Ethics board complaint against Macomb County Prosecutor Peter Lucido dismissed
It's been languishing for about a year, and now it's gone.
The Macomb County Ethics Board dismissed a complaint against Prosecutor Peter Lucido that lingered for nearly a year and resulted in a lawsuit against the ethics board and the county's top attorney.
The complaint alleged Lucido used county property, buildings and offices to create a photo of himself for political campaign purposes.
"Pete is elated that they're no longer attacking him. ... He's always said he's done nothing wrong," Lucido's attorney, Todd Perkins, told the Free Press on April 25. "It should have been dismissed a long time ago. We're happy to have this."
Mark Brewer, the former Michigan Democratic Party chairman who filed two complaints against Lucido, a Republican, with the ethics board last year, said: "This is outrageous on several fronts." Brewer said he had no notice about the ethics board's meeting and no notice to make any additional arguments.
"He's not gonna be held accountable for violating the ethics ordinance," Brewer said of Lucido, adding: "They just let him get away with it."
The other complaint against Lucido was dismissed by the ethics board in June.
The ethics board dismissed the remaining complaint against Lucido on April 15. It also dismissed complaints filed in March against other countywide elected officials, including Executive Mark Hackel and others who work in his office, Sheriff Anthony Wickersham and Don Brown, former chairman of the Board of Commissioners, County Corporation Counsel John Schapka said.
Warren resident Paul Kardasz, who briefly served under county Clerk Karen Spranger before she was ousted in 2018, filed a handful of the complaints, most alleging Hackel and some in his office failed to disclose financial relationships with Hackel's campaign committee.
Christopher Stump, who works in Perkins' law firm, filed complaints alleging Hackel, Wickersham and Brown used county resources, including, in some cases, "Make Macomb Your Home" photographs, on their campaign websites and/or campaign social media.
Schapka said the majority of the complaints, including the one against Lucido, were dismissed for "failure of subject matter jurisdiction." Another was dismissed, he said, because of "failure of personal jurisdiction" as the person is not a county employee.
Perkins wasn't present for the ethics board's decision this month, but said he believes "as soon as these other individuals were put in the crosshairs of ethics complaints, they dismissed Pete's."
More: Whitmer, Nessel have chosen different rallying cries since Trump took office
A hearing on the ethics board complaint against Lucido was to be held in July 2024, but Lucido sued the board and Schapka weeks ahead of it in circuit court, and the hearing was put on hold.
Schapka said the claims against the ethics board in the lawsuit were dismissed, and the board could proceed on the complaint it had against Lucido. The lawsuit is pending, with two claims remaining against Schapka.
Schapka said it is unusual for this many ethics board complaints to be filed at one time against elected officials or county employees. Most complaints get dismissed immediately as they are either "blatantly bizarre" or not about county workers. There is one pending ethics board complaint against Schapka, which was filed by Perkins.
"I don't like the ethics board or the ethics ordinance being used as a tool for political revenge," Schapka said. "That is not what they exist for, and they're never meant to be used in that fashion."
More: Ex-Wayne County official sues, alleging corruption, sexually harassing texts
Perkins said that he believes the ethics board "has been weaponized by politicos and people in power to go after other people," that it should be dismantled and be within the embrace and control of the Board of Commissioners. Currently, the five ethics board members are nominated by the executive and subject to approval by the Board of Commissioners.
In October, it was reported that Lucido may have violated the state's Campaign Finance Act when a newsletter from his public email address included a link to his campaign website after Brewer filed a separate complaint with the state.
In a March 5 letter, the Department of State determined the complaint was filed nearly two years after the unintentional violation and that Lucido "took affirmative action by correcting the violation before the complaint was filed, the Department concludes that a formal warning is a sufficient resolution to the complaint and considers the matter concluded."
Contact Christina Hall: chall@freepress.com. Follow her on X, formerly Twitter: @challreporter.
Support local journalism. Subscribe to the Free Press.
Submit a letter to the editor at freep.com/letters.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Macomb County Ethics Board dismisses complaint against Peter Lucido
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
2 hours ago
US Senate seeks to add expanded compensation for nuclear radiation victims to tax bill
WASHINGTON -- A program to compensate people exposed to radiation from past nuclear weapons testing and manufacturing could be restarted and expanded under a provision added by U.S. senators to the major tax and budget policy bill. The language added Thursday to the Senate version of the massive tax bill would overhaul the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, which was originally enacted in 1990 and expired about a year ago. The law compensated people in about a dozen western states who developed serious illnesses from nuclear testing and manufacturing stemming from World War II-era efforts to develop the atomic bomb. The new Senate provision would expand the coverage to states including Missouri and Tennessee, among other places. It would also cover a wider range of illnesses. The program's limited scope in the West has led Republican Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri to push for its expansion to include uranium sites in St. Louis and victims in other states. His advocacy led the Senate to twice pass a major overhaul of the program, but it stalled in the U.S. House amid concerns about its cost. Without an agreement over the program's scope in Congress, the program lapsed. Hawley said the new language compensates many more people, but at a far lower cost than previous legislation. 'These folks deserve to be recognized for the sacrifices they made and compensated when the government has poisoned them without telling them, without helping them, without making it right," Hawley said Friday. 'This is a chance, finally, to make it right.' Still, the new provision's pathway remains uncertain when the House considers the Senate's changes. While there is broad Senate support for the payments, it is unclear how the addition of Hawley's legislation will be received by cost-conscious Republicans as they barrel toward a self-imposed July 4 deadline for the overall tax bill. House leaders are waiting to see what comes out of the Senate before deciding whether they might make further changes or simply try to pass the Senate bill and send it to President Donald Trump's desk. St. Louis played a key role processing uranium as the United States developed a nuclear weapons program that was vital for winning World War II. But that effort exposed workers and nearby residents to radiation, with lingering issues remaining to this day. An elementary school was closed down a few years ago because of radioactive material found on site. