, sensitive on the gun issue. Why is a state police lieutenant acting in her official capacity, calling instructors she certifies in an attempt to influence constitutionally protected communication between a constituent and an elected official? In January and February 2013, Senator Flowers and I exchanged several polite emails
leading up to our only meeting on February 4th that I mentioned earlier. For my lawsuit, I was deposed by the defendant's attorney, an employee of the state attorney general's office. The attorney showed me printouts of these 2013 emails between myself and Senator Flowers. In these printed emails, someone had changed the sent times of my emails to Senator Flowers from local time to Greenwich Mean Time. This was six hours ahead of local time.
times of Senator Flowers' emails were not altered. This made it appear as though I was emailing the Senator at 1 and 2 a.m. in the morning and asking to meet with her even after she had agreed to meet with me. The Attorney General's Office Attorney pointed out these altered times and asked me why I was sending the Senator emails at such an hour and why I continued badgering the Senator for a meeting even after she had agreed to meet. I would like to know who changed the sent times of my emails in these printouts and why an attorney
from the Attorney General's office used these altered documents in my deposition. Captain Ron Casey was the state police officer who, as directed, called my chief of police and reported to him the false allegations as fact. He didn't make up the lies that Corporal Lewis witnessed and reported to the state police headquarters. Captain Casey was just the messenger of unverified lies. On February 24, 2017, in his email to Corporal Chuck Lewis, Captain Casey tells Corporal Lewis, quote,
Chuck, this guy's a very good man and a good officer, as far as everyone tells me. I wish I would have known that this incident didn't happen. Monk is a strong supporter of the state police. I have talked with his chief. Again, everything about Ed has been positive. In summary, acting on a directive of a state senator, a sergeant at arms made up a false misconduct story about a constituent and reported it to the state police as fact in order to get wrongful, negative police action against that constituent, which did occur.
Then, instead of naming the sergeant-at-arms who used the state police for wrongful, abusive political purposes, the state police, including high-ranking officers in the state police, lied in an attempt to hide the identity of the guilty sergeant-at-arms because he was a well-known retired state trooper. One polite email in four years to my senator resulted in the following happening two days later.
My senator reporting to the Capitol Police that I was intimidating and harassing her. A sergeant-at-arms making up false misconduct reports about me and giving it to the state police who reported it as fact to my chief of police. A state police lieutenant calling my brother in an attempt to influence my constitutionally protected rights to communicate with my senator. I hope members of this legislature, the governor's office, and the attorney general's office find this unethical, dishonorable abuse of government power by state employees to be completely unacceptable.
The definition of unacceptable is that you will not accept it, that you will act to identify and hold responsible all state employees who acted intentionally to violate my rights. I'll be happy to answer any questions you may have or to speak to anyone after this meeting. Senator Ballinger, other members of the legislature, and especially to my two great attorneys, Joey McCutcheon and Whit Hyman, who saw what happened and saw it as unacceptable, so they volunteered to act on my behalf.
I cannot thank you enough. I started with a quote. Please allow me to end with one by Abraham Lincoln. To sin by silence when they should protest makes cowards out of
Speaker 3
27:32
men. Thank you. I have one question. What are you wanting? Like, what would satisfy you in this situation? Senator Ballinger, I would like to answer that in the way
Ed Monk
Unverified
27:42
that I've answered it to everybody that's asked it for the past two years.
And I don't mean to be disrespectful on how I answer it, but my answer to everybody has been, it should not matter what Ed Monk wants. Had I died the day after the false allegations, I would hope everybody would want to identify unethical state employees that had lied, slandered constituents, tried to bully constituents, and then lied to cover it up. So it should not matter what I want. Everybody should want this, but I think what I want, Senator, is the same thing that I
think everybody in here would want if it happened to them. State employees that the evidence clearly shows acted unethically and dishonorably to be publicly identified and held responsible. To not do so, to sit silent when we know we should protest, as Abraham Lincoln would put it, means we're going to continue to have unethical behavior. Despite what the facts show, when I filed my lawsuit, the court said you can't do anything about it. What that tells me is a Senate Sergeant
of Arms could make up a false criminal report about a constituent every day for the rest of his life and report it to the state police and there's no recourse. I don't see that as the way we want government. So I think what I want is what everybody should want even if I wasn't in here asking for it. We have unethical state employees. They need to
Speaker 14
29:11
be identified and they need to be held responsible. Thank
Speaker 3
29:15
you, and I probably should have waited to ask this question, so I'm going to hold off on questions until anyone has a chance to make a comment.
