I can assure you that those victims and their families and many of us in Palm Beach County dont believe and feel he kept Palm Beach County safe., Listening to the wild accusations of Mr. Freeman wallowing around in the gutter doesnt do us any good, Bradshaw said. The DC Leaks domain name was really registered two weeks after Dougans arrival in Moscow, just as in his story. In addition to exposing the sheriffs offices desperation to pin something on Dougan, the recordings captured Lewis boasting about doing the same to another longtime Bradshaw critic, an ex-cop from Michigan named Jim Donahue who ran against Bradshaw in the 2012 election. He changed training to include a tactical pause designed to de-escalate confrontations and leave more distance between the deputy and a suspect. 1290 WJNO - The Palm Beaches' Home for Mudd, Beck, Hannity, Clay & Buck, Levin & Noory. ROYAL PALM BEACH, Fla. - Palm County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw expressed outrage last week, saying that the murder-suicide at a Royal Palm Beach Publix could have been avoided if someone came forward . During Palm Beach County's 2020 elections, some races that were non-partisan since 2004 will now be partisan, including the one for Palm Beach County Sheriff. "Let me make this cleareven though the court changed the way the elections system is, the court hasn't changed the way I will do business. (Ditto above). Sheriff Bradshaw has a successful track record of forty-nine (49) years in law enforcement. Creepy.. Please outline your work history for the past 15 years. Fearful that hed be arrested and wind up in the custody of the very cops hed been battling, Dougan fled to the only place he felt safe: Russia, where Vladimirs Putins government granted him asylum status. Instead, The Daily Beast has learned exactly how Dougan used public information and sophisticated data analytics to blow holes in Floridas address confidentiality system without cracking a single network. He told Jessica that Borodin was related to a shadowy figure called Flyman. For about a decade ending in 2007, Flyman had led the Russian Business Network, a notorious cybercrime group that operated its own server farm. A confirmation e-mail will be sent to you. That includes this election cycle. Bradshaw asked Governor Ron DeSantis to have FDLE conduct an investigation and his agency has also been looking into whether any policies were violated. In October 2017 Dougan posted a story to one his fake news sites claiming that Ric Bradshaw's second-in-command was a white supremacist nursing fantasies about killing "a black man or a Jew . Ill always have his back, said Kerner. I have commanded two of the largest law enforcement agencies in the county with the West Palm Beach Police Department as Chief and now as Sheriff. In May, according to Dougan, the Kremlins RT network shot video for a feature-length documentary on Dougan. Antisemitism has been on the minds of local authorities as the number of incidents being reported has been going up. Diaz, who was unchallenged for the Republican nomination, said that Bradshaw is a better politician than a sheriff. He wasn't working for the government any more, but he owned businesses, and he was looking for another business to partner up with, says Dougan. Our policies and practices have to be sound, fair, clear, and understood. In other areas, however, Bradshaw has not embraced reform. He has raised $680,000 compared to roughly $27,000 for his challenger, Alex Freeman. I dont know what it is, but I feel so comfortable talking to you, and I enjoy our conversations.. And true to his word, once Dougan was safe in Moscow he set up a website called DC Leaks to host them. He rose through the ranks of the West Palm Beach Police Department and in 1996 was appointed Chief of Police. Whenever we have a bad contractor or person who attacks one of our judges or the sheriff or the state attorney, thats one of the things I do, Lewis told her. Bradshaw did not exaggerate during his interview with the Sun Sentinel Editorial Board that the department he took over 16 years ago was pretty much in shambles. The previous sheriff was an incompetent leader who favored buying expensive toys such as the law enforcement version of an armored personnel carrier over maintaining public safety. Sheriff Bradshaw has extensive knowledge and training in all aspects of law enforcement with a special emphasis on Domestic Security, Field Operations and community based policing. DC Leaks published a completely different assembly of leaks, consisting primarily of a grab bag of emails and documents sourced from a GRU-linked phishing campaign earlier that year. He arranged to route his calls through an offshore VOIP service that had a bank of numbers in a New York area code, and bought a $40 program called MorphVOX Pro to change the pitch of his voice. That was based on the question, Who do you want to make the best decisions for your family, your neighborhood and your safety? Bradshaw told the Town-Crier. In a majority-Democratic county, Bradshaw is a Democrat who enjoys support from key Republicans. They were published on Julian Assanges WikiLeaks beginning July 22, 2016. This time Dougan was sure Bradshaw was going down. This list came from your government, he wrote. Yes, in Palm Beach County 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016. For these he turned not to property records, but to a similar vulnerability in the states voter registration rolls. Sports agent Marc Roberts, a