Metropolitan News-Enterprise

 

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

 

Page 1

 

Alan Jackson Doubles Down in TV Ad, Calls Lacey ‘Dishonest’

Opponent’s Consultant Scoffs at Both Medium and Message

 

By KENNETH OFGANG, Staff Writer

 

Deputy District Attorney Alan Jackson, a candidate for district attorney in the Nov. 6 general election, yesterday unveiled a television ad in which Jackson describes his opponent as “dishonest.”

Jackson’s campaign strategist, John Thomas, has previously accused Chief Deputy District Attorney Jackie Lacey of having “lied under oath to protect a political boss.” But the 30-second spot, entitled “Protect,” represents the first time that accusation has been voiced directly by the candidate, Thomas acknowledged to the MetNews yesterday.

The spot offers no context for the statement. But Thomas confirmed that both the commercial, and his previous comment, relate to testimony given by Lacey in a labor dispute between her office and the Association of Deputy District Attorneys, in which she said she had been mistaken in a couple of particulars when she had testified at a previous hearing.

Text of Ad

The ad, which Thomas said would run through Election Day and which is also on YouTube, features Jackson, facing the camera and walking across a courtroom. The text reads:

“I’m Alan Jackson, and this is my office. For 17 years I’ve made sure violent criminals who sit here get the justice they deserve. I’m modernizing the DA’s office and working to keep kids out of crime in the first place.

“Jackie Lacey is a good person, but she hasn’t tried a case in 13 years. She’s a political appointee who was dishonest under oath to protect her boss. I think we need a D.A. who knows how to protect families, not politicians.”

Lacey testified before the county’s Employee Relations Commission, commonly known as ERCOM, on July 9, 2009. She said she had advised Deputy District Attorney Rob Dver, a close friend, not to align himself with then-Deputy District Attorney Steve Ipsen, who was then trying to turn the Deputy District Attorneys Association into a union.

‘On a Personal Level’

Ipsen asked Lacey whether she had “warned” Dver “that it was bad for his career to associate with the union.” Lacey said that she had advised Dver “on a personal level” that such association would not be in Dver’s best interests.

She denied that she had used the words “bad for your career,” but said that might have been Dver’s interpretation.

She also made the two concessions at the heart of the dishonesty accusation, that she told Dver that he “shouldn’t be part of the bargaining team” because Cooley didn’t like Ipsen, didn’t “like the union,” and thought “the union is going to be a disaster and anyone associated with the union is not going to be—that it’s going to be very bad for their careers.”

In her subsequent testimony, on Jan. 14, 2010, however, Lacey said she had not intended to acquiesce in Dver’s assertions, reflected in the transcript of his testimony, that she had told him that Cooley “[d]oesn’t like the union” and thought it would be a “disaster.”

She said she had been confused during the prior testi00mony, and had believed that she was answering only to whether those statements were in the transcript of Dver’s testimony, not whether she had actually made them. She attributed the confusion to her having been “really tired” and to having “blood sugar issues in the afternoon where I lose concentration quite a bit in the afternoon.”

Lacey Consultant Responds

Parke Skelton, the chief consultant to the Lacey campaign, said there was nothing dishonest in Lacey’s changing her testimony.

“She corrected the record herself, voluntarily, “ Skelton said. “That’s not dishonesty, that’s being highly honest.”

The Lacey campaign is not going on television, Skelton explained, and does not believe it will be hurt by the oblique accusation in Jackson’s ad.

It will cost the campaign—which reported having less than $200,000 in the bank as of the end of last month—$500,000 to run the ad, both campaigns said. Skelton said the ad buy is equivalent to “shredding” the money, because “it’s not enough to have any impact, it’s nothing.”

Jackson, through Thomas, declined to be interviewed by the MetNews. The candidate said he wanted to “let the ad speak for itself,” and will not be talking to reporters about it, Thomas explained.

Jackson also said he would not be drawn into a “hypothetical” discussion as to whether, if elected, he would ask a grand jury to investigate possible perjury charges against Lacey based on the change in her testimony, Thomas related.

 

Copyright 2012, Metropolitan News Company