Did you approve of the statements he s been making against Kyle?

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Georgina Carter
5 years ago
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1 Setting: Down Thyme Café, Fremont Oh Date: 1/14/2016 Time: 6:45pm-7:05pm Note: The following is remembering of a conversation had with Kyle Overmyer and Tracy Overmyer following a speaking engagement. I have tried to lay out of the facts and timeline of the conversation as best I could remember in the hours after the exchange. There are probably parts of the conversation that are out of order and comments that I cannot recall but this is the best representation of my conversation with both of them.! Situation: I was on hand as the Mayor of Gibsonburg to speak to the Sandusky County Republican Woman s Committee about our village and upcoming events for I was invited to speak by the president of the committee, Jean Turner. Upon finishing my speech and answering question, myself and Marc Glotzbecker (Gibsonburg Village Administrator) excused ourselves and proceeded to gather our things to leave to return to Gibsonburg for scheduled meetings. I was approached by a woman, and was asked to step into the hallway to speak privately. I assumed that it was about my speech or wanting to get involved in our 9/11 dedication event. I did not know the identity of this woman at the time and accepted her request to talk privately. We moved into the hallway adjacent to the conference room we were speaking in. The woman began to ask me a series of questions about the Gibsonburg police chief and my knowledge of his actions surrounding the active case against Kyle Overmyer. I had to stop her and ask her who she was, and at that time she announced herself as Tracey Overmyer, Sandusky County Clerk of Courts. She asked the following questions: Do you know what your police chief doing? Did you approve of the statements he s been making against Kyle? My reply to her questioning was that Paul does not discuss details of active cases with me. I do know of the situation and have seen what s in the papers, but I have not authorized or approved anything that has gone on. I reiterated the fact that I do not know details of what is going on and that Paul is the President of the Police Chiefs Organizations and is acting as the spokesman for that group. She followed with: How do you not know what your chief is doing? What do you mean you don t know the details of the case? You are the Mayor, and he is your employee. You mean to tell me that you don t know what your people are doing. If that type of behavior was going on in my office I would know about it.

2 If that was my employee there would be discipline for doing such things. At about this time (approximately 2-3 minutes into the conversation) Marc walked into the hallway and told me he was leaving and proceeded to leave the building. He was followed into the hallway by Kyle Overmyer. I had never met Kyle before but was aware of who he was. Kyle stated the following: Hi, I m Kyle Overmyer, Sandusky County Sheriff. I don t believe we have met. I responded with hello Kyle, yes I know who you are. What can I do for you? Kyle responded with the following: I am not the evil person your police chief makes me out to be. There are probably going to be lawsuits for slander and deformation, and you know you are going to end up getting pulled into this. Do you really want to be involved in something like this? This is something you want to be involved with. You know the 1 st investigation found nothing. Your police chief keeps pushing this and keeps making sure that there is an investigation. Sometime during that exchange, I responded to Kyle that as I was telling Tracy, I do not have details about what is going on. I know what s in the paper and that s about it. I know that Paul is acting as President of that chief s organization and I do not believe that Paul is the guy who is pushing all of this. At some point during the back and forth Tracy interjected, and stated: You police department does nothing. They do not generate revenue. They do not write tickets or control crime. But he has the time to attack Kyle and go after him but not enough time to do those things. I responded that I did not know this to be true and was unaware of that and would look into it. She followed with: (She rolled her eyes) Ok, I have data that shows this. I a control the Woodville court where their cases are tried and can show you there s nothing. You know he s come into the court in the past and created a scene and said he was going to call the states attorney and that he didn t agree with how things are being handled in this court. None of her previous comments pertained to the current case but the conversation at this point started to turn towards a little more personal attacking conversation rather than information about the current case against Kyle. She then stated:

