Salem County Sheriff’s Race Update; BUNYAN MILLS: “I Was Greeted With Gant’s Nightstick.”

Bob Gant

When I last wrote about the Salem County Sheriff race some supporters of Bob Gant were mad at me. I still don’t understand how people could be mad that I believe that a lieutenant in the Sheriff’s Department who wants to be sheriff might actually go to work. That anger led me to do some digging, even my co-host Bob drove an hour to run down a lead for me. Thanks Bob!

While digging, we found a Facebook post by a guy named Walter Hudson. Granted, the guy doesn’t appear to like cops very much, but Hudson’s post made me dig because “where there’s smoke, there’s fire. Hudson wrote in part:

“Over the years Gant have not been fair to black people. We know how abusive Gant was and still is to black inmates when the jail was in Salem City? We not going to act like Gant didn’t beat the hell out of Bunny Mills. In fact, he was fired, but hired back on the force.”

It got me thinking, who is Bunny Mills? It turns out his name is Bunyan Mills, he no longer lives in New Jersey, he works as a union electrician, coaches youth football and has a kid in college. Even better, I was able to track down a phone number for Mr. Mills and he answered on the third ring. I spent 29 minutes and 26 seconds on the phone with him last night.

Mills is a nice guy who acknowledges he did something wrong when he was very young, it had to do with drugs if you must know. Mills told me that mistake set him on the straight and narrow.

I asked Mills if the rumor that Gant assaulted him in the Salem County Jail was true, the answer was an immediate yes.

I explained to Mills that I understood this might be difficult to talk about and he didn’t have to if he didn’t want to and he quickly agreed to give me details.

Mills explained he was in the holding cell with “a lot of other guys” and there was an elderly man by the last name Parsons, now deceased. Apparently, Parsons was ill and Mills called for a Corrections Officer (CO). Mills said, “The CO brushed me off” and admits, “I had some choice words,” for the CO brushing him off.

Mills explained that as inmates were being transferred to cells or “the pods,” he was one of the last ones to get the paperwork done. He explained the process of how inmates turn around with their backs facing COs to be handcuffed.

Mills went on, “When they came out to get me I knew something wasn’t right because usually it’s one CO, two came to get me. I was escorted by two, one on the left, one on the right and when I entered the room I saw Gant and another CO had their shirts off and I was greeted with Gant’s nightstick and when I came to I was in solitary confinement.”

Gant, and his supporters have, publicly denied this happened. Fortunately, I have a lot of friends who are lawyers, call it an occupational hazard. What that means is I have access to, well friends with access to all kinds of legal records. And that means I can find the truth! Don’t believe me, I was once charged criminally for releasing expunged records that somehow ended up on my doorstep, fortunately I didn’t know the records were expunged and the case was dismissed. My point, the story was true and I told it.

So, if you still doubt Gant beat a handcuffed, defenseless man unconscious with a weapon I do know Salem County imposed major discipline and terminated Gant's employment. I know because he appealed to the New Jersey Office of Administrative Law (Docket No.: CSV5577-91) and lost. I know he lost because Gant appealed to the Appellate Division, N.J. Superior Court (Docket No.: A-4025-91 T2).

I’m assuming the County got tired of the constant appeals and obviously rehired Gant as a Sheriff's Officer and not a Corrections Officer. There must be a reason why Gant only does courthouse security, serves warrants, writs and court process. Is it possible they think he can’t be trusted around handcuffed, defenseless inmates?

I’m going to continue digging into candidate Gant for the memory of my stepfather who was a good, dedicated cop and for all the good cops still on the job because guys like Gant, who are willing to beat defenseless men unconscious, are the ones who create cop haters like Walter Hudson and make life difficult for every good cop out there.

And, as a special bonus to this post, Bunyan Mills has agreed to call in to The Bob & Steve Show at 8:10AM tomorrow and tell his story.

OPINION: Just Another Hypocritical Democrat Trying To Score Cheap Political Points

I love following politics, both fact and opinion, and even though I put a lot of time and effort into this blog and our weekly radio show I read InsiderNJ and the New Jersey Globe every day. I believe Max Pizzaro at InsiderNJ is one of the fairest and most balanced political reporters out there. New Jersey Globe founder David Wildstein hasn’t missed a step since getting back into publishing a political website, getting down to the super local stuff, love him or hate him he’s one of the best.

Both are different than The Bob & Steve Show, they are completely nonpartisan in their reporting while we freely admit, on the “About The Show” section of our website, to being unabashedly Republican, mostly conservative and extremely opinionated. While we admit to our right-leanings we will call out Republicans when they are wrong, just ask Vincent Squire.

One of the things I hate in politics is hypocrisy and at The Bob & Steve Show we are always quick to point it out when we see it. And, that’s what this post is about – hypocrisy.

