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Portsmouth — A Portsmouth man has taken out criminal charges against Vice Mayor Lisa Lucas-Burke, alleging she violated a section of the city charter when she called for the resignation or firing of the police chief. The move comes amid the controversy over charges Portsmouth police filed against Lucas-Burke’s mother, state Sen. Louise Lucas, and others after a protest at which some — though not Lucas — vandalized the city’s Confederate monument.
On Sunday, 42-year-old Portsmouth resident Tommy Dubois went before a magistrate, who issued summonses against Lucas-Burke charging her with two misdemeanors.
Dubois is accusing Lucas-Burke of unlawfully directing or requesting Greene’s removal. The city charter section he cites says City Council members can’t take part in or “direct or request” the hiring or firing of city workers employed by the city manager.
The charges carry no jail time and a fine of up to $500, but Lucas-Burke would lose her position on the City Council if convicted. She’s running for reelection in November.
The vice mayor declined to comment Tuesday as she had yet to speak with her attorney. But she told HuffPost she was upset about the charges and believed they’re “bogus.”
Lucas-Burke and her mother are Black, as are most of those charged in the protest. As The Virginian-Pilot reported Sunday, many Black officials, activists and historians see the charges as the latest chapter in a long history of white people using the criminal justice system to intimidate powerful Black leaders.
Dubois is white. In a phone interview Tuesday, he said his decision to pursue charges against Lucas-Burke had nothing to do with race and that he would have done the same thing against any other council member: “To me it’s about right and wrong.”
Dubois said he listened to a news conference held last week in support of those charged. At the rally, organized by the Martin Luther King Jr. Leadership Steering Committee, Lucas-Burke and others called for the police chief’s resignation. Dubois said he thinks “the race card gets thrown (around) a lot.”
“There are racist people in the world. It’s not as bad as they made it seem,” said Dubois.
Dubois said he’d heard about the city charter section on Facebook, though he couldn’t remember exactly whose post he read. Several people, including a former sheriff, had spoken publicly about the section. Dubois said he’d messaged with someone else on Facebook who was interested in seeking charges. They and several others showed up at the magistrate’s office and a WAVY-TV camera crew recorded it.
Dubois said one of the counts stems from what Lucas-Burke said at last week’s rally and the other from an email she wrote.
Louise Lucas was one of 14 people charged with felonies last week stemming from a June 10 protest at the city’s Confederate monument. People spray painted the monument that afternoon, ahead of a scheduled rally. Hours later, after Lucas had left, demonstrators beheaded four statues of soldiers attached to the monument and pulled one down with a tow rope. A man was seriously injured when the statue fell on him.
Two months after the protest, Portsmouth police charged Lucas, NAACP leaders, public defenders, a School Board member and others with felony injury to a monument. Eight of them also face a conspiracy charge.
Neither the city manager nor the commonwealth’s attorney knew the charges were coming. City Manager Lydia Pettis Patton told council members in an email she thought city police were supposed to end their involvement in the investigation because of a conflict of interest, although she did not say what that alleged conflict was.
Police Chief Angela Greene said she tried to have an outside agency investigate because of a potential conflict involving “elected city officials” who were at the protests. After “all efforts were exhausted” to have an outside group investigate, Greene said it was left up to her department to do it and no conflict of interest for her department was revealed.
But state police told The Virginian-Pilot this week their investigation is still ongoing, despite Greene saying her officers began investigating only after state police finished their investigation July 22.
Gov. Ralph Northam, other Democrats and activists condemned the charges and questioned their timing, one day ahead of a special session during which legislators, including Lucas, will address criminal justice reforms. Sen. Mamie E. Locke, D-Hampton, called the charges a “thinly veiled attempt to intimidate and silence the most powerful Black woman in the Virginia legislature.”
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Louise Lucas has denied any wrongdoing.
Dubois said he didn’t understand how the charges against the 14 people could be considered racist since Portsmouth is a majority-Black city with a Black police chief and several Black council members. He praised the police chief and the way her officers responded to the June 10 protest.
Dubois said he doesn’t care about the Confederate monument, which he called a “piece of concrete in the middle of the road,” and supports moving it. He said he was born in Portsmouth, served time in the Army and has a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice.
“There’s got to be a line where things have to be done by law,” Dubois said.
An arraignment on the charges is scheduled for Sept. 2.
Staff writer Ana Ley contributed to this report.
Margaret Matray, 757-222-5216, margaret.matray@pilotonline.com