Attorney for Ellisville Mayor Says Emails Undermine Impeachment Case

With his impeachment hearing scheduled for Monday, Ellisville Mayor Adam Paul's legal defense is attacking the nature of the process that brought the allegations against him. 

Chet Pleban, Paul's attorney, went onto St. Louis radio program the McGraw Show on KTRS this morning to discuss emails, documents and other testimony he has gathered at this point. 

He argued they showed Ellisville city attorney Paul Martin had been covertly maneuvering with members of the city council to impeach Paul. He said Martin had started compiling a document titled "Potential Charter Violations: Adam Paul" in May 2012, shortly after Paul's election.

• Hear the audio from The McGraw Show on the KTRS website. Look for the "Audio" tab lower on the page.

The city initially had fought the release of the documents, arguing they were protected by attorney-client privilege, but a judge ruled they had waived the right to privacy with the resolution calling for Paul's impeachment. 

The result is that Paul's defense has gained access to copies of e-mails between Martin and former mayor and current council member Matt Pirrello and the rest of the council. 

In one such e-mail, Pleban told host Mark McGraw the two discussed a timeline for impeaching Paul, beginning with recruiting a person outside of the current council to file a complaint. 

"A decision is made that we can't have a council person going ahead and filing it because of the public reaction," Pleban said, paraphrasing the e-mail. "They will be outraged."

The complaint then was filed in February by former council member Katie James, but Pleban said the e-mails showed Martin and Pirrello discussing an extensive outline for how the process would unfold, and what it would contain prior to its filing. 

The move by Katie James eventually resulted in two charges alleging Paul had violated the city's charter by asking police officers to remove citizens he thought were disrupting public meetings. 

At this point, Paul hired his current legal representation, a move that caused Martin and the city to change their strategy, according to Pleban's account of the e-mails. 

Pleban read from one dated Feb. 17 from Martin to the members of the city council that stated it meant Paul would likely challenge his impeachment in court. It's likely, Martin wrote, in that case that the two charges brought against Paul would not be enough for the courts to uphold any decision to remove him. 

"They probably thought Adam would rather resign than go through all this nonsense," Pleban said, characterizing the city's initially strategy as hoping for a process that would be "short and sweet."

Subsequently, a meeting of the Charter Enforcement Commission declined to forward the allegations filed by Katie James. Shortly after, councilwoman Michelle Murray then requested Martin draft a resolution based on a provision of the city charter that allows the council to review the qualifications of any of its members, including the mayor.

That resolution contained several allegations, including that Paul disclosed confidential information, attempted to unilaterally end the city’s contract with Martin and exceeded the scope of his authority as outlined in the city’s charter.