The Place Where Ludington Talks

John Shay-- Criminal Intentions: Public Extortion

Previously, I have documented facts that seem to show that Ludington City Manager John Shay was guilty of a misdemeanor violation of Michigan Law here: John Shay: Violation of Personal Privacy

Last October, I had did a lot of research on various aspects of local policies, and had made a couple of FOIA requests with multiple items for inspecting what I thought were easily-found public records. Mr. Shay, who serves as the FOIA Coordinator as well, lumped all items into just one request and wanted to charge me huge amounts for unidentified charges. These charges were not touched on until I had expressed that I wanted to formally appeal the charges 11-3-10 FOI Appeal Letter. The requests were misrepresented in my appeal, the reason for my appeal was not discussed, and Shay then released my own private information to the Daily News, as detailed in the first link above.

I then split my requests and tried for 4 requests concerning stuff I have done articles in the Torch since then, and even before then, having three other friends send in their own requests so Shay would not lump them together. He did anyway with this stock reply to each of our E-mails

Dear Mr. D, Ms. M, Ms. S & Mr. Rotta:

Please see the City of Ludington’s attached response to your FOIA requests. The total cost of $199.36 is broken down as follows:

· The request for information on the Municipal Marina is the same as contained in Mr. Rotta’s request dated October 25, 2010. The total cost to provide the information in those 5 requests was $138.35 or $27.67 per request. Thus, the City will charge $27.67 to reimburse its costs to provide this information.
· The request for information on the Stearns and Cartier park deeds is the same as contained in Mr. Rotta’s request dated October 18, 2010. The total cost to provide the information in those 4 requests was $228.90 or $57.23 per request. Thus, the City will charge $57.23 to reimburse its costs to provide this information.
· The request for information on the water towers is the same as contained in Mr. Rotta’s request dated October 18, 2010. The total cost to provide the information in those 4 requests was $228.90 or $57.23 per request. Thus, the City will charge $57.23 to reimburse its costs to provide this information.
· The request for information on the dog park is the same as contained in Mr. Rotta’s request dated October 18, 2010. The total cost to provide the information in those 4 requests was $228.90 or $57.23 per request. Thus, the City will charge $57.23 to reimburse its costs to provide this information.

Upon receipt of your payment in the amount of $199.36 to cover the City’s costs, the City will make the records available for inspection.

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These were four separate requests sent by four separate people, and he not only figured out the fees in a matter inconsistent to the FOIA, but also did not treat the amended requests as separate. The following E-mail was sent shortly afterwards by Mr. D. showing the impossibility of arriving at the charges he quoted for each of our requests by using the fees allowable by law by the State and City FOIA law and policy:

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FOIAC Shay,
As I see it, the law and your stated policies make me owe nothing to you. Both the state and Ludington FOIA laws agree that you can charge me only for the following-- correct me if I'm wrong:
1) Each page copied (you charge $.15 per)
2) Postage
3) The cost of search, examination, review, et. al if the request would result in an unreasonably high cost to the city and the FOIAC (you) specifically identifies the nature of these unreasonably high costs.

I asked to inspect public records concerning the municipal marina. I was told that it would cost me $27.67 to do so. Charge #1 and #2 would not apply, so it must be a charge for search, examination, etc., #3.

My good buddy, Tom Rotta, has a letter dated Nov. 3, 2010 signed by you that says"For your future reference, the City of Ludington FOIA Coordinator considers failure to charge a fee as resulting in an unreasonably high cost to the City anytime the costs exceed double the amount set by statute as permitting the City to demand a good faith deposit, or in other words, any time the costs exceed $100." [Editor's Note: see the above 11-3 letter link]

I was charged $27.67. There was no explanation given to me what this $27.67 was for or any possible way of getting that cost by using Ludington's existing FOIA policy on my request. You sir, are knowingly committing fraud. The other people's request likewise could not total the $57 figure you quoted, nor was their a specific identification of these fraudulent costs to them. Please gather the requested materials and send me back a reply when they are ready for my inspection.

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There was never any reply to this. And of course, in each of his replies to our separate requests, he did not identify the nature of those "unreasonably high costs" which required the odd figures for costs.

In about three weeks, Dec. 14, 2010, I sent this E-mail to FOIAC Shay: "I will be coming in tomorrow afternoon (Wednesday) to inspect and review (another's) FOIA Request, and remit whatever payment you see fit to inspect the Competitive Bids for the Water Tower as per my previous requests and Ms. S's request, which you quoted as $57.23."

The next day, I came in and paid the $57.23 Receipt for Wate Tower Painting Records (NOTE: the receipt says it is for 'copies'-- not for search, review and/or labor) and got 24 pages on the Water Tower Painting. For my money, he had them copy and let me keep the pages. As we have seen, these pages show that project was not started due to any need for it, and was not competitively bid on, even though it would cost the city over $1.2 million. Easy to see why Ludington City Manager John Shay, who moved this project along at least ten years before these water towers needed to be painted, wanted to price it out of the range of viewing.