Mr. Hyman, Mr. McCutcheon, do you guys have any comments? Anything to add? You want to make
Speaker 19
29:30
a comment? Well, I was just going to talk about the state of qualified immunity generally and how it prevents people from being able to seek justice. And so that would be one of my
Speaker 3
29:42
questions if you don't address it. So if you want to go ahead and address that, then that would be appropriate. Just kind of give people the state of the case. So from a legal standpoint, where are we at and what happened?
Speaker 19
29:55
So the case was dismissed in Pulaski County Circuit Court because the judge essentially ruled that even if every single thing Ed just said was true, we could not sue the government official involved. So that's known as qualified immunity. And there's a lot of pitfalls there to qualified immunity. Basically, in order for you to sue over a constitutional right being violated, like in this case,
the First Amendment right to petition your elected official for a redress of grievances or even communicate with your elected officials or anyone else. That's a First Amendment violation, right? So before we get there, it has to be, under the current state of the law, clearly established. And what does clearly established mean right now, according to our court system, is that someone else has filed a lawsuit over this once before in a very similar instance. And not only did the court rule that a right was violated,
But they also ruled that this person in this similar instance would be able to recover. So what's crazy about qualified immunity is the court can look at it and say, and they can look at Ed's case and say, well, we're not even going to say whether or not a right was violated. We're just going to say that we can't find any similar case of this ever happening before. And because we can't find any similar case of this ever happening before, we don't even have to reach whether or not a right was
violated or not. So that means the next time, the next time a person like Ed Monk gets any kind of negative action against him for speaking to an elected official, the court could then say this case is really similar to Ed Monk's case, but the court then did decide whether or not a right had been violated so we don't have to either. And that can just keep going and going and going to where there's no telling what your rights are and aren't and I think that is probably
the the most offensive thing about qualified immunity is that you have to find such a similar circumstance and then say and then and then they have to agree whether or not it was a rights violation and that almost never happens if you go through the case law there's crazy things that have happened in Arkansas and in other states for example there's a case right now that may go before the Supreme Court out of the 8th Circuit out of Nebraska. We're in the 8th Circuit in Arkansas as well. There was a woman who was horsing around at the pool with her husband and
kids, and someone called the cops because they thought that they were in an actual fight when they weren't. And the police come up, and they pull this woman aside, and they're like, hey, is this man hurting you? And she was like, what? No, we're just horsing around at the pool. And then the police kept wanting to question her and question her and question her. And then out of corner of her eyes she says she saw one of her children was being bullied by another kid in the pool and she wanted to go address that and and go help out her child and she goes I'll talk to you about this later I'm gonna go back to being in the pool with my kids the police officer says no you're gonna talk to me about it right now and she goes no I'm gonna go deal with this
problem with my child I'm not even the criminal in this situation you think I'm the victim so she turns around and then the officer picks her up and body slams are on her shoulder and breaks her shoulder. And the Eighth Circuit said, we can't find any circumstance where a woman has been body slammed and the court has said that that violated her rights against excessive force under the Fourth Amendment. So therefore, she can't recover. And you kind of think about that, and it sounds terrible, but then think about it on top of that. She has medical bills, and she's probably out of work, and she's
probably at a public pool where this is happening, so she's probably not a person who owns a pool in the backyard. This isn't a rich person. This is just a person who happened to be at the pool whose life's been turned on their head. Out in California, the Ninth Circuit just affirmed that this guy claims when the police served a warrant to take away his illegal gambling machines, a lot of these people in these cases aren't very sympathetic, but he's claiming that when the police came and took away his illegal gambling machines, they also stole about $276,000 from him. And so he sued under the Fourth Amendment, claiming they violated his constitutional right
when they served this warrant and then took his stuff and stole it from him. Ninth Circuit said that's not clearly established. It's not clearly established because it's never happened before. On top of that, we're not even going to say whether or not this violates the Fourth Amendment. So now the next time that a police officer may steal something in the Ninth Circuit, which may happen occasionally because there's about 500,000 police officers in the United States, I mean, there's probably just a little less criminality among police officers than attorneys, which I am but I mean you look at this and you say okay so the next time a police officer steal
something in that ninth circuit it's possible they won't be able to be sued either. In Tennessee there's this guy who who answered the door to his house at 1 a.m because his his wife heard a weird noise outside and he opened up the door and he had his gun facing at the ground on in his hand and as soon as he opened up the door he saw a man crouching with a gun that was pointing at him and they shot him and killed him. It turns out it was a SWAT team that got the wrong address and they killed this guy without ever giving an order for him to drop the gun, without ever doing anything
just because he had a gun that was pointed at the ground. And the court over there said, well, we can't find any other case where someone opened the door with a gun and the police were at the wrong address and they shot him and killed him. So qualified immunity. So your kid's going to grow up without a dad. Then this police officer could have had $100,000 worth of insurance that would maybe pay for your college, but you know what, there's qualified immunity, so we can't even get to that point. There's no way for these people to even recover from a lot of these situations.
