Carthage City Councilwoman Tiffany Cossey charged with stealing

 

Whether she will still be a member of Carthage City Council at that point depends on the voters, but a 9 a.m. November 21 initial appearance is scheduled in Carthage Municipal Court for City Council member Tiffany Cossey on a stealing charge.

The Carthage Police Department filed the citation against Cossey for allegedly stealing two signs asking people to vote to remove her from the City Council October 11.

Carthage residents have already had the opportunity to read about the case thanks to Facebook postings from Cossey and from the What's Happening at Carthage MO City Council page, which have posted differing versions of the alleged crime.

Both versions end with the signs in Cossey's trunk. 

Posted six days ago on What's Happening at Carthage MO City Council:

Breaking news: we are unaware of all the details, but some signs were taken by someone and were in the possession of councilwoman Tiffany Cossey, they were retrieved from her trunk.

But the police showed up and her attorney showed up very rapidly. Must be nice to get that kind of legal services on a Friday after hours.

It’s unclear who took the signs, but it’s very clear they were in her possession, which is an election violation of a fairly decent magnitude.

We will report updates as we get them.

Cossey provided her own version of events later that day:

I’m sure you’ve seen some new lies and scandal from what has now accurately been dubbed the “Hate Page,” which is run by the person who accurately identified himself to the city council as the “Merchant of Hate.” The real story is much less scandalous.

Coming to work at my office today, I saw two recall signs in my neighbor’s yard. I have a good relationship with my neighbor, so I was confused and I wondered if he was, too.

I went to talk to him. He told me that he didn’t know what the signs meant and that his son asked him to put them up. English is not his first language. After we talked about what is going on in the city, he pulled the signs out of his yard and had me put in one of mine.

He gave me the signs he had pulled out. Not knowing what to do with them, I tossed them in my trunk for the time being and went in to work. Later in the afternoon, Bill Scheerer came by and asked if I had the signs and I gave them back to him. That’s it.

It seems that wasn’t enough drama for him, so he went to the police station and made a complaint.

In retrospect, I wish I would have told the neighbor to keep them at his house for Scheerer to collect. Hindsight is 20/20. 

I never had an intent to steal signs; if there was I wouldn’t have given them back when asked if I had them. I would have simply lied and said I hadn’t seen them. When the police officer came to my office to discuss it he seemed content and left shortly after talking to me and to my neighbor to confirm the information.

Some people will take any opportunity to spin things. This is just an angry man trying to make something out of nothing to further his cause. I’m sure it doesn’t help that, yet another person chose the right side of things once the truth was known.

The photo above, which is from the What's Happening at Carthage MO City Council Facebook page, shows Cossey returning the signs to the rightful owner, something she acknowledged doing in a Facebook post.

What's Happening at Carthage Mo City Council responded later that day with information that didn't match Cossey's version of events.

We are glad to receive a response 6 1/2 hours after the incident was first reported. Ms Cossey, you are not the victim.

I am excited to obtain the body cam footage of her testimony, Bill Scheerers testimony and the testimony of the neighbor.

Regardless of whether or not she knew the laws or understood rules of elections, the signs were gone from a yard they were put in, Bill went to ask the gentleman who owned the home what happened to the signs.

The man told him the neighbor took them. So Bill went and asked Tiffany where his signs were. She went to her car and opened her trunk and pulled out two signs that had the wire frames already removed from them and they were put in the backseat which she also had to retrieve.

She then called her lawyer to show up at her office because she knew she messed up. I have never once in my life had to call a lawyer over an honest mistake or misunderstanding.

The bad news for her is that she gave a statement before her lawyer arrived, her statement confirmed what had happened.

What she conveniently left out is that she told the man who owns the house next to her, if they kept the sign up and didn’t put hers up the kids who live next-door would not be allowed to wander onto her property anymore. Because sometimes they play on the parking lot. 

We spoke to these people, too, they confirmed that she pulled them out of the ground, and she put them in her trunk.

The sad part about this is it’s going to become a legal matter, and charges will be pressed tomorrow and depending on how long it goes on the public will not get to see what happened until the full case is over.

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