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers remains years away from finishing environmental cleanup work. An investigation by The Associated Press, The Missouri Independent and MuckRock found the federal government and companies responsible for nuclear bomb production and atomic waste storage sites in the St. Louis area in the mid-20th century were aware of health risks, spills, improperly stored contaminants and other problems but often ignored them. Nuclear waste contaminated Coldwater Creek, and those who live nearby worry their cancers and other severe illnesses are connected. It's difficult to definitively link specific illnesses with the waste, but advocates for an expanded compensation program said there's evidence it made people sick years later. After the report by the AP and others, Hawley said sick St. Louis residents deserved help, too. He was joined by Dawn Chapman, co-founder of Just Moms STL, which brought attention to local nuclear contamination. She has called St. Louis a 'national sacrifice zone.' 'Many of us have had extreme amounts of devastation in the form of illnesses in our families,' Chapman said Friday. The provision added Thursday would also expand coverage areas in several states for those exposed to radioactive contamination that blew downwind from government sites. In New Mexico, for example, advocates have sought to expand the program for people near the spot where the first Manhattan Project-era bomb was tested. These residents didn't know the blast was why ash had fallen. It poised water, crops and livestock. Attention for these 'downwinders' rose following the release of the film Oppenheimer. 'Our federal government has a moral responsibility to support Americans that helped defend our country — and it has a moral responsibility to include all people who were exposed. That begins with reauthorizing RECA and amending it to include those who have been left out for far too long,' said Sen. Martin Heinrich, Democrat of New Mexico. Prior to the addition of the radiation compensation measure, Hawley had so far withheld support for the overall tax package, questioning cuts to Medicaid programs and the potential effects on rural hospitals and low income residents. He said he still wants to see improvements in the package, but added that help for radiation victims was essential. 'It would be very hard for me to vote for a bill that doesn't include (the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act). This is extremely, extremely important to me," Hawley said. ___
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Republicans, some Democrats and even ex-Gov. Rod Blagojevich weigh in on ex-Speaker Michael Madigan's sentence
In what's become somewhat customary once an Illinois political titan falls, leaders throughout the state responded with condemnation and called for reforms upon hearing Friday that ex-Speaker Michael Madigan was sentenced to seven and a half years in federal prison and fined $2.5 million on federal corruption charges. House Republican leader Tony McCombie of Savanna and Senate Republican leader John Curran of Downers Grove called for bipartisan ethics reforms in the wake of the sentencing, with Curran specifically requesting committee hearings and votes on potential changes — something that didn't happen this session. Madigan's sentencing was 'a stark and shameful reminder of the corruption that has plagued Illinois government for far too long,' McCombie said in a statement. 'Justice was served — but the damage to public trust runs deep.' But Illinois' last prominent statewide politician who went to federal prison, former Democratic Gov. Rod Blagojevich, held back on the chance to take a swipe at a bitter nemesis when Madigan was sentenced. Though the two were Democrats, they feuded for nearly all six years Blagojevich was in office between 2003 and 2009. 'When that guy, Madigan, was on the top of the mountain, they were all kissing his ass,' Blagojevich said. 'Now they're going to be stomping all over his grave. And it's really, it's really sort of an unappealing side of human nature.' Blagojevich said Madigan's conviction underscores the systemic problems in politics and government in the state Capitol. 'Is the system in Springfield corrupt, in many ways, absolutely,' Blagojevich said in an interview with the Tribune while insisting he didn't break the law. 'It's a system, I've been saying this from the beginning, it all too often works for itself on the backs of the people.' Blagojevich — whose 14-year federal prison sentence for corruption was commuted by President Donald Trump, who ultimately also pardoned Blagojevich — didn't want to celebrate Madigan's prison sentence despite the two's often-tense relationship. 'I just don't think it's right for me to kick a man when he's down,' Blagojevich said. 'What's happening now to him, I know what it's like. And it's really easy for these politicians to get on their high horses and start kicking someone, stomping on someone.' Senate President Don Harmon, a Democrat from Oak Park who is facing a potential fine of nearly $10 million from the Illinois State Board of Elections for improper political fundraising, said Friday's sentence represented 'a solemn reminder' that the duty of public office holders is to serve 'and that there is accountability for those who do not.'
2 hours ago
Judge blocks State Department from firing workers while injunction is in effect
A federal judge in San Francisco on Friday stopped Secretary of State Marco Rubio from proceeding with plans to downsize the State Department, saying that it was prohibited behavior under an injunction she issued last month. U.S. District Judge Susan Illston barred the Republican administration from carrying out much of its plans to reorganize and slash departments while she hears a legal challenge brought by labor unions and others. She said that President Donald Trump had failed to seek Congressional cooperation to do so when he ordered government-wide cuts. But, in late May, the State Department notified Congress of an updated reorganization of the agency that would cut programs and personnel even more deeply than previously revealed. Rubio this week also ordered U.S. embassies to fire all remaining staffers with the U.S. Agency for International Development. He said the State Department will take over USAID's foreign assistance programs by Monday. The Trump administration said Rubio had launched a reorganization of the State Department independently of the president's directive and so was exempt. Illston, who was nominated to the bench by former President Bill Clinton, a Democrat, was not convinced. 'If the State Department has any question about whether planned actions fall within the scope of the Court's injunction, the Court ORDERS the Department to first raise those questions with the Court before taking action,' she wrote in an order issued Friday.
