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Open letter to Sheriff
Mitchell
April 2003
The following letter will explain why you are a hypocrite, racist and a dictator. This report is from my experience only. Nothing written is untrue or fabricated; it is correct to the best of my knowledge. The only reason that prompted me to write this open letter is your stubbornness for not meeting with me although some county Supervisors were in fact willing to participate in the meeting as mediators. No harassment is intended from this true story. Dollar amount figures may vary.
First, I would like to start out with the 2002 Stars of Lake County AWARDS Ceremony where you accepted the " Best Idea" AWARD for the Citizens Academy, which was NOT your idea. In fact, you read it in the Porac Magazine where a Sheriff on the East Coast had that idea and you copied it and introduced it to Lake County Citizens. Well, for what ever that's worth, I hope you have the plaque hanging on your office wall so it can remind you each day of what kind of a character you are. Since you like awards so much, I have a few to award you. Now let's talk about the word hypocrite.
As you know I am the father of Claudine Schorfheide who was born and raised in Lake County and has lived here for the past twenty-two years. She attended Lower Lake Elementary, Oak Hill Middle School and graduated from Lower Lake High. She was always an outstanding student. During her school years she was many times on the Principal's list and was an honor roll student almost every semester. She was awarded those honors by such respected teachers and principals as Mr. Greg Mucks, Mr. Bill McDougall, Mr. Alan Siegel, Mrs. Linda Mock, Mrs. Mariam Broomfield, Mrs. Harby, Mr. Biemer, Mr. Chambers, Mr. Markowitz, Mr. Cox, Mr. Frank Turdici, Mr. Chris Tyner and many others. She was in the Campfire Girls with Mrs. Peggy Parker. She also participated in local soccer games. She organized her own "all girl" music band "The Hats" with her friends they played for special fund raising events such as the annual Kelseyville Relay for Life and entertained at many Lake and Mendocino County events. She showed her oil paintings at the Lake County Fair and at the Lower Lake School House Museum for Lake County Artist of the month, where she received many ribbons.
For three years during her Summer break she worked at Konocti Harbor Resort & Spa and received a $1000.00 scholarship from The Plumbers Union #38 of San Francisco recommended and sponsored by Mr. Greg Bennett. She used that scholarship toward her dream career in Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice, I am telling you this not to brag, but to let you know she is not a looser. After graduating from Lower Lake High School and working on her AA Degree in Criminal Justice, she went on to Yuba College in Marysville and successfully completed her Basic Police Officer Standard and training Post academy certificate with 26 other students including Deputy Gary Basor. I paid for her schooling and all related expenses for 6 months. Also, as a taxpayer and including everybody else in Lake County, we paid for the education of Deputy Basor in completing his law enforcement training to the tune of approx. $40,000.00 including salary. There were also deputies before and after him for which our tax dollars went towards their careers. I think this opportunity should be made available to anyone in the County and not just to your close friends. It should be advertised and approved by our County Supervisors since we are talking about a lot of taxpayer's money. At the Academy Claudine completed many certificates such as: Hearsay Evidence Testimony, Intoxylizer training, 11550 H & S Drug Identification, Chemical Agents, Hazardous Materials, Expandable Baton, First Aid/CPR, Gang Awareness, Side Handle Baton and the 832Pc. certification.
She applied with the Lake County Sheriff Dept. for a Deputy position. As you know, you interviewed about half of the Basic 6 class of 2000. You showed up with a chocolate "Snickers" bar in your gun belt to interview potential deputies, which turned into the biggest joke among all of the cadets. I think this was a complete disgrace to the Lake County Sheriffs Department. Therefore, I give you the "Chocolate Snickers" bar AWARD.
As a resident of Lake County for 31 years, owning several properties for which I paid property taxes on to support your expenses and your approximately, $135,000.00 yearly salary, including retirement, health plan, fica etc., you dared to hire Deputy Hockett and Deputy Wolf from the same academy class and from the State of Oregon!! I don't believe that their parents ever paid a dime into the Lake County Tax Collection account. Again you seem to forget that when we voted for you we gave you a job to do. You should go by your own mission statement dated 02/01/01 paragraph #5. To accomplish this mission, quote: "We will provide law enforcement services utilizing sound HIRING practices, training and education" end quote. After several phone calls and Letters to the Editor complaining about your unfair hiring practice, Claudine was hired on April 9, 2001 as a Correctional Officer at the Hill Road Correctional Facility after passing a physical examination, psychological examination, and had a polygraph test. Obviously being a clean local teenager, no drugs, smoking, or alcohol, the back ground check was done by none other than our long time resident who is paid approximately $115,000.00 a year including benefits, Lieutenant Jeff Markham, your friend and re-election campaign manager against Joe Totorica. Too bad we did not live in Oregon. The background check usually takes 40 hours, which would have been a one week paid vacation. By the way, the budget is showing you are spending $186,000.00 a year on back ground checks, which does not include salaries. Where are you hiring these people? From Oregon, Florida, Hawaii, New York, or Alaska?
