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Who Is Sean Pitts, Part II

In the week since our last installment, some light has been shed on the mysterious K2K books distributed under dark of night to county commissioners before their last meeting. (The books, an apparent attempt to make opposition to the justice center look like a conspiracy spearheaded by Mayor Victor Ashe, were a creative compilation of posts from a public Internet discussion site.) After hemming and hawing for four days, Dwight Van de Vate—chief deputy and media mouthguy for Sheriff Tim Hutchison—finally came out and said he'd produced the books on his own time and tab. But he didn't answer the question of who exactly was "Sean Pitts," the name under which the material was downloaded.

Fortunately, some "Ear" moles pointed us toward the striking coincidence that a certain Micah Bridges—information technology specialist for the Sheriff's Department—has a step-brother who lives out of state and answers to the name Sean Pitts. When asked about that, Van de Vate acknowledged the two Pitts were one and the same. But he reiterated his position that there was nothing odd about using an out-of-state computer account to join a local Internet group, or about the anonymous late-night distribution of the books, or about his own reluctance to acknowledge authorship. He did, however, say that much of the work was done on taxpayers' time (he paid for the materials himself, including $35 for pizza during an evening binder-compiling session). "Staff of the department have been and continue to be actively following the K2K discussion," he wrote in an email. "We do so during normal working hours, using department-issued computers and printers. We will continue to do so as long as we believe it is relevant to our professional obligations and in the public interest."

He also disputed the assertion that the books were intended to make jail opponents look like Ashe pawns. "[K2K] is not a conspiracy, we have never called it a conspiracy, and we do not regard it as a conspiracy. We were fully aware of K2K and the nature of the group's discussion. It may be that some recipients of the now-famous binders regarded the group and its activities as a conspiracy, but if so, it was a conclusion they reached on their own and without influence from me."

The Big Backfire

Meanwhile, K2K organizer Buzz Goss reports that subscription to the list jumped 40 percent—to some 230 participants—after Van de Vate's publication and the attendant publicity. "Thank you [email protected] and officer Van de vate!" Goss wrote in one post. Wanna join the not-a-conspiracy? Send a blank email to [email protected].

People and Parties

There's something about a Moxley-Carmichael party that makes folks get frisky, maybe think about wearing some boxing gloves, in case some fool might want to fight. Take the little wingding they threw at the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame the other week for new TVA directors Skila Harris and Glenn McCollough. Superchamberman Tom Ingram tried to engage city development chief Doug Berry in some conversation about the progress of the new high-tech cable TV deal Ingram's been working on. Berry reportedly got testy with Ingram, snapped at him, whereupon Ingram (our spies report) said something that sounded a lot like "You little sonofabitch, this is MY damn project," whereupon deputy mayor Gene Patterson stepped between the two.

Ingram says he never said the "this is MY damn project" part, and claims his mother will get mad at him if we print the SOB part (of course, we found out his mother doesn't even live here, so what the heck). Patterson calls the incident "a miscommunication. I had to step in between the two, but I will give them credit—neither one of them backed away. Things got a little toasty..." Host Cynthia Moxley, who says she didn't see a thing, deserves credit for "bringing together people of varied temperaments," Patterson says.Got Those Meters Running

It's getting crowded when parties to County Commissioner Wanda Moody's lawsuit against her colleagues meet. Ever since News-Sentinel lawyer Rick Hollow argued that reporters should be allowed to be present for depositions because of Moody lawyer Herb Moncier's suggestions of criminal wrongdoing concerning Sheriff Tim Hutchison's taking over jail construction, county employees, county commissioners, and anyone Moncier takes a notion to subpoenhave been forced to hire criminal defense lawyers. (And this after the Sheriff's Department spent much of the last six months at war with the local defense bar.) So far, we have Bob Ritchie (representing Hutchison), Dennis Francis (representing Chief Deputy Dwight Van de Vate), John Valliant (representing deputy Tim DeBord), Eddie Daniels (representing Chief Keith Lyons), John Eldridge (representing sheriff's department financial officer Harry Brooks), Greg Isaacs (representing George Korda of the Ingram Group), and Bill Lockett (representing architects Barber and McMurry). New lawyers are being hired daily. Of those listed, only Isaacs and Lockett are not on the public nickel.