I would just hope that the legislator steps in and changes the standard, because this qualified immunity standard is something the court's made up interpreting a statute, and we have a similar statute in Arkansas. All we have to do is change the statute. I think Bob wants to make it to where you can sue the state of Arkansas by a constitutional amendment to pierce sovereign immunity. But in order for individuals to be held accountable and for individuals' lives not to be ruined, I think all it would take is a change of the statute. There's another case
I'll finish up. There's a lot of pitfalls when you're suing any government agent. I had a guy who claims he was falsely arrested and he tried to sue. He also had a hearing where they took away his concealed handgun license permit. And he appealed that, and then an attorney quoted him, well, I can appeal your appeal, but it'll be about three grand. And he goes, you know what? I don't even need a concealed handgun license permit in Arkansas anymore. The legislator passed this statute that says I can carry open or concealed without a license. I'm not going to appeal that, but I'd like to still pursue my case against him for the false arrest.
The court said no. So, because you didn't appeal this administrative hearing where you couldn't even bring witnesses, couldn't even compel witnesses, couldn't even have a jury, couldn't even have impartial 12 people off the street decide the facts of your case, you can't sue that this was an unlawful arrest. You can't get the money back that you spent on your attorney in district court. You can't get the money that you spent on your attorney in circuit court. You're just out. And I think there's a fundamental problem there when people have no way to strike back.
Speaker 5
37:34
And I think I'll end with this case that I had a trial on this last September. And, Mr. Chairman, go ahead. But what I would say is let's make sure we don't get too far off in the weeds and we have opportunity for questions. Sure, yeah. Sorry about that.
Speaker 19
37:47
I had a case in September where this guy yelled FU at a police officer and was arrested, spent eight hours in jail. again not a very likable person he was 20 years old whatever he had to bond out he testified he had to hire an attorney he testified that you know he had these other costs and the jury came back and they gave him a dollar and in that case he was able to pierce qualified immunity because
they said well yeah there's all these cases where you can flip off police officers and do all these other things and they're supposed to not arrest you for it but even in that case these aren't cases where the jury is going to go wild and give people insane amounts of money that they don't deserve. This guy got a dollar, and I think most Arkansans would hear that and say, good. I don't think people should go around saying F you to the police. You're good, you got a dollar. I think that's probably a common sentiment when I read the Facebook comments on a lot of these articles about this case. But at the same time, when
Speaker 5
38:38
you stop somebody from even being able to sue, you
don't get a jury to decide what's fair and how to make them whole. Thank you.
Speaker 10
38:47
Mr. McCutcheon, have any comments? I do. I'd like to echo what Ed Monk has said. First of all, I'd like to thank you, Senator Ballinger, for having us here today, and I'd like to thank the subcommittee also for listening because, quite frankly, this strikes at the heart of our republic. If Ed Monk or any
other citizen can't go to their state senator or state representative and have a cordial conversation, which if you'll read the documents in front of you, you'll see the cordial nature of Ed's comments, then where is our republic? We ought to be able to have tough conversations on the issues and hash the issues out, but in this case, Ed Monk was accused of lying was accused of this conduct
one thing after the next from being on the Capitol in the Capitol, which he was not from confronting a state senator which he did not do from using threatening behavior toward a state senator and being forcibly removed from the Capitol which he did not do. And then also there was a warning to be on the lookout
because this man may return. Our reputation means something. And our family names, as each of you I'm sure will agree, mean something. And it's very important to Ed, a West Point graduate, a law enforcement officer, an officer in the Army. And that's why Witt and I took this case voluntarily. It's not about sometimes, Senator Ballinger, we may argue about tort reform. We may argue about how much money should a jury award.
But all Ed wanted was a simple apology. He wanted the truth. And what's happened since then has been nothing short of a cover-up. It smacks of the powerful protecting the powerful. You start with a state senator, you go next to the sergeant of arms, you go to the director of the senate, you go all the way up to the governor's office, and nobody can get an answer as to why these lies and who made them were made about Ed Monk.
