Sandy likes a plea deal
Now that a plea deal has been reached in the Sideras case, it’s time for me to share how this case has affected me over the past couple of weeks. When I found out that Jim’s attorney was using the excuse that comments Patrick Warren made in the Argus Leader and on my BLOG proves he has a vendetta against his client, I was shocked, baffled and quite honestly LIVID! It seemed to me that some of evidence the prosecutors have already presented pointed all fingers at Sideras. Simply put, even if Warren would have somehow got access to Jim’s personal computer remotely, how on earth could he do it when Sideras was in San Antonio?! The defense was grasping at straws, and as they proved today in the plea agreement, Jim was ultimately the guilty party.
Besides speculating on Jim’s probable light sentence (I will be surprised he gets any jail time) the plea agreement is kind of telling. Notice Jim only plead guilty to possession of an image on his personal laptop. This is significant. Why?
The Human Resource Director for the City of Sioux Falls says regardless of his plea, Sideras is still entitled to his pension, after serving 34 years with fire rescue.
This statement alone may explain why this was the only count he agreed to plea to. Besides the fact many city employees and citizens are extremely angry he gets to keep his pension, by state law he is entitled to it. I felt after the verdict came down the city should just cut him one check for his vested pension and send him on his way without taxpayer pension funds or healthcare.
Could they legally do that? Is there a loophole? I believe there is. See if this would have went to full trial and he was found guilty of some of the other possessions, some of those occurred while he was on company time, and it could give the city the right to file charges of misuse of government property or capital, even fraud. If they could successfully tie Jim to those charges they probably would have the right to pull his pension. Besides the fact he got one heckuva a plea deal, the greater misdeeds in misusing taxpayer property was the real crime here. Unfortunately we will never know. That may explain why we have gotten NO official statement from the city on this case.