Miami nightclub owner and developer, and his family have poured $16,000 into Bradshaws campaign. In June, Dougan self-published his autobiography, BadVolf: The true story of an American cops retaliation against a corrupt system of justice and politics, forcing him to seek political asylum in Russia. We arrest somebody that lives in the county that we live in, we want to keep it private. We hope that four more years will bring even more progress. Revenge websites rarely have an impact, but PBSOtalk.com would prove an exception. As Sheriff, I have worked to make the Palm Beach County Sheriffs office one of the nations most professional law enforcement agencies. He said hes challenging Bradshaw because its time for new leadership in the county. If that was the plan, it worked. When he talks about his leadership and who has kept Palm Beach County safe for the past 16 years, I question that, Freeman said. Palm Beach Sheriff Ric Bradshaw, who faced blistering criticism for granting Jeffrey Epstein liberal work-release privileges while the sex offender was serving time in the county stockade, has . It was a former deputy named John Mark Dougan. Jessica had contacted Lewis for a planned home renovation project, but she quickly took an flirtatious interest in the 56-year-olds personal life, peppering him with questions and flattery. Does that mean that in a couple of years Dougan might start treating Putin to the same tactics he used on Sheriff Bradshaw? How would you assess PBSOs response to the coronavirus at the jail, in terms of arrests, and in protecting employees? At best, this is irresponsible behavior.. Palm Beach Sheriff Ric Bradshaw, who faced blistering criticism for granting Jeffrey Epstein liberal work-release privileges while the sex offender was serving time in the county stockade, has . The final report nine months later evinced little interest in the hacking boasts by Lewis and Rodriguez, but found that Lewis had broken department regulations by divulging PBSO business to Jessica.. This is not a blanket answer and depends on the circumstances. (TRACEY) Editor's note: Sheriff Bradshaw completed . All rights reserved. Dougan claims his involvement mostly ended at that point, but that he sometimes logged into the server and saw the whistle-blower and his friends uploading additional files. Legislature considers flooding our streets with cancer-causing chemicals | Opinion, Before DeSantis and Disney, a Broward case with free speech parallels | Steve Bousquet, Hispanics are turning Republican, and theyll vote for Ron DeSantis in 2024 | Opinion. Got a tip? On Saturday, the day after my home was raided, I took a rental car and drove to the nearest Russian embassy, located in Washington, D.C. Mar 10, 2023. He couldnt just throw them on his website and admit what hed doneFlorida is one of 12 states where its illegal to record a phone call without the consent of both parties. Some very wealthy, powerful people. In truth, there was no Russian hackerand there were no hacks. They didnt have an arrest warrant, and no charges had yet been filed. We have to have the ability to listen and understandand we do. The building is home to professional service. Hes so much involved in this gutter talk, he cant figure it out.. Dougan mastered the dark art of fake news, crafting official-looking websites with names like DCWeekly.com and DCPost.org for his made-up stories. We contract with an inmate health care provider and ensure that all possible CDC guidelines are followed. The agents had a search warrant to seize all his electronics and any and all records, data or materials pertaining to the computer networks of 24 different Florida county governments and confidential property records within these counties.. West Palm Beach, FL 33406 One sheriffs official carried on an intimate 10-day telephonic flirtation with a woman who turned out to be Dougan using a voice changer. Freeman knows how high a mountain hes attempting to climb. A reporter from Gawker interviewed BadVolf over online chats, suspecting at first that he was actually talking to Dougan, but eventually falling for the hoax as thoroughly as Lewis fell for Jessica. Its been part of the the far-right canon since Vince Fosters suicide in 1993. The details are under seal, but an arrest warrant was issued, and Dougan is now officially a fugitive. Endorsement: Easy call in Palm Beach County, Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window), Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window), Endorsement: Easy call in Palm Beach County Sheriffs race: Ric Bradshaw, Key things to know about Floridas pending abortion ruling, DeSantis oversight board votes to sue Disney, Known for laughs, White House Correspondents dinner takes a turn and spotlights risks to journalism. In some ways, Bradshaw has been ahead of this curve. Bradshaw has formed seven mental health teams, consisting of a deputy and a social worker. By the end of the 40-minute call Lewis and Rodriguez had agreed to do some paid freelance work on Jessicas behalf and obtain her gold-diggers private Facebook messages and web browsing history. The county property appraisers office was baffled by the address leak. We hope that four more years will bring even more progress. Once in Moscow he came to appreciate the city almost as much as the woman. The violent crime rate here hovers at three times the national average, and 37 percent of the 20,000 inhabitants live below the poverty line. Dougan didnt appreciate how successful