Last Tuesday, the judge hearing the charge made against Cr David Scott involving a former staff member in April 2017 declined a discharge without conviction following the surprising jury verdict in May which found him guilty of the allegation and ordered a fine of $1,500.
David Scott says he will appeal the conviction in a bid to clear his name. However, he says he won’t seek re-election to the council for health reasons, which isn’t surprising: a combination of diabetes, a heart condition and skin cancer plus the stress he has been subjected to following the trivial, but malicious allegation given front page coverage in both the Dominion Post and the NZ Herald.
KCDC chief executive Wayne Maxwell says what happens next depends on the outcome of David Scott’s appeal.
“Until the end of that appeal is heard, he will be on a leave of absence. During that time he cannot act as a councillor.”
If David Scott’s appeal was unsuccessful he would be disqualified from office. If that happened before 12 October 2018 there will be a by-election, he says. David Scott cannot continue as a councilor if the conviction stands.
It’s likely the appeal process will take several months, so the threat of a costly by-election — for a district-wide position this would be around $100,000 — isn’t great. Kapiti Ratepayers should at least be relieved about that.
As mentioned earlier, we will do an exposé of what went on during the last 14 months to counter the one-sided publicity by other media in favour of the KCDC management. Hopefully, we can complete the investigations before the end of the year.
If you investigate and print the facts you’ll presumably be accused of ‘re-victimising the victim’. It won’t do at all to state the truth; that’s being insensitive.