After Claudine went on training at the Correctional Facility for Approx. three months she did her duties at the jail to the satisfaction of all training officers. After nine months of employment she was sent to Butte College for a 56 hours Supplemental Correctional Officer Core Course for Correctional Officers that are also POST Certified, which again she passed. She was also given a recommendation by one of your Sergeants, the following is the exact transcript: Dated Wednesday Nov. 13th, 2001, Personal Commendation: "Officer Schorfheide, I just wanted you to know that I noticed that you were one of us involved in taking down and restraining inmate Mr. ……….. on 11/13/01. You and Officer Rowley were quick with your actions and I'm proud of you. I think you were even technically off-duty. There were other officers there who could have acted sooner but, instead, did nothing but watch. Thank you for your help and thank you for just doing your job. I haven't worked with you very much, but you showed me today that you have what it takes to do this job and showed others how they should do their's. Great job, Sergeant Daskam." She was terminated 4 weeks before she was scheduled to get off of probation, without any prior evaluation, which I believe, should have been done "labor law wise" after 11 months by guard Townsend whom, by the way, would like to run the Jail as a Commander. You have three untrained Lake County house wives (none of these three guards have post certificates) that do a professional job and are paid $85,000., $75,000., and $69,000 respectively, + or -. It's easy to find the actual figures by checking the W-2 forms from Chief Commander Eyerly and from guard Townsend and from guard Duvall, also known as the "TRIO."
As you can see, this is where the 32 violations originated last year (see Grand Jury report 2002). A shake up in your command staff, I believe, would straighten out the mess you created for yourself. My suggestion would be that Deputy Chiefs Markham and Bauman run the jail.
After a few phone calls, you stated, "The buck stops here", well Sir, I don't agree with that remark, the buck stops with the Lake County voters, taxpayers, and citizens. Still you refused to meet with me. You had a meeting with Claudine and you agreed that you would check in as to why she had been fired from her job, which by the way, she enjoyed and loved every minute of. You agreed in the meantime to hire her as a civilian at the jail tower. After 4 months, which I think is a long time to get an answer about her dismissal, she was again fired on a minor uniform violation with again no warning. Now you have the satisfaction of telling everyone: "Well we hired her twice and it did not work out". Therefore I give you the "HYPOCRISY" AWARD.
You remember the Duvardo double murder case where the crime scene camera batteries were dead and a bloody crime scene towel was missing? Was anybody reprimanded or fired for that? As you also know there are older officers who in fact trained you when you got here in 1983 and they were already here in the Department for twenty-five years. Without any respect for them what so ever, you by- passed almost all of these old timers for promotions. When promoting your employees keep this in mind next time: "Instead of using the buddy system, try using the seniority system." See the Seniority list at the jail, (starting with the eighties) and you would understand. And, if you ask those senior officers they would remember that under the two previous administration chiefs we had three or four African-American officers working in the department. They all disappeared from the Department under your administration. Right now there are approximately 325 officers, guards, and detectives under your command and you do not show one single, let me repeat again, not one single African-American working for you. Therefore I give you the "George Wallace, Montgomery-Alabama 1963 the "School house door" speech racism AWARD." I urge anyone getting and reading this letter, to have the Sheriff change his racial practice immediately or stop federal and state funding to Lake County. You are not George Wallace, you are Sheriff Mitchell of Lake County, California and the year is 2003. Racism has been over for 40 years. The fact is you do have African-American job applications on your desk. Right or wrong, according to the budget you are spending $198,000.00 for K-9 officer dog training; we are not even giving our five county supervisors, combined, that kind of salary. You are also spending approximately $4,000.00 of taxpayer dollars twice a year for the Citizens Academy, which could be used on local Lake County folks for job training, so you will not have to dismiss so many employees on probation. What ever happened to the $80,000.00 renovation and $800.00 per month rent which is being used as a storage facility right now next to the Lakeport Bowling Alley, was that also your idea? You are paying the administrative secretary $67, 612.00; with this salary why would anyone move to other counties. See budget form #4 where as we only pay the County supervisor secretary half that amount. This will give you the "Money Waste AWARD".
