Owens calls for OPOTA Director to Resign
This letter was sent to Ohio’s 8 major daily newspapers: Akron Beacon Journal, Canton Repository, Cincinnati Enquirer, Cleveland Plain Dealer, Columbus Dispatch, Dayton Daily News, Toledo Blade, and Youngstown Vindicator.
To the Editor:
Tomi Dorris, executive director of the Ohio Police Officers Training Academy, must go.
On August 14, Columbus Dispatch reporter James Nash described how Dorris got her job in the first place. The now disgraced former attorney general Marc Dann overruled the academy’s training commission (which had unanimously selected another candidate), to appoint Dorris. Dann’s reasoning for such a decision appears to be either personally or politically motivated - or both.
Training our police and private security officers is far too serious a job to be left to political cronyism. If Dorris wants to run for Franklin County prosecutor, that’s fine - the voters can decide her competence for that position. But, as to her appointed job and the $105,000 per year taxpayer-funded salary that goes with it, she should do the honorable thing and resign immediately.
Sincerely,
Robert M. Owens
Independent candidate for Ohio Attorney General
Not only did Dorris get her job through political cronyism, but equally important is her ineptitude at doing her job. This isn’t the space to get into all the details, but one fact should speak loudly: no major public official from her party is publicly defending her. Here is Dispatch reporter James Nash’s full story from August 14 referenced in the letter:
Former Attorney General Marc Dann shot down the top candidate to lead the state’s police academy last summer and instead promoted an employee who had not sought the job, newly released e-mails show.
During a June 2007 law-enforcement conference in Istanbul, Dann decided on Tomi L. Dorris, a lawyer who had been running the Ohio Peace Officer Training Academy on an interim basis, as its permanent executive director. Dorris accompanied Dann and several other Ohio law-enforcement officials on the trip to Turkey.
In picking Dorris, who never applied for the job, Dann overruled the police academy’s commission, which had unanimously picked a retired Cincinnati-area police chief in May.
More than 950 e-mails released by the attorney general’s office to The Dispatch minimized the role played by Edgar C. Simpson, who was Dann’s chief of staff and Dorris’ boyfriend. Although Dorris and Simpson had discussed the search for a police academy director, there’s no evidence that Simpson intervened on his girlfriend’s behalf.
The attorney general’s office withheld about 140 e-mail messages between Simpson and Dorris for further legal review.
When the academy’s commission chose retired police chief Ken Hughes last May, Dorris praised him as a “great choice” in an e-mail to Dann and Simpson.
Dann didn’t appear to share that view.
“I had hoped to be much more involved in this process,” he wrote back. “Let’s discuss on Monday.”
Dorris forwarded Dann’s message to Simpson with her own comment: “Uh oh!”
A month later, Dann and Dorris were in Istanbul with several Ohio police chiefs when the subject of the job came up, Dorris said this week. Dann told the chiefs that he was picking her, she said.
Dorris said she scolded Dann for overstepping his authority by naming her as executive director — a power that belongs to the academy’s commission — and for not telling Hughes.
Dann said this week that he and Dorris reached an informal agreement to promote her while they were in Istanbul.
Dann sent Simpson to the academy’s commission two weeks after returning from Turkey to present Dorris as the only approved candidate for the $105,000-a-year position.
Dorris’ promotion, and Simpson’s role in it, have created a political headache for Dorris as she challenges longtime Franklin County Prosecutor Ron O’Brien for his job.
Dorris, a Democrat, now is on leave from the attorney general’s office to wage her campaign.
A final thought on why this office matters. This blog post from Cornell McCleary, a OPOTC licensed Private Security Training Commander, describes one of the critical issues the attorney general must address. Here is how McCleary, a former 610 WTVN radio host, described the problem in colorful terms as only he can.
Urban crime. Without question, crimes of violence occur most frequently in urban communities especially in areas which have a high concentration of poor and minorities. We all know that we will never have enough jails or police to effectively deal with this issue of high-crime in urban areas. The next AG can do communities a great service by aggressively educating targeted urban communities that it is legal to protect themselves and legally conceal and carry a weapon. Most minorities have been brainwashed into thinking that it is a bad thing to be able to or try to protect yourself-call the cops-the battle cry of the Black politicos. Meanwhile, the urban body count rises, the bad guys get more guns and the liberals slowly but surely eat away at providing many needed public services trying to pay for more police then we can afford and never effectively address the problem.
… without the needed background info, you all won’t know if the AG candidates decide to man up and publicly respond…. They can’t say legitimately, that’s not my job or a legitimate matter to be prioritized by the AG.
Well, one of those candidates is responding to real issues that affect Ohioans. Former prosecutor Robert Owens believes that urban crime is a legitimate and serious issue that must be a priority for the Attorney General. Mr. Owens knows that the Ohio Peace Officers Training Academy is a vital piece of protecting Ohio. As such, he has promised to make law enforcement training a top priority. Specifically, Robert Owens will expand training recently implemented by Attorney General Nancy Rogers to better train peace officers on Ohio’s gun laws, including the freshly-adopted Castle doctrine legislation, which formally recognizes citizen rights to “stand your ground” in your home. He will expand training on open and concealed carry laws.
As importantly, Robert Owens has a plan to raise awareness of the Castle doctrine law to citizens throughout the state. As attorney general, Robert Owens WILL address the issues of urban crime. It will take real, principled leadership to get the job done. Join the fight to restore INTEGRITY FOR A CHANGE!