until the morning of March 14, 2016. It was the largest settlement ever reached by PBSO. Dougan moved back to Palm Beach County with a burning sense of injustice. Another was scorched with accusations linking him to a white supremacist group, reported from a fake news site so convincing that the legitimate press picked up the false story. The sheriff says he'll have that proposal in 30 to 45 days. They were letting these guys get away with murder, and they were fucking over the citizens they were getting paid to protect.. Sheriff Bradshaw has a successful track record of forty-nine (49) years in law enforcement. I am your sheriff, he said. But Dougan was an unusual cop. His first job in law enforcement was on a small-town police force in Mangonia Park, Florida, where he distinguished himself by writing more traffic tickets than the other 11 officers combined. For Dougan, that was the last straw. Bradshaw serves on regional task forces that deal with homeland security and emergency management. He kept going, slathering layers of disinformation over his citizen journalism. Internal Affairs is now investigating. But when Dougan gets into less-publicized, fine grained details, his tale diverges from DC Leaks actual history, particularly in the period between the sites domain registration on April 19th, 2016, and its public debut on June 8th. I have worked to ensure our hiring reflects the diversity of our community. Try calling the PBSO and you get an endless recorded greeting that mentions his name probably a dozen times. Jessica didnt exist. He has near-universal name recognition, and he regularly raises gobs of campaign money. Bradshaw said hes proud of how his deputies handled the protests. Before he got into the construction business hed worked at the Palm Beach County Sheriff's office for 23 years, retiring in 2005 as a lieutenant detective. Bradshaw has helped to secure reimbursement for those expenses. The Sheriff's Office has nearly 1,800 civilian employees about 45 percent of Bradshaw's workforce. Bradshaw is the most politically powerful persona in the county. But that day in the spring of 2016, his hoax backfired spectacularly, with FBI agents raiding his home and carting off his computers. In short, we have demonstrated our ability to make needed changes quickly and most of our policies/practices are established well before we encounter a crisis or have to navigate through challenging times. In October 2017 Dougan posted a story to one his fake news sites claiming that Ric Bradshaws second-in-command was a white supremacist nursing fantasies about killing a black man or a Jew. The post was widely circulated, and proved convincing enough that the genuine news outlet RawStory picked it up and ran with it. For Political Parties; It was a former high-ranking Kremlin official named Pavel Borodin. Sheriff Bradshaw has a successful track record of fifty (50) years in law enforcement. Weve taken significant steps to ensure that our policies are identified as best practice, but we dont stop there. The two exchanged photos and texted frequently, and before long they were talking until 1:00 in the morning. His message to voters: Who do you trust to keep you safe?. In 2013, Lewis said, the bureau had been on the brink of arresting Dougan for allegedly providing false information on his FAA pilots certification, failing to disclose that he suffered the potentially-disqualifying neurological illness Tourettes Syndrome. Freeman was a major in the Riviera Beach Police Department, which at the time was one of the countys worst. Its like when your friend robs a bank and you're sitting at home. Prosecutors want to investigate whether Krischer's office has ever told the grand jury the full scale of Epstein's crimes, or whether the prosecutor's office is interfering with the judiciary . Its absolutely the best nightlife of any city Ive been, including New York, he says. The previous high for a settlement amount came in 2017, when Bradshaw settled over the shooting death of Seth Adams for $2.5 million. An Internal Affairs lieutenant named Dean Johnson was eventually charged with four felonies for allegedly leaking information to and about Dougan (he later copped a misdemeanor plea), but Dougan himself emerged unscathed. Thats precisely what Dougan did, for every confidential address in the county. He replaced the Excel spreadsheet with a user-friendly web interface, and then began dumping more confidential addresses from other Florida counties. Dougan says hes now on a track to citizenship. But his primary focus was the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office, and its elected chief, Sheriff Ric Bradshaw. Dougan claims that Nelson made everything up to retaliate for complaints he made about her performance, and that Windham officials only fired him because theyd learned about his Belle Glade whistle-blowing. In this contemporaneous telling, Dougan had gone to Moscow to do business. Do you support or oppose cash bail for misdemeanor charges? Bradshaws fund-raising prowess isnt his only source of political strength. The Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office leadership is using their totalitarian authority to commit vast numbers of crime to investigate and persecute [sic] its political enemies.. As he puts it, I should not be the largest mental health provider in the county. Hes talking about the county jail, which the sheriffs office runs. The Sun Sentinel endorses Ric Bradshaw for Palm Beach County sheriff. Expand. How