And that should be disturbing to everyone in this room. And there needs to be accountability. I'm not sure what this subcommittee or what you as individual representatives and senators can do, but my recommendation would be to find out, and my hope would be that you would find out, get to the bottom of this, why this has occurred, who made the accusations, and And look at Ed's well-put-together piece that he's laid before you,
documenting every lie, and hold those people accountable. And that may include some people losing their jobs. Because if conduct rewarded is conduct repeated. And I just want to say this about Ed Monk. He has been so persistent on this, and most people would have given up but not Ed because he wants the truth and he deserves the truth and I hope that whatever you can do
whatever action you can take that you will do it because Ed Monk's name and his family's name deserves just that he deserves answers and I would also echo what Whit Hyman told the committee about qualified immunity I hope that we will see some changes in that regard so that people whose rights have been violated get justice and get closure to matters.
We've gone through depositions, we've gone through an entire court case, and now we have no answers and Ed has no justice. I would just again like to say I appreciate you Senator Ballinger for taking on this this is a sensitive matter I mean it's at the heart of this is one of your colleagues Senator Flowers and I appreciate you we've been known to disagree with one another on an issue or two
but I appreciate you very very much for allowing this to be heard in this public forum them, and specifically because our rights do matter. Thomas Jefferson wrote about them in the Declaration of Independence, and we all have rights, but if those rights aren't enforced, then what good are they? Thank you. Thank you, Mr. McCutcheon. Let me just reiterate,
Speaker 3
44:00
the two things I hope to take out of this, once again, is allow a citizen to offer some redress and get his issue off his chest, which
I think was accomplished. The other thing is there is no action that we can take as a committee. This committee has one job, and that's basically to overview pending litigation. I feel like to some extent we've done that, or litigation that the state is involved in, not necessarily pending litigation, which we've done that, but obviously we're hindered in that because we are only getting one side of the story. And what I would just, what I feel like to caution the committee is, you know, clearly I believe Mr. Monk that he believes these were lies that we're told, right?
No doubt about it. I'm not questioning his sincerity. However, I would say that probably the other parties may have some explanation that if they felt liberty to do it, they may be able to explain that. I also don't think that all of them believe that they were lying, although we don't know for sure how that goes. But to me, that's almost irrelevant. So the question is not whether or not everything that Mr. Monk has presented to this committee is being true. The question is, if it is true, then what is his recourse? How does he address that from a, how does he address that with the state?
And in the end, that's the point he made, is that, you know, essentially there is nothing that can be done if this can be dismissed and everything he said was true, then repeatedly somebody could engage in this behavior and not do it. But that's just basically my comment. And I do have a couple of questions from members. And if you do have questions, get in the queue. But Senator Garner, you are recognized for
Senator Trent Garner
Unverified
45:40
a question. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'll give full disclosure. Ed Monk's one of my good friends, supporters. I took my enhanced carry with him. But I think it's interesting this time whenever President Trump and some of our colleagues are being sued for blocking people on Twitter,
we can have allegations made against a man who served his country, a man who takes his personal time to go around and protect schools and churches by giving free training, a man who, in every sense of the word, is cordial, trying to interact with his elected officials, be put on an email thread that questions his character and who he is. And we have to ask, if I got an email such as Senator Flowers got from a constituent and wrote that this is intimidating and harassing behavior, I don't know how we could interact with any of our constituents moving forward.
So I think the most important thing is to realize that we as senators and elected officials have a responsibility to our constituents to interact with them in a cordial manner and to treat them with the respect and dignity they owe. And we've seen some of Senator Flowers' action in this last legislative session, some of her outbursts against members of the Senate, and it seems that we have a clear-cut case of her interacting with a fellow citizen in the same way. And I think that should bring us all greater concern. Thank you. Thank you, Senator Garner.
Speaker 3
46:56
One thing I would say is that I want to really try to make sure that this is not, I mean,
one of the concerns that had been voiced to me about having this meeting on this issue is that we would use it as an opportunity to attack another member. So while I, yeah, I understand your position, Senator Garner. What I would say is, you know, in our questioning and concerns, let's try to make it about this issue or about the greater policy rather than about individuals and personality. Representative
Chair
Unverified
47:26
Love, you are recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I guess this is a question to the Chair because I'm following what's going on here.
Now, I thought that any redress for the state, if you want to take redress against the state as far as suing, would go to the Claims Commission. That is correct.
