After learning last week that a sheriff's deputy was about to serve him a lawsuit in Minneapolis City Hall, a North Side activist slipped out through a back office -- accompanied by an aide to Mayor R.T. Rybak.
The "great escape," as blogger John Hoff refers to the episode in the City Council chambers, was inadvertently broadcast on the city's cable network during its coverage of Police Chief Tim Dolan's reappointment hearings.
Though he admits running down three flights of stairs to avoid being served, Hoff and mayoral aide Sherman Patterson both told a Star Tribune reporter this week they didn't intend to evade anyone when they walked out a rear door of the council chambers through a staff area.
They said they went that way to set up an interview with City Council Member Don Samuels for Hoff's blog, "The Adventures of Johnny Northside."
But that explanation doesn't fit what a Star Tribune reporter saw and heard before the pair left. Directly in front of the reporter in the crowded chamber, Hoff approached Patterson and spoke into his ear, with Hoff saying loudly enough for the reporter to hear that he was about to be served and needed a back way out. He asked Patterson to help him.
The video recording of the meeting shows Hoff with his arm around Patterson as they speak. Patterson's head inclines toward Hoff. Hoff gestures toward the rear door. When the meeting adjourns, Patterson and Hoff walk out that door together.
The Hennepin County Sheriff's Office confirmed that a deputy waited outside the chambers to serve Hoff. "We would never recommend to any citizen to help somebody else evade a deputy or any law enforcement officer who's carrying out an important duty," said spokeswoman Lisa Kiava.
Hoff said: "I am not going to confirm or deny whether I spoke to Sherman Patterson"
Patterson told the reporter that he wouldn't interfere with an officer serving papers. He said he didn't hear what Hoff asked him because he was focused on the meeting. "I was not paying attention to him, really," he said. Yet the video shows Hoff began speaking to him during a brief break, with the chambers relatively quiet as people waited for a speaker.
"Sherman," Hoff began in an agitated voice, then told Patterson about the waiting deputy. Despite his explanation for why he needed to leave by the rear door, Hoff said that Samuels wasn't available, so he left.
The plaintiff who tried to serve Hoff via the deputy is Peter Rickmyer, a registered sex offender from the Jordan neighborhood. He filed a lawsuit this year naming several people, including Hoff, for what Rickmyer says are damaging comments about him by Hoff on his blog. Several defendants said Rickmyer has filed multiple suits and grievances against his neighbors and area groups, including a church.
Hoff gave blog readers a detailed account of what he called his "great escape."
"I ran down three flights of grand Italian marble, quickly but prudently, no bannister-sliding, and at the ground floor I dashed past Poseidon, the Father of Waters," he wrote.
Hoff, a former law student, wrote that evading service is not illegal, and the Sheriff's Office agrees. "There's nothing that those folks could be charged with, as far as we're aware of," said Kiava.
Always nice to see that our community's sexual predators have full access to the legal system to harass people who expose them to their neighbors...
