Argus Leader: Senator identified - Dan Sutton
The South Dakota Attorney General's Office and Senate leaders are investigating allegations of wrongdoing involving a state lawmaker and an 18-year-old legislative page, officials confirmed Tuesday.Read it all here.
The father of a former page has accused Sen. Dan Sutton, D-Flandreau, of misconduct during the last legislative session, according to state Sen. Garry Moore.
and..Schoenbeck, who wouldn't talk about his letter, did say the parent of a page complained to him last week about the inappropriate behavior of a state senator.
"Under Senate rules, it's my job to be the first one to deal with that," he said."I would not express an opinion about the truthfulness of the allegation," he added. "That's why we have a hearing process in the Senate."
In his letter addressed to Sutton, Moore indicated that Sutton may have violated legislative rules by failing to notify Senate leaders of the accusation.
"I know you can understand that since these allegations involve misconduct relating to pages, it is a serious matter," the letter states.The letter also said, "I am proposing to the Executive Board that the rules surrounding pages and their associations with legislators be studied and revamped."
And the letter indicated that "the Attorney General's Office has opened an investigation into these allegations."When asked about Moore's letter, Attorney General Larry Long said, "There is a criminal investigation, and I'm not going to talk."
Schoenbeck said he was aware of a criminal investigation, but he didn't know its status.
Both Schoenbeck and Moore say they are making proposals to revamp South Dakota's page program.
I'll open up comments, but please don't speculate to the alleged victim's identity. And please keep it civil.
Comments
What if the investigation turns up nothing? Will Schoenbeck resign?
You'd be the same idiot accusing Schoenbeck of a cover up if he did nothing. He received a compaint and actually did something about it. The problem here is not with Sen. Schoenbeck or even the Democrat party... it is with one Senator.
And I think the reason why no one said anything about it until now is much more complex than what the Argus story said or what is commented here.
Your argument makes no sense. If the Argus was trying to protect the Democrats they would have leaked this story right away rather than 3 weeks prior to the election. That would have given the Democrats time to have him resign and get a fill-in candidate.
(and by the way...I'm anonymous not because I'm Chicken @#$*, but because I don't want to screw around with all the crap of registering)
9:55
If a State Senator resigns, it makes the procedures and investigation surrounding alleged rule violations not matter anymore.
I think you're dreaming if you think Schoenbeck can make the criminal investigation by the AG go away. That will "go away" only if there's not enough evidence to show that a crime was committed.
. . . all the above conspiracy theories notwithstanding. Can't wait for Bonnie Russell to accuse you as being part of a cover-up. What exactly did you know and when and where's your black helicopter parked?
Your an idiot......this is all for lee's attempt to plot out his run for G1 in 4 years......and so it begins for the Lee for gov campaign.
Yes, (if you haven't noticed) I will delete allegations against other legislators unless you can provide a factual basis for it documented in writing.
As far as people having known about it for months, I think my fellow blogger at CCK, Chad put it best:
"the reason why no one said anything about it until now is much more complex than what the Argus story said or what is commented here."
I think he's dead on in his assessment.
Part of the problem is that since the page is supposedly 18, you technically are dealing with what may or may not have gone on between two adults. As Garry Moore noted, it's a he-said, he-said situation. Short of a forcible criminal act, I don't think any local prosecutor is going to touch that case with a ten foot pole.
While I have no evidence to cite on this assumption, the rumor mill did allude to the fact that a prosecutor (I have no idea who) looked into it, and came to this conlusion
Criminal allegations aside, what we DO allegedly have, is a situation between a Legislator, and a subordinate (i.e., a page.) In this case, there may be a violation of joint rules. I'm guessing they're going to look at 1A-4.
1A-4 states - Sexual harassment prohibited. All members are responsible for ensuring that the workplace is free from sexual harassment. All members shall avoid any action or conduct which could be
viewed as sexual harassment. A member shall report any sexual harassment complaint to the
presiding officer of the house to which the member belongs. If the situation is not resolved, the
member shall forward the complaint to the Executive Board of the Legislative Research Council.
Until a complaint had been initiated at the level of the legislature, they had no grounds to act. At ths time the father of the page sent in a complaint, there was no question about what had to be done.
There's no ulterior motives. There's no politics involved. The complaint was made last week, the issuance of allegations were made last week, and here we are.
The complaint process might be new to everyone, but give it an opportunity to move forward before you start throwing stones on the basis of partisanship.
I assume you mean me (10:04) when you say "your an idiot" (sic). What is Schoenbeck suppose to do? Why don't you fill us in on what exactly he should be doing when presented with this problem.
The FBI has conducted over 40 interviews in the Mark Foley scandal and has not found one incident of sexual contact.
Where's Stephi now?
Probably where all the other Dems were when Gerry Studs was having sex with underage male pages.
Act now Stephi or we will know you are only motivated by politics or we always knew and you will confirm it.
And again, it appears that there will be (or is) an official investigation of some sort going on and that process must be allowed to be conducted without partisanship or favor. These are serious, life-changing accusations for the principals involved. Everyone has an interest in it being done right. But is this a story worth pursuing? Absolutely.
Since the senator's identity has been revealed, are you going to give us the goods, PP?
This is exactly why you have no credibility except in your very small and ever-shrinking circle. Thank you for having two sets of standards and not even trying to hide it. You lose.
While I (anon 8:33) may be an idiot, I would not accuse Schoenbeck of a cover up. Further what did he do? Send a threatening letter saying resign or I will make this public? You think that is leadership? What a crock. Contrary to your statements, the problem is with Sen. Schoenbeck (and possibly Sutton too). It is fair game to question Schoenbeck's motives.
He wants to be Governor. Brining this ALLEGATION to the front will ruin Sutton's career. Until the matter has been investigated, it should remain private to protect all parties involved.
Witch hunt = Schoenbeck for Gov 2010.
So, if you're going to be mad at Schoenbeck for intervening when a Senator was alleged to have had some sort of inappropriate contact with a minor, you've got egg all over your faces. Let's see. Princess Stephanie called for the Republican leader in the House to resign, so now that a similar situation has happened in our back yard, it's time to start calling for democrat leadership to resign. First up? Senator Moore.
Sure, that's ridiculous, but so is every other bit of liberal "logic."
Think before you speak (or type). Fact is, Schoenbeck did exactly what he was obligated to do. He's neither the good guy or bad guy. He simply did his job.
There was no coverup. It was in the hands of law enforcement.
Contrast that to the Foley situation.
No action from Republican leadership for years despite their knowledge of Foley's "problem"