But this itself, is a crime. Mr. D said that it as fraud, and this could probably be proven in court by showing that the five separate elements of fraud were evident in the transaction. But the FOIA has set rules for fees that he did not follow in charging such a fee, and that can be easily shown. Charging me $57.23 when there was no specifically identified unreasonably high cost to grab a folder for a contract engaged in less than a year prior, was unethical and violated clearly this law MCL 750.214 Public Extortion whose violation is another misdemeanor. And where do you think my $57.23 went? Should we believe that Kurt Malzahn got $6.60, Deb Luskin got $18.73, John Shay $30.60, and Heather Venzke got $1.29 for this simple act? And why should they have?

Since that time, I and others have had our FOIA requests often priced beyond what a reasonable person might assume was worth paying for. We couldn't even inspect the Workplace Safety Policy and how it was applied to me, without spending nearly $40, and we were charged for 3.5 hours of the City Clerk's time (including her benefits) just to look at the receipts and/or invoices of 2011's water safety purchases. The easily gathered requests we made above are still out there with only the water tower info being released. Such is the height of tyranny when you are required by law to divulge information, but can block it by charging a fee that makes it ridiculous for anyone to do so. Yet that's what John Shay can do, and does-- in a criminal manner.

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Permalink Reply by Sweater Cows! on September 4, 2011 at 1:49am

I am not sure what your getting at here(does it beg a question or is it a statement?), other than that what he is doing is wrong. I'm not grasping anything new compared to prior threads. What is the goal of this specific thread aside from listing everything out? What I am getting at is that after reading this I thought, ahh...just another drop in the bucket. lol I am unsure if you were going for more than that. It may be that you are not and therefore the ' exciting conclusion' is missing as it is just a statement of records.

The one thing I can pick out that I don't think your picking up is that the people you listed who would 'get' dollar amounts don't technically 'get' that money(unless they did it on there own time after hours), they are paid through there paycheck and since the time spent doing the searches costs the city as its done on city time, then the city is reimbursed for the time spent, otherwise the person(if they 'get' the money would be getting paid twice). It doesn't make sense to me that you would approach that the way you did in the paragraph above because I am sure you know that as well, so it really loses me as to what your getting at, or did you have a brain fart :P when writing that part?

Or are you saying it really didn't take them that long to find the stuff? and its just the way its worded that makes it sound otherwise?

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Permalink Reply by XLFD on September 4, 2011 at 9:28pm

Thanks for your input, Dagny nee Lando, because I perhaps didn't clarify how it differed from what I have already made part of the record.

If John Shay does not follow the FOIA guidelines as refers to fees or the letter of that law, violates the Open Meetings Act, or fails to perform other of his official duties, he likely has only committed a civil violation-- meaning that if someone was to call him on it and goes through the bother of taking it to court and succeeds, then John Shay is untouched by it, because the local taxpayers and the City of Ludington's insurance agency would be culpable for paying the bill-- and then City Hall and their allies at the Daily News can spin it like they did with the Jack Byers' lawsuit.

Remember, Shay had said that it was a slam dunk for the City to win the case, but settled for $250,000 because the City of Ludington didn't want to have the bad publicity and legal fees to fight it. Bullcrap, the City was guilty as heck, and owed Jack the key to the City.

This, and the previous thread on John Shay's criminal intentions, show that Mr. Shay is little more than a common criminal and could be held accountable for a misdemeanor for the violations of both laws I have displayed.

Therefore, he can ask for $57 for a FOIA request and be civilly accountable for demanding unlawful fees, but if I actually pay that and the fee does not match any figure justifiable by law, he has went into the realm of criminal accountability for public extortion.

The subtle difference can be shown in this example. If with the Letter of Trespass in effect John Shay said that I could only enter City Hall by paying $20 to him, then if I never bothered paying the $20 there has been no criminal act. However, if I did pay the $20 to enter City Hall, then he has extorted the money.

John Shay was told that his figures were impossible to arrive at with the existing FOIA policies by Mr. D, and notified by me beforehand that I would pay 'whatever payment you see fit' for the Water Tower records. He then had a clerk accept this money and write a receipt for 'making copies' when I had only asked to inspect non-exempt records (and $.15 does not go evenly into $57.23, LOL). That is criminal.

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Permalink Reply by Sweater Cows! on September 5, 2011 at 3:25pm

Thanks for the clarification.

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Permalink Reply by AQUAMAN on September 6, 2011 at 9:20pm

As stated earlier and repeatedly, trick-shot artists like this are just what top officials want and need to achieve an objective of inpenetrable fortress of secrecy and invisibility to do as they want, irregardless the consequences and law. I've heard the old saying you "can't beat city hall" but this kind of overcharging of FOIA fees is over the top, and someone should gladly pay the extortion to get it on record for the coming events in time that need to happen for cleansing this type of conduct.

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Permalink Reply by XLFD on September 7, 2011 at 1:02am

You do have a good point, Aq. And our usual City Hall guest, Wanda Marrison, Fourth Ward City Councilor, and any other City official or employee (and there are over 300 such people) are always welcome to come on to the Torch and offer some sort of explanation as to why City Manager Shay is not guilty of the crimes I have laid out. To be his Defense Attorney. To explain why there was a $57 charge for 24 copies that I hadn't even ordered as copies. To explain why he assassinated the truth, my privacy, and my character in November 2010 when he violated the Preservation of Personal Privacy Act.

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Permalink Reply by Marty Redman on September 7, 2011 at 11:25am

Keep pestering the new Attorney General Shuette about these things. Anybody else should too. What Shay is doing to you are high crimes and misdemeanors, and thuggery.