Speaker 3
47:46
Okay, so is that remedy not afforded here? The answer is, and that actually is a great question. We are in no way a court here. Claims Commission sort of acts like a court. Their job is to try to find out what damages were and award damages, at least
the damages that would be addressed through claims commission. That's not exactly accurate, but pretty close enough for government work. For here, the situation is, I don't know what his financial loss is. Probably none. I mean, even if he got through the court, you know, the court may say there's no damages or approval of that. Maybe they'd be able to demonstrate something. I don't don't know. But in this case, through the claims commission, I don't think he has any claim for financial damages, and so there wouldn't really be probably anything to award. I think that that's another area that he would probably be shut off and wouldn't be able to offer any kind of redress
to the government. So, you know, I can't think of another way for him to be able to come to the state and say, look, this is what happened, and this is my concern, and this needs to be addressed when you come to this committee. All right, thank you. Thank you, Representative Love. Yes, Senator Chesterfield, you are recognized. Thank
Representative Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
48:57
you, Mr. Chair, and I appreciate your remarks concerning the remarks by my colleague, Senator Garner. I would just ask that if we have concerns about each other, that we speak to each other,
and I would suggest if Senator Garner has a problem with Senator Flowers, that he take that problem to Senator Flowers and not to this committee. And it would be interesting to see that interaction. Thank you. That would
Speaker 3
49:20
be interesting to see, I think. and that's an obvious side note we ought to be professional we ought to be ought to be colleagues and ought to be kind to each
Speaker 22
49:29
other that would be my recommendation any other questions or comments
Speaker 3
49:38
from the committee all right i seeing none um is there's nobody else in the audience that has
this wants to speak to this issue is that correct okay do you guys have any any closing remarks
Ed Monk
Unverified
49:49
anything that you'd want to add I just thought of two to add. One is I did try to cordially, directly interact with Senator Flowers. And what I got was a call to my chief by a state police captain and a call to my brother by a state police lieutenant. So sometimes one side attempts to cordially interact and the other side violates rights and makes up things.
And then I talked about the slantering and the cover-up, but there's an additional thing. I had occasionally visited the Capitol. I've been on radio shows that broadcasted from here. I've visited maybe two or three elected officials here. I've eaten in the cafeteria, not here, but over in the main Capitol building. So I have been to the Capitol and the legislature was in session when this happened. So there were radio programs broadcasting from the Capitol and it was very likely I would be invited to be on one of the two that I'm occasionally on. What if, What if, on February 23rd, 2017, just after 1 p.m., when the three state troopers were
given my photo and said, this is Ed Monk, armed, threatened a senator, got kicked out, he'll probably return, be on the lookout for him. And what if I had just by chance walked into the Capitol that afternoon to be on a radio show or to interact with my representative, Ken Bragg, and three troopers see my photo and see me and think, because they've been lied to, because of the directive of a senator, that I'm armed, dangerous, have threatened a senator, and got kicked out? What if that would have occurred?
That's the seriousness, not just the defamation and the lies and the cover up, but that's the seriousness of what could occur when people make very poor, unethical decisions to create lies for political purposes. Thank you, Senator. Thank you. All right,
Speaker 3
51:40
no other questions or comments from the committee? All right, this committee stands adjourned. Thank you.
Agenda
A. Call to Order
B. Comments by Co-Chairs
C. Settlement Review - Alicia Christopher v. Department of Human Services (DHS) [EXHIBIT C]
D. Discussion of 60CV-18-1027 – Monk v. Rogers, et al. [EXHIBITS D1 & D2]
E. Other Business
F. Adjournment
Documents
| Title | Type | Pages | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agenda — ALC-LITIGATION REPORTS OVERSIGHT SUBCOMMITTEE, Jan 16, 2020 | Agenda | 1 | Official source ↗ |
| EXHIBIT C A. Christopher v DHS Settlement | Exhibit | 7 needs OCR | Official source ↗ |
| EXHIBIT D-1 Monk v Rogers Amended Complaint | Exhibit | 30 needs OCR | Official source ↗ |
| EXHIBIT D-2 Monk v Rogers Motion to Dismiss | Exhibit | 2 needs OCR | Official source ↗ |
Speakers
Speaker 2
Speaker 3
Speaker 7
Speaker 5
Speaker 10
Speaker 12
Ed Monk
Unverified
Speaker 14
Speaker 19
Senator Trent Garner
Unverified
Chair
Unverified
Representative Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
Speaker 22