Former Gwinnett County Commission Chairman
Charles Bannister on Monday filed a federal lawsuit accusing Sheriff Butch
Conway of having deputies falsely arrest Bannister on drunken-driving charges
as part of a long-standing vendetta to remove him from office.
The DUI arrest was made "to
embarrass and humiliate Bannister in retaliation for Bannister's articulated
opposition to Conway's political aims," the lawsuit said. It said
Bannister's inquiries into the work habits of Conway's wife, State Court Judge
Carla Brown, and into Conway's handling of the sheriff's department prompted
Conway "to use any means possible" to oust Bannister.
The suit accuses Conway and two
deputies of false arrest, false imprisonment and retaliatory prosecution. It
seeks unspecified compensatory and punitive damages for "extreme
humiliation, embarrassment and anguish which has continued to this day and is
expected to continue into the future."
Conway said Monday that he stands
by the apology he issued to Bannister after test results cleared him of the
charges. "I was sincerely sorry it happened," Conway said. "I
felt sorry for Charles and his family. It's something you never want to have happen
to anyone. We did all we could as quickly as possible to mitigate it." Brown
declined to comment.
"Unfortunately, the sheriff
thinks you can use the unbridled power of the office for your own personal and
political gain," Atlanta attorney David Walbert, one of Bannister's
attorneys, said. "If the Constitution doesn't provide a remedy for this
then we don't have a Constitution anymore."
Bannister was arrested on DUI
charges in June 2010 after he left Cafe Hot Wing, a Lilburn-area restaurant. A
witness called an off-duty sheriff's deputy to report Bannister was drinking
and driving his county-issued car.
Although two breath tests showed
Bannister had no alcohol in his system, deputies booked Bannister into the
county jail, took his mug shot and then transported the shackled commission
chair to Gwinnett Medical Center in Lawrenceville for blood tests. Those tests
verified the earlier breath test results.
The lawsuit said that during
Bannister's first term as commission chair, Conway developed "an intense
hostility" toward Bannister. Conway was particularly upset at Bannister
for questioning whether Brown was working as often as she should and for
requesting Brown's access card records that showed when she entered and left
the courthouse. Conway was also angered by Bannister's opposition to the
magnitude of the sheriff's budget request and his belief Conway was improperly
inflating the retirement pay of his employees, the lawsuit said.
One of the ways Conway hoped to
politically embarrass Bannister was to arrest him on "trumped-up
charges" during a time he went to Cafe Hot Wing, which Conway knew
Bannister frequented, the lawsuit said. At Conway's direction, sheriff's
employees let the restaurant know that when Bannister was there, the sheriff's
office wanted to be alerted, the lawsuit said.
Bannister, who was elected into
office in 2004 and reelected in 2008, abruptly resigned in Oct. 8, 2010, after
appearing before a special grand jury investigating county land purchases. At
the time, he said past events, including his arrest and exoneration of the DUI
charge, "placed an undeserved strain on my family and has threatened my
own health."
A grand jury report, unsealed
weeks later, disclosed that the grand jury was prepared to indict Bannister on
a perjury charge when he offered to step down, in effect giving up his office
to avoid prosecution.