According to one co-worker at the jail and a very respected citizen from Clearlake and a member of the LCCOA. After talking to him, his exact words were: quote, "Here is a local Lake County girl with all the qualifications and training and he chewed her up and spit her out, end quote."
Something you may not know is this. After guard Townsend's six-month leave on an injury vacation; the day she returned to work, on a Saturday, three hours into the start of her shift, Claudine was terminated. Townsend apparently, did not like Claudine. Thank you for destroying a young girl's dream and self esteem to have a career in Administration of Justice and Law Enforcement. Also when you had the meeting with Claudine for the second time, you did not want any outsiders present other than employees within the department. This qualifies you for the dictator "Joseph Stalin" AWARD.
Under the current Chief Jail Commander the word is out: "It's not the inmates your have to watch out for it's the TRIO."
You are constantly complaining about the departure of good officers to neighboring Napa, Mendocino, and Sonoma Counties for better pay. Well Sir, that's where you hired them from and most want to go back to their hometown where they grew up with family and friends. Maybe some do not want to work for you being constantly reminded on which side the butter goes on a slice of bread. Also in your position I am pretty sure that you politically satisfy a lot of favors for friends and theirs. Therefore I recommend you to see the movie "THE GLASS SHIELD," a true story.
If you would surround yourself with the energetic Deputy Chiefs and Sergeants in your department, which you have and don't even know of their qualifications, you would be a more respected leader. See Bob Chalk, Clearlake Chief of Police with only thirty-five officers in his department for a free consultation, he does hire locals and African-Americans. I am glad Governor Gray Davis canceled your parking permit for the many wheelbarrows in front of the County Supervisors Chamber every Tuesday, as seen last year, for money grants and government-funded entitlements.
The reason of this letter is from a concerned father who looks after the well being of his kids. Just like you did Mr. Markham or Sheriff Mitchell and Congressman Mike Thompson, your children are working at the Lake County Court House in Lakeport and enjoy a paycheck while my daughter is one of the 10.8% unemployed in Lake County. I encourage every parent of a high school graduate in Lake County to have Sheriff Mitchell help your son or daughter find a job. Seeing as it was so easy for him to arrange a job for his daughter, he should have no trouble finding one for yours. Given that this county obviously goes by "Who you know and not what you know."
Please call Sheriff Rodney Mitchell's office at (707) 262-4200 or (707) 262-4216, or write to the Lake County Sheriffs Office at 1220 Martin Street, Lakeport, CA. 95453 in regards to this letter or e-mail him at: <mailto:lcso@pacific.net>lcso@pacific.net or FAX (707)262-4220
Finally, Sir, you don't have what it takes to be a Sheriff, Supervisor or decision maker; your sense of direction is completely missing.
All names and figures mentioned above are available to the public under the budget for every division. By having qualified local guards constantly dismissed by the "TRIO" which in turn results in under staffing and ensures job security for the $65,000.00 overtime pay per month as seen last year.
With this racial discrimination you are leaving the doors wide open for huge lawsuits, and you would not be stuck with that amount, in what could be millions of taxpayers money wasted.
This letter was sent to the Lake County Record-Bee newspaper, to be printed as a paid political advertisement. With the recommendation by the Sheriff, the Record-Bee refused to print this article.
WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO THE FREEDOM OF THE PRESS!!!
I recommend for you, to step down from your Saddam Hussein kingdom and let the Supervisors run this County. I would not like to see name changes in our county's natural treasures for your benefit such as Lake Rodney or Mount Mitchell.
(My apologies to Officer Basor, Sergeant Daskam, Deputy Hockett and Deputy Wolf for using your name in making my point.)
Please distribute this true story. Stop this unfair hiring, unfair firing, and racial discrimination now. Send copies to your neighbors, friends, and Law Enforcement Co-workers throughout this beautiful country.
This open letter is Address Site available WORLD WIDE under
<http://www.northstarcandlelight.com/>www.northstarcandlelight.com
.J. Schorfheide.
Kelseyville
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