A Vermont district attorney could face impeachment after being accused by several colleagues of making repeated insensitive and insulting remarks.
On Thursday, Vermont State Department attorneys and sheriffs released a compiled report of the investigation. Franklin County State Attorney John LavoyLavoie has spent decades as a prosecutor, but last November he was named the top contender in Franklin County.
Most of the accusations against Lavoie have to do with women and their appearance. It is said that he called
He is said to use the “c word” regularly. report criticizing women’s weight and diet. When one young woman asked what she should eat for lunch, Lavoie “snapped her stomach and replied, ‘I don’t think I need to eat today,'” the report claims. When employees discussed purchasing exercise equipment, Lavoie supposedly replied:[O]Yeah, it’s for fat people like you. ”
But Lavoie, a Democrat, didn’t limit his politically inappropriate humor to women and their physiques, the report claims. He supposedly joked roughly that the woman was a lesbian, and told another, “There is nothing worse than an Irish Jew.” There were even claims that he used the N-word, but the report claimed that it found no “support” for those claims.
According to reports, Lavoie regularly used various versions of the word “retard,” including “f***tard.” “I don’t think you’re an office retard. You might just be autistic or just Asperger’s,” he supposedly once told an office employee. It is even said that the term was used in reference to clients with limited cognitive abilities.
Some of the targets of Lavoie’s jokes have reported experiencing physical ailments such as stomach pains because of his humor. Others burst into tears, adjusted their diet, or sought counseling.
Vt. Officials release report on harassment allegations against Franklin County State Attorneywww.youtube.com
Lavoie has denied some of the most offensive allegations made in the report, but has addressed others as well, establishing himself as an old man of a bygone era. But he also maintained that he always had the same sense of humor and that all his jokes were meant to be fun. No. People I’ve been with for 20 years,” he said.
“I’m still the same person,” he told reporters.
Lavoie isn’t the only Franklin County official facing potential impeachment. Sheriff John Grismore has also been accused of kicking a “shackled” suspect during a pre-election interrogation, he reported VT Digger. Like Lavoie, Grismore was first elected last November and took office in January. Despite calls for his resignation, both men steadfastly refused to do so.
House Speaker Jill Krowinski (D-Burlington) argued for a task force to investigate both Lavoie and Grismore. But with the legislative session coming to an end in just a few days, an impeachment vote could prove difficult. No Vermont official has been impeached since 1976, and in nearly 240 years since 1786, no official has been convicted of impeachment in the state.
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