ALERT: Georgia Supreme Court Run-off!
by politicalvine
Rumors have it that an ethics complaint has been filed against Tamela Adkins, one of the candidates running in the Georgia Supreme Court run-off election to be held on November 30.
PV Discusses The Issue: Despite what some of you may believe, violations of state ethics laws should be of a significant concern to you…especially when the violations concern a candidate who is running for a statewide position in which her prime responsibility will be to interpret laws and issue rulings on her interpretation of laws.
Here is a copy of the filed complaint (and we chose to mask the filer’s personal info). It succinctly lays-out three violations, of which we will present in reverse order of their presentation due to more examination being needed on one of the allegations regarding her 2008 race for Court of Appeals:
1) In her 2008 race for Court of Appeals, she was required by State Ethics Laws to file a Financial Disclosure within 15 days after qualifying. That was never filed, and has not been filed as of 11/19/2010.
2) In her current race for Georgia Supreme Court, she was required by law to file a Financial Disclosure within 15 days after qualifying, and did not file this disclosure in that time period. And, upon recently checking the State Ethics Website, it was not filed until November 18, 2010…shortly after she received a copy of the ethics complaint filed against her this past week.
3) In her 2008 race for Court of Appeals, as of her October 2008 disclosure report, she had approximately $40,000 of Cash on Hand. She lost that election, but did not file any disclosure after that October 2008 one as was required to disclose to the state exactly what happened to nearly $40,000 in cash. So, at minimum, one violation of not filing the required 12/31/2008 disclosure.
And, if she did not get rid of all that Cash on Hand as of 12/31/2008, then other disclosures were due in 2009 that were not filed that disclosed whether or not that nearly $40,000 was either a) properly spent on campaign activities, or b) used for personal purposes in violation of state law, or c) possibly even used for her current race for Supreme Court, which would also be a violation of state ethics laws.
No one knows if this money was properly disposed of, which is, actually, a concern to us. Because there are legal uses for money not spent on an election…and, then there are some specific illegal uses for money leftover from a campaign.
With no proper adherence to our state’s disclosure laws, no one really knows either way. And that is a problem because we are being asked to vote for someone who is charged with interpreting laws who may not know how to follow laws. See the relationship there?
And, in due diligence fashion, PV has confirmed that Adkins’ opponent, David Nahmias (pronounced NAH-mee-iss), has filed all proper campaign and financial disclosures.
November 21st, 2010 at 12:17 am
Good information but there is one key point that has been overlooked: The very distinct possibility that Tamela Adkins was a plant to help David Nahmias get elected since she divided the anti-incumbent vote and prevented the highly qualified, Matt Wilson from challenging Nahmias, a career federal appointee, one on one. After all, why would someone enter the race at the last minute, pay a $3,000+ qualification fee and then literally run no campaign whatsoever throughout the general election.