Busker Subpoenas Larry O'Brien for His Defence

Look up, look way up.

A street musician inspired to take up the tin whistle after watching the classic children’s show The Friendly Giant is facing charges after allegedly cutting the wires of a Muzak radio speaker that was drowning out his live music in a Rideau Street underpass.

But busker Raymond Loomer is planning an interesting defence: he has successfully subpoenaed Ottawa Mayor Larry O’Brien, hoping the colourful politician’s testimony will help vindicate him.

Loomer, 47, has been playing the tin whistle for 15 years in the underpass, which is in the shadow of 700 Sussex Dr., where Larry O’Brien lives.

O’Brien, who walks the streets of Ottawa, has passed by the “The Whistler”, and once, according to the busker, said his music reminded him of The Friendly Giant, the show that featured a giant, a rooster named Rusty, who lived in a sack, and a giraffe named Jerome.

Read more here

Mayor served with claim before council meeting

Safford Mayor Ron Green was served with a small claims court complaint Monday at the only place the process server could find him — the Safford City Council meeting.

The complaint requests Green pay the remainder of the amount due for various signs and decals he ordered from Kim's Window Tinting. The signs and decals were for a new newspaper spearheaded by Green, the Southwest Express News, and were picked up on May 4. Some of the signs were a large banner Green used in the Cinco De Mayo Parade and magnetic signs he placed on his own truck. Kim Prentice, the owner of Kim's Window Tinting, told the Courier that Green said payment for the signs would be in the mail.

After waiting more than a month, Prentice called Green for payment. She said he told her he was having problems financially and asked if he could make payments on his bill, which was about $1,000. He then charged $200 toward the bill on his personal credit card June 23. The Southwest Express News' last issue went out the following day, and the publication was suspended due to restructuring, according to Green. A Courier reporter went to the publication's office in Green's building Downtown on Friday and found it locked and deserted.

Prentice's records show Green made another $200 payment June 30, but he has not made a payment since then. After failing to make a payment for three months, Prentice wrote a text message to Green asking for payment Sept. 8. Green allegedly called Prentice a couple of hours later, and the two argued before Green hung up on her. Prentice then filed a claim the next day for the $603.10 still owed — plus interest. She told the Courier since Green would not sign a certified letter in reference to the claim, she will be including the cost of having to hire a process server to notify him.

Read more here.

Detroit Mayor Confronted Process Server

Michigan State Police will investigate a confrontation involving Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick and a process server attempting to serve a subpoena on one of his close friends, the Wayne County sheriff said Thursday.

The process server from the county prosecutor's office, accompanied by a sheriff's deputy, had gone to the home of Kilpatrick's sister, Ayanna, and her husband, Daniel Ferguson, to deliver the subpoena to Daniel Ferguson's cousin, businessman Bobby Ferguson, Sheriff Warren Evans said.

"Mayor Kilpatrick exited the house," Evans said during an evening news conference. "The (sheriff's) officer alleges the mayor pushed him with significant force to make him bump into the prosecutor's investigator."

James Thomas, one of Kilpatrick's lawyers, said the process server asked several questions of Daniel Ferguson. The mayor told the process server that Bobby Ferguson did not live there and twice asked the man to leave, then "gently escorted" him off the porch when he did not.

Surprise! You've Been Served, Mr Mayor

For the first time in the history of the City of Ryde, a subpoena was served on the mayor while he was chairing a meeting.

Mayor Ivan Petch usually brings a formal quality to the council meetings and unlike other mayors, he likes to wear the official mayoral chains.

At the June 10 meeting, councilors and staff stood up at 7.30pm for the mayor to enter.

Former Mayor's Real Estate to be Sold at Auction

Although authorities say they still do not know what has become of former Ridgeley Mayor Mitchell Reeves' personal property, his real property - three parcels of land that include two structures and a mobile home - are scheduled to be sold at auction on the front steps of the Mineral County Courthouse.

"He's actually got two writs of execution against him," Mineral County process server Jeff Conley said, explaining that James Newburn of Columbia, Md., has said the former Ridgeley mayor owes him approximately $208,000, while Jackie Collins of Mineral County has said Reeves owes her about $65,000.