Pictured is Cleveland Ward 4 Councilman Kenneth Johnson
By Kathy Wray Coleman, associate publisher, editor in chief.
CLEVELAND, Ohio-A leg of the Ohio Supreme Court has suspended longtime Cleveland Ward 4 Councilman Kenneth Johnson from his 87,000-a-year city council job in connection with a 15-count indictment on theft and conspiracy charges, a suspension that some Johnson supporters say is racist and politically motivated.
A three-judge panel of retired judges with nothing to lose who were handpicked by Republican Chief Ohio Supreme Court Justice Maureen O'Connor after Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost, also a powerful Republican like O'Connor, recommended the suspension, issued the suspension determination on Monday, which is rare but allowed under state law to protect the financial assets of the governing authority at issue when a person is charged with theft and other associated crimes while in office.
Johnson will retain his annual salary and can run for reelection, but an interim replacement will be chosen by city council.
He has pleaded not guilty to all charges and awaits a June pretrial.
He argues that federal prosecutors and not Yost have the authority to seek such a rare suspension under state law, and said he will appeal the suspension ruling.
A city councilman since 1980, Johnson,74, is a Black Democrat and an ally of four-term Black Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson, who sources say will likely not seek an unprecedented fifth term this year.
He spoke before the judicial panel and urged the retired judges not to suspend him saying he is innocent, but to no avail as the suspension, which some sources say is politically motivated and a double standard where White Cleveland council persons do as they please for the most part, was issued anyway.
He was arrested in February following a federal grand jury indictment that accuses him of stealing $127,000 from the city by submitting false monthly expense reports for his ward over a period of years.
A Black city councilman, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Johnson is among a host of Blacks under investigation and that it is "open season on Black elected officials by the White establishment."
The counts of the indictment against the councilman accuses him of filing false tax returns, falsification of records, witness tampering, and two counts of conspiracy to commit theft from a federal program.
The indictment was unsealed in district court as an FBI investigation continues into the councilman's monthly expense account relative to city monies he gets for his ward and federal monies earmarked for the non-profit Buckeye- Shaker Square communities he serves.
It says that Johnson demanded the maximum amount of $1,200 monthly for his ward from the city's coffers but could not prove how much of the money, which has allegedly been requested for several years, including in 2019, has been spent.
Johnson's longtime aide, Garnell Jamison, 61, was also indicted, as was John Hopkins of Cleveland Heights, the former executive director of the Buckeye -Shaker Square Development Corp. in ward 4, which encompasses the Buckeye area near Shaker Square along the Shaker Heights border, and the Woodland Hills and Mount Pleasant neighborhoods.
The charges come as Johnson and the other 16 members of city council are up for reelection in 2021 and following a plea deal with federal prosecutors involving Robert Fitzpatrick, a Johnson affiliate and 35-year city employee who pleaded guilty earlier this month to charges that he conspired to commit theft from a federal program.
Also at issue are federal and state monies regarding the Kenneth Johnson Recreation Center on Woodland Avenue, which is named after the councilman, and is one of several city recreation centers that Fitzpatrick oversaw.
Mayor Jackson has not commented on Johnson's indictment, and City Council President Kevin Kelley, a mayoral candidate, is taking a wait and see approach, though he has been critical of his council colleague.
Cleveland is a largely Black major American city and the second most segregated city in the nation behind Boston.
Mayor Jackson and all of the city council, nearly half of its members Black, are Democrats.
Jackson is the city's third Black mayor.
Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, the most read Black digital newspaper in Ohio and in the Midwest, and the most read independent digital news in Ohio. Tel: (216) 659-0473. Email: editor@clevelandurbannews.com. We interviewed former president Barack Obama one-on-one when he was campaigning for president. As to the Obama interview. CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE AT CLEVELAND URBAN NEWS.COM, OHIO'S LEADER IN BLACK DIGITAL NEWS.
