Tag: hearsay

Was There Malfeasance in Sending the Carotti Memo to SLED?

Much of the county, especially the citizens who voted for Johnny Gardner, are eagerly awaiting a report from SLED exonerating Gardner from the allegations made against him by Horry County Administrator Chris Eldridge and Horry County Attorney Arrigo Carotti.

The SLED investigation into the allegations was called for by Eldridge after Carotti authored a five-page email memo outlining these supposed allegations based solely on hearsay and rumor.

If I had written a story about the chairman, the same story related in the Carotti memo, with the same lack of solid documentation and using only the same rumor, hearsay and gossip used in the memo as my sources, I could justifiably be sued for libel, defamation and reckless disregard for the truth.

And with the rapidity that the memo was leaked and appeared in print, I’m not sure that is not exactly what was done with the reporting to SLED as cover to try and build a whistleblower defense.

But allegations based on rumor and hearsay are specifically excluded from the whistleblower defense. Therefore, it looks like Carotti and Eldridge are far out on a limb while sawing it off behind them.

One definition of malfeasance is the performance by a public official of an act that is legally unjustified. I submit making allegations of wrongdoing with nothing more than rumor, hearsay and gossip to back them up, reporting those allegations to SLED and having them leaked to the media are legally unjustified acts. Therefore, it is not a stretch to say that both Eldridge and Carotti may have committed malfeasance by acts so irresponsible they should be fired.

It is a felony in South Carolina to make a false report to law enforcement officials.

I would further submit that any council member who told Eldridge to send the matter to SLED, as Eldridge claimed in a letter to council, and any council member who tries to shield Eldridge and Carotti from discipline by attempting to justify their acts may also be committing malfeasance because there is nothing legally justified about sending a memo to SLED based entirely on rumor, hearsay and gossip.

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Blowing the Wrong Whistle

As the county awaits the report of the SLED investigation into alleged wrongdoing by county Chairman Johnny Gardner, initiated by County Administrator Chris Eldridge and County Attorney Arrigo Carotti, it appears those two are attempting to couch a defense for their actions in the pose of whistleblowers.

This has been obvious since the January 4, 2019 special meeting of council when both appeared at the meeting with personal attorneys.

The Eldridge letter presented to council members after the special meeting specifically speaks of him being a “target of retaliation” if he is either fired or suspended by council – a classic whistleblower defense.

There is one major fault with this defense. Whistleblowing protections are not extended to those who report potential wrongdoing based on unsubstantiated hearsay and rumors.

According to documents written by Carotti and Eldridge, unsubstantiated hearsay and rumors are all they had to justify the imaginary plot they had developed in their minds.

In its simplest form, that plot goes this way – Gardner campaign manager Luke Barefoot and Gardner, by extension because he accompanied Barefoot to one meeting held on November 30, 2018, with two Myrtle Beach Regional Economic Development Corporation (EDC) officials, attempted to have the EDC pay Gardner campaign consultant Donald Smith so that a rumored negative story about the EDC would not appear in Grand Strand Daily. (Total Rumor)

On or about December 5, 2018, Carotti and Eldridge learned that a tape recording of that meeting existed and, apparently, believed it contained a “smoking gun.”

On December 12, 2018, Eldridge wrote an email to Neyle Wilson, Chairman of the Board of the EDC, sharing “conversation points” (hearsay) EDC CEO Sandy Davis allegedly told to Carotti about that meeting. In the email, Eldridge complained that the EDC had “an unwillingness to share the taped recording” even though the email is part of an email string in which Wilson twice (December 7 and December 12) offered to allow Eldridge to listen to the recording.

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The Eldridge and Carotti Version of Extortion – ‘He Said, He Said, She Said, He Said’

Horry County Administrator Chris Eldridge and Horry County Attorney Arrigo Carotti were left off the hook last Friday when Horry County Council quickly voted to adjourn a meeting rather than drill down on why the two embarrassed the county by calling for a SLED investigation of a rather ridiculous version of events allegedly involving council Chairman Johnny Gardner.

Using alleged here is really a stretch as fantasy much closer describes a five-page email Carotti authored and Eldridge said, in a letter delivered to council members after the meeting, “accurately summarized” what transpired.

If Eldridge and Carotti are to be believed, we have to accept that Gardner attempted to have the Myrtle Beach Regional Economic Development Corporation (EDC) funnel “thousands of dollars” (Eldridge words) to Donald Smith (Gardner’s campaign consultant), somehow using the Beach Ball Classic “for political cover” (Carotti words). The EDC board is filled with many of the most prominent and politically connected business people, educators and government officials in the county.

By Carotti’s admission in his email, he began writing the email on the 14th relating events that began on (or before) December 5th. Carotti completed his email on December 19th sending it to Eldridge and the 12 members of county council at that time. The entire email was leaked and published in a Columbia media outlet within 12 hours of its completion.

There are supposedly only 14 people who had initial access to this email. At least one of those was the source of its initial leak. Find the leaker among Eldridge, Carotti and the 12 members of council in December and you will discover not only the reason for the leak, but also the reason the email was written in the first place. The motivation will be political not legal, moral or ethical.

The email contains information Carotti allegedly heard from Davis about conversations she allegedly had with Barefoot. In other words, ‘he said, she said, he said.’ In Eldridge’s case, most of his knowledge was gained from Carotti’s retelling of those conversations, or another way, ’he said, he said, she said, he said.’

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