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PORTSMOUTH — NAACP leaders have been rejected for a second time in an attempt to file criminal charges against two Portsmouth City Council members, alleging they violated the city charter by telling the police chief to charge protesters in vandalism at the Confederate monument in June.
The NAACP officials suggested the decision, when a Black council member was charged recently with violating the same charter section, shows a racist double standard at work.
Louie Gibbs, vice president of the city’s NAACP chapter, said he and President James Boyd went to the Portsmouth magistrate’s office Friday, where they showed Thomas Cahill, the regional magistrate supervisor, emails they said supported the misdemeanor charges.
In the emails, Councilman Bill Moody wrote, “I am requesting that the law be enforced,” and Coucilwoman Elizabeth Psimas agreed. The emails were sent to a group that included other council members and Police Chief Angela Greene.
The city charter says City Council members can’t give orders to subordinates of the city manager, and they can’t take part in or “direct or request” the hiring or firing of city workers employed by the city manager.
Moody and Psimas have said they were expressing their opinions and did nothing wrong.
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Gibbs said Cahill told him that, in his opinion, the emails were not an “order” or instruction.
Vice Mayor Lisa Lucas-Burke is charged with violating the same city charter section, after a Portsmouth man went before a magistrate and alleged she violated it when she said she wanted the police chief out of her position.
Gibbs said it shows a disparity in the legal system: A man was able to take out charges against a Black councilwoman, and yet the NAACP couldn’t take out the same charges against two white council members.
“It’s hugely frustrating to see the disparities waved in your face,” Gibbs said.
Magistrates don’t decide whether someone is guilty of a crime, which requires proof beyond a reasonable doubt and is a decision for a judge or jury. Instead, magistrates rule on whether there is probable cause to charge someone, a lower standard. Gibbs said he thinks the magistrates who rejected charges against Moody and Psimas are playing the role of judge instead of letting guilt or innocence be determined by the courts.
Gibbs and Boyd first tried to file charges against Moody and Psimas earlier this month, after The Virginian-Pilot reported on the emails. Virginia Beach Chief Magistrate Michael Poulson told them he would not allow charges to be filed because he didn’t believe there was enough evidence in the emails, Boyd told The Pilot.
Poulson was called in at the request of Portsmouth magistrates, who said they had a conflict of interest. Portsmouth Chief Magistrate Mandy Owens also recused her office last week, which is why Cahill was called in, Gibbs said.
In late August, when Tommy Dubois went to seek charges against Lucas-Burke, the chief magistrate from Norfolk, Amanda Winchester, was brought in to consider the evidence and she approved the charges. In an interview Monday, Dubois said he had looked at what Moody and Psimas wrote, but thought their words were too vague to warrant charges. Dubois, who is white, has said his decision to seek charges against Lucas-Burke had nothing to do with race but was “about right and wrong.”
Boyd and Gibbs are among the 19 people charged by police stemming from a June 10 protest at the Confederate monument. State Sen. Louise Lucas, who is Lucas-Burke’s mother, is also charged with felonies, as are several other NAACP leaders, public defenders and a school board member.
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The afternoon of the protest, demonstrators spray painted the monument ahead of a rally planned for that night. The City Council meanwhile postponed a vote on moving the monument, although they have since voted to move it.
Lucas told police at the scene that they couldn’t arrest protesters.
Hours later that night, protesters beheaded statues of soldiers attached to the monument, and one fell on a man, seriously injuring him.
Portsmouth Police Chief Angela Greene announced the charges two months later, a day before Lucas and other state legislators were scheduled to begin a special session aimed, in part, at addressing criminal justice reform in the wake of the death of George Floyd.
The city’s elected commonwealth’s attorney and the city manager didn’t know the charges were coming.
Much political fallout has happened since. City Manager Lydia Pettis Patton temporarily removed Greene from her position. Pettis Patton has since resigned, and the City Council fired City Attorney Solomon Ashby.
Margaret Matray, 757-222-5216, margaret.matray@pilotonline.com