The investigation into the alledged theft of campaign signs involving State House Dist. 1 candidates Greg Brown Jr. and Doug Broxson has been moved to the State Attorney’s Office in Panama City.
In a press release today, State Attorney Bill Eddins says the case was moved to the 14th District location because of a conflict of interest in his office.
“A long time employee of this office is a close family relative to the alleged victim in this matter,” he writes. “My stepson has been employed by the father of Greg Brown (Greg Brown Sr., Santa Rosa Property Appraiser) for a number of years.”
On Saturday, July 24, Brown Jr. and his wife were video taped removing Broxson campaign signs from a property, owned by Don Dewrell, just north of Milton. The video was placed on Youtube and quickly surfaced as the second candidate debacle in Santa Rosa County in recent weeks.
In order for the case to be moved, Governor Crist will issue an Executive Assignment order, which usually “takes a few days” according to the Assistant State Attorney Greg Marcille.
Marcille tells IN that he cannot comment on the case directory due to the conflict issue, but similar cases involving campaign signs have led to petty theft charges.
“In the past we’ve had similar situations but not with candidates.”
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Steve & Jerry:
Chill out men, never said it was right, point is this happens every year and folks are making a mountain out of a molehill, this isn’t watergate, Brown has done himself quite a bit of damage on his own, I just want law enforcement going after more important criminals
Nope the folks in SRC want a insurance man , Mine has not when up lately and I am upset about it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Campaign signs are expensive. The Brown “Boy” and his wife were caught red handed stealing Mr. Broxons signs on public property and lying a about it. http://www.thirdreport.com (politics) shows the private property well. A “Man” would not have been in that positon stealing signs or having to lie about it.
Truth is Truth, Theft is Theft and lieing is lying. If folks in SRC want a thief and liar to represent them in Talahassee so be it. Vote for the person that represents your true value system.
Dave Bower: Are you kidding. Someone running for election to a position of “trust”, taking other’s campaign signs. Are you faulting Broxson for catching Brown, II taking campaign signs to Brown’s house! Broxson did NOT take anyone’s signs down. Broxson did NOT remove anyone’s signs from property OWNED by State. Check ownership out yourself — because the media (including Rick’s Blog) is NOT looking into it for some ? reason. Signs were NOT on right-of-way. Signs were NOT on attorney’s private property. If you’d put up your “Garage Sale” signs on property owned by State, along with lot’s of other’s Garage Sale signs already there, what would you do if somebody, holding their own Garage Sale, took your signs down at night & took your hard-earned $ signs home with them? Would you ignore it, or would you report the improper actions to Sheriff’s Office to look into. Or would you take action yourself? Reporting to Sheriff’s Office is CORRECT way to handle. Sheriff’s Office wouldn’t have referred to State’s Attorney if case didn’t have “smoke” to it — we’ll see if there is “fire”, or not.
Come on guys, much ado over nothing, campaign signs get swiped all the time, do we really neeed to spend all this time and money on this