do you see the differences facing voters in this race? Our command staff has an excellent relationship with our road-patrol deputies. None of the DNC emails did. Do you support civil citations for some misdemeanors and/or other diversion programs? In October 2009 he was fired from the Windham police force for sexual harassment. But the DNC emails that Dougan says he raced to D.C. to get, the ones he claimed to have uploaded onto a website he created for that express purpose, never appeared there. Reining in pay for civilian employees could be one way for Bradshaw to cut costs,. The Russian capital felt free and ungoverned, a place where you could get away with almost anything, as if the internet itself had suddenly transformed into a major metropolis. Seven months later, an Internal Affairs probe concluded there was no excessive use of force by the men. Neal H. Moritz's Original Film (Fast & Furious franchise) will produce with Rocket Science, as well as Stallone and Braden Aftergood's Balboa Productions. There must be real news with real photos on the front of the site so the fake story blends in and becomes believable.. DeSantis' move comes as Sheriff Ric Bradshaw has come under increasing scrutiny for his decision in 2008 to give Epstein, . That is why our Police Benevolent Association has endorsed me. It included current and retired federal agents, prosecutors, local cops and judges. And this is where his story hits another snag. CA: Do Not Sell My Info He moved into an apartment in the western part of the city near the Moscow River and about eight miles from the Kremlin. In Mangonia Park, Dougan helped the DEA with a series of drug busts, and the agency praised him for his pronounced surveillance skill. Dougan later improvised a sting to collar a local fugitive, leading a Palm Beach County detective to enthuse about his creativity: This is a Deputy thinking outside the BOX., But Dougan faced controversies on the force too. If so, please name them: Have you ever run for office before? Dougans trick was to cross-reference that number against previous versions of the data, stepping back month by month until he found the same voter not yet protected as confidential. But they dont feature at all in Dougans story. Sometimes called Putins mentor, Borodin had been Boris Yeltsins top aide. Palm Beach County commissioners, who complain privately about the ever-increasing share of county tax money that goes to PBSO, would not deign to publicly criticize the sheriff or his spending priorities, lest they run the risk of being tarred by him as soft on crime, a brand no politician wants to sport. Voters granted confidentiality in Florida are listed without names or addressesjust their Florida voter ID number. The change came about this year, when the Florida Supreme Court ruled in a case involving Orange County that state election law prevents counties from deciding to hold nonpartisan elections. Lewis was certain that Dougan was visiting Russia to partner with that countrys cybercriminals. For over 50 years, I have committed my career to public safety in Palm Beach County. Bradshaw started out good. Finally, we must mention the case of Jeffrey Epstein. As far as the body cameras, were thrilled to death, he said. He has served as sheriff for 16 years. About two weeks after the leak, Palm Beach County shut down its public feed of the SITUS dataset, according to logs kept by an open-source cartography site. Were in charge of homeland security, weve fought the gangs, weve fought the opioids, were doing great with the coronavirus, helping the neighborhoods, helping the healthcare workers, feeding the people in their neighborhoods and getting them to the testing sites.. But Dougan hadnt yet updated Chapter 32, which offered an altogether different account of the trip. She had a Linkedin profile and was on Facebook, but there was little else. Do you want the person with the most experience, has done the job and has proven himself over 16 years as the sheriff and has executive experience in actually running major law enforcement organizations? Rodriguez did not respond to repeated emails and phone messages). Sheriff Bradshaw allowed Jeffrey Epstein to be on work-release for 12-hour days, six days a week. PBSOtalk.com vanished in the wake of the address leak, after a Broward County prosecutor pressured GoDaddy to take away the domain. (This is wrong. He believed the sheriffs office was whitewashing the whole affair, punishing Raban and his deputies with technical violations to satisfy the public, while glossing over the police brutality at the heart of it all. Freeman denied the allegations. He was the guy they called in for sensitive investigations. It was too small a case for the FBI. Hed just gotten his kids off to school when he noticed a suspicious pickup truck with tinted windows idling in front of his house. Refuses to come under the countys Inspector General and Ethics Commission, using PBSO credit card to wine and dine south county condo political kings, renting class-A office space for himself etc. WPTV- West Palm Beach Scripps. Asked about the criminal investigation of Epsteins jail time that Gov. It took a few days for me to get my head on straight and apply for asylum. Staff writer Chris Persaud and researcher Melanie Mena contributed to this story. On January 4, 2005, Sheriff Bradshaw was sworn in as Sheriff of Palm Beach County. Bradshaw is also speaking out, for the first time, about the controversy surrounding late businessman