3 Someone tried to reach out to him last week, and was told he was out on leave. They asked to speak to the 2 nd in command but got nothing. I replied with the fact that Paul was at his brother s funeral on Thursday and had taken the rest of the week off for that reason which I approved. They both made the following comment: Oh, so he was well enough that he could set up a meeting with the Sandusky Register on his day off in his office with all of the chiefs. I responded something to the effect that I do not believe that Paul called the Register to set up a meeting of any kind. Any meeting/interview that took place was not initiated by Paul. Kyle then made the following comments: Did you know that Paul was visiting one of my inmates (Robert Hemminger) on a regular basis. I think he s involved with his mother. I told them that yes he is in a relationship with his mother and that Paul s personal life is his own and I have no issues with what Paul does outside of work. Kyle also made the following statements: Do you know who dispatches for your police department? I do. Do you know how much you pay me for that? Nothing I do it for free. This is the kind of treatment I get for doing something like that for your department. All of this started over an inmate that I wouldn t take of his, because it was going to cost the county unnecessary money. Somewhere in this exchange Kyle made the following statements: You are probably going to get called by some of the other Mayors from around here because they are pissed off. Do you know Charlie Nopper? He s from Gibsonburg, I ve talked to him and he is pissed off. Matt Damschroder, do you know him? He is pissed off. Your chief has pissed off a lot of people with this thing. I responded with yes I know those people. I also at this time told Kyle that Paul is not the most liked guy in town. He has enemies like everyone else and at times has made people upset. I told him that Paul can sometimes be harsh and outspoken and that his come across can make people angry. I told him that I have talked to Paul about these things. Kyle s follow up exchange had the following comments:

4 So you work at Whirlpool? Do you know he listed a handful of employees I work with. You know I m friends with Dan O brien and we work pretty well together. Ask them about me, they ll tell you I m not a bad guy. Opinion: I am not sure what he was trying to get it with this line of questioning other than naming the division Vice President and making sure I knew that they were friends and worked well together. It seemed a little threatening to bring up my job situation. Kyle then proceeded to make the following statements: How long do you want to be Mayor in Gibsonburg? You know there are people in this county that love to dig into Mayors and other peoples history and find out things. They look to see if you have any old warrants, or other things that need to be looked into that you might be involved with. (He mentioned a guy by name here but I can t recall the name) Opinion: At this point in the conversation I was starting to get the feeling that I was being pushed/squeezed and intimidated a little bit. Kyle s tone and demeanor were passive aggressive and cocky. It was almost as if He was threatening to look into me or involve me in something because he has that authority or power. I started to feel like I was going to be targeted as a result of this. It was about this time when the tone changed and both Kyle and Tracy turned the conversation. They began to say the following: We are sorry if this seems like we are attacking you. We aren t trying to attack you on this, we just wanted to talk with you and let you know our frustrations. We didn t want to put you on the spot and ask these questions in the room in there in front of everyone. We are upset, angry, and frustrated with all of this. If there is anything you ever need from us, don t hesitate to call us we are here to help. I said thank you and that if they ever felt that Paul was doing something out of line that they should contact me so I could look into it, because obviously I wouldn t hear about bad behavior from the Paul if he was doing something he shouldn t. I told them that if Paul was doing something that was inappropriate and needed discipline that we would be dealt with as any employee would and I would see to it. I told them I don t have alliances with anyone and that I am not here to be friends with everyone, I have a job to do and I will make sure things are taken care of if need be.

5 I excused myself and told them I really needed to get going and then I exited back through the conference room.! My thoughts, feelings, and opinion on the matter: I was shocked to see Kyle at a woman s event, as he was the only other male there besides me and Marc. The actions of Kyle and Tracy were unprofessional and confrontational. I believe Kyle at the very least was in attendance for the sole purpose of cornering me about the situation. I felt attacked and intimidated by the both of them. They made it clear to announce themselves and who they were in the county as far as their positions. Being in a position of some power, Kyle seemed to be arrogant and cocky when talking to me, in a way that I feel he was trying to intimidate and persuade me to doing something for him. I left the conversation feeling like I was now going to be a potential target and I anticipate being pulled over or looked into for no reason. I felt that I was straight forward that I didn t know anything, but this definitely seemed like a planned fact finding mission on their parts in effort to gain knowledge or influence in the situation. I felt bullied and talked down to by an elected official of the county who was trying to throw their weight around. I can understand the anger and the feelings that they might have about the situation, but not knowing them or ever meeting them, to be attacked in the manner was inexcusable.

Note: Tony Miano in Italics Police Interviewer in Regular Script Michael Phillips, solicitor for Mr. Miano italicized and capped by LR:

Tony Miano Interview with Police Rough Draft of Transcription Date of Interview: 1 July 2013 Date of Transcription: 4 July 2013 Note: Tony Miano in Italics Police Interviewer in Regular Script Michael