and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein's time in jail. The biggest one weighs 200 pounds, he says. Even as Lewis and Jessica exchanged endearments and drew plans to meet in real life, the conversation turned again and again to the topic of Lewis Great White Whale. It is such sadness this must be done to protect a friend but we see no other way to do this. It was an unusual movenobody volunteered for Belle Glade. Freeman, 51, is pinning his hope on the moment. The Daily Beast asked Dougan about the discrepancies. Its fair to say he was a whistle-blower who used firsthand knowledge, inside sources and public records laws to expose violence and scandal inside the department. Dougan, though, was soon in hot water of his own. Former West Palm Beach police chief. The contrast with his opponent is stark. Reports of the treatment drew national scorn. Click to Tweet Bradshaw, a Democrat, was first elected in 2004 and reelected to another four-year term in 2020, easily crushing his opponent in the Democratic Primary and the Republican Candidate in the general election. Shootings have declined significantly. I am the only candidate who has the qualifications, experience and professionalism to lead the largest law enforcement agency in the county and continue to retain our countys position as the seat of Homeland Security for southeast Florida. ". Memes View Map Hed given the FBI clear evidence that the sheriffs office had been stalking him for years, even hacking into his stuff, all because it didnt approve of his constitutionally protected free speech. Lewis promised to contact his technical guy, who he called probably one of the best hackers that was out there.. You would think that they would notify people, especially police officers and judges and shelters and things like that, says a woman who manages a shelter for domestic abuse victims. In this we were able to hack their database and give all records confidential to public so their privacy is no more important as the people they hack.. It seemed puzzling from the start that Dougan, hot on the heels of an FBI raid and already planning his escape, would take a couple of days off to physically transport a zip file small enough to be sent as an email attachment. There no way to know if Dougans entre into the Russiagate truther club is calculated to support Putins denials that Russia interfered in the 2016 election, or just to sell books. When The Daily Beast asked Dougan if he could provide a copy of the contents of the thumb drive he claims to have received from his source, he came back a few days later with a zip file of 743 DNC emails, just as hed described. The Icelandic hosting apparently didnt work out, and whoever controlled DC Leaks moved it to Malaysia five days later, on May 5th, where it stayed for the remainder of election season. Dougan quickly discovered that Muck City was the stomping ground for a gang of rough deputies led by one his superiors, Brent Raban, a sergeant who liked to patrol in a skullcap emblazoned with the word punishment. Raban bragged on Facebook about brutalizing the people he arrested, sometimes posting mugshots of bruised and beaten faces. The only reason conspiracy mongers fixed on Rich, rather than any of hundreds of his fellow DNC workers, is because he was killed. But the independent Maine Human Rights Commission ruled that Dougan did indeed sexually harass Nelson, and in January 2013 Nelsons lawsuit against the town of Windham was settled out of court on undisclosed terms. He says PBSO has succeeded in keeping crime down and that he is a regional and national leader in law enforcement. Under Bradshaw, the department has come far. I am running for re-election to ensure the Sheriffs Office maintains this level of excellence and continues the critical safety programs needed in the fight against gangs, opioid overdose reduction, Homeland Security, mental health challenges, community policing, and advancement in technology. To a sizable number of fringe conservatives, it goes without saying that the Clintons order hits on the people who get in their way. No. A Channel 5 reporter said Lewis sounded more like a modern-day hatchet man than a cop in the recordings. The hacker turned out to be Anthony Rodriguez, a social media specialist in PBSOs media relations office. In 2001, Borodin was briefly detained in New York on Swiss money-laundering charges en route to George W. Bushs inauguration. At the time of the Lewis catfishing episode, Dougan had been to Moscow two or three times, staying for a month on each visit. The rumors are true! Dougan spammed out an election-day email under the name of a prominent county commissioner slamming Bradshaw for immoral and criminal activities. Bradshaws second-in-command filed suit against Dougan for defamation, dragging him through years of litigation before the case was voluntarily dismissed by both parties. Youd think they would give you some kind of warning so you could be more on alert., A retired cop says he knew about the incident from news reports, but did not know that his name and address were on the list until contacted by The Daily Beast. Russias not my fight, he explains. Over the previous weeks, someone had been systematically targeting federal agents, judges, local cops and intelligence agency workers throughout Florida, posting 14,000 of their home addresses to the web, all of them specifically exempted from public records because of their sensitivity.

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