On October 10 state Senator Joseph “Jersey Joe” Pennacchio wrote a column, “A Call to Traditional Democrats – Help Save Our Country, Before it is Too Late” and a day later, a Democratic consultant, Pat Politano wrote a response, “Hey, ‘Jersey Joe’: Wake Up; Your Party’s Over.” Both pieces can be found in the “Columnists” section of InsiderNJ.

In my opinion Pennacchio’s piece was well written. In my view I could find nothing Pennacchio wrote that was untrue. He did a good job pointing out how the Democratic party has been taken over by extremists.

I don’t know Politano, never met him, wouldn’t know him if I tripped over him, but his response to Jersey Joe’s column is a bunch of hypocritical BS.

To attack Pennacchio, a conservative who isn’t afraid to reach across the aisle for the greater good, is disingenuous. Pennacchio and Democratic state Senator Loretta Weinberg have been working together to bring more transparency to state government. And, this isn’t the first time the two have teamed up to try to make things more transparent in our state. A few years ago, Weinberg and Pennacchio agreed on the need to pass Port Authority reform legislation to protect all New Jerseyans.

To be clear, I am not picking on Politano. It’s the hypocrisy within his response I have an issue with. It’s the same hypocrisy I’ve written about from New Jersey Democrats repeatedly. He is just one more Democrat attacking Republicans over the party’s “treatment of women” while ignoring the same thing from his own party. To make matters worse, he decided to attack a Republican who isn’t afraid to work across the aisle.

This is just one more Democrat who has not said one word about the way women on Governor Phil Murphy’s soccer team have been treated. Has Politano ever said a word about the fact that Murphy’s soccer team forced women to live with an elderly man who repeatedly made inappropriate comments to the players and made them feel uncomfortable? Nope! And, let’s be clear, every person reading this knows what “inappropriate comments to the payers that made them feel uncomfortable” means, the elderly man was likely making sexually inappropriate comments. Has Politano ever said a word about Murphy likely paying women soccer players less than $15 per hour while campaigning on a $15 per hour minimum wage? Nope!

How about the fact that U.S. Senator Bob Menendez helped secure visas for young women to come to the country to be with their Sugar Daddy, Salomon Melgen? Not a word! Maybe he believes, like Hillary Clinton, that since these women were young adults that sexually inappropriate behavior couldn’t have taken place? Say what you want about Menendez’s alleged involvement with hookers, the visa thing, Menendez’s lawyers “conceded that the senator intervened on his pal’s behalf” when it came to the young women getting into the country.

How this Democratic consultant can have the nerve to attack Pennacchio and the Republican party over the party’s “treatment of women” while completely ignoring the two highest ranking Democrats in New Jersey and their treatment of women is beyond me.

Bottom line: The response to Pennacchio’s column is just another piece of Democrat hypocrisy used to score cheap political points.

PRESS RELEASE: MOMENTUM SWINGING TO GROSSMAN AS SMALL DONORS COME OUT IN FORCE

Republican candidate for Congress in New Jersey’s second district, Seth Grossman, says momentum is swinging his way. In a press release this morning the campaign says he raised $120,000 from roughly 1,000 small donors in the third quarter. The press release follows:

Democrat Kavanaugh Attacks Motivating Voters

MOMENTUM SWINGING TO GROSSMAN AS SMALL DONORS COME OUT IN FORCE

Somers Point, NJ, October 18, 2018 – The Democrats angered Republicans and independent voters nationwide with their disgusting attempted character assassination of US Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh and doing so awakened a sleeping giant in southern New Jersey who are now backing Seth Grossman for Congress.

Roughly 1,000 small donors contributed over $120,000 to Grossman For Congress in the campaign’s 3rd Quarter, with many indicating with accompanying messages of support that they are adamantly against Grossman’s opponent, Jeff Van Drew, and any Democrats winning in November’s midterm election.

“The momentum and support now turning out for me is incredible!  It mirrors the support that Donald Trump received in 2016 – the everyday, middle class working American who for years has been ignored by the Democratic Party in Washington.  They are now angry at the treatment Kavanaugh received, and they are angry that Van Drew announced that he would side with his leftwing cronies and not support Kavanaugh,” Grossman said. 

“Just like with President Trump, these people are pulling out their checkbooks and sending our campaign whatever they can because they see Washington is broken and they know that I am 100% behind helping President Trump fix it.  They know Democrats like Van Drew will undo the progress Trump has made with jobs, tax cuts, skyrocketing economic growth and making the nation safer, and they are supporting me with their money and their votes to keep the President’s agenda going.”

Van Drew’s disconnect with his constituents includes many of his recent legislative positions as a state senator such as siding with the Democrats voting to include illegal aliens in the 2020 federal census.   That would reward sanctuary cities and states with additional political representation and federal and state funds.

Seth Grossman and Jeff Van Drew are facing off in New Jersey’s 2nd Congressional District.  The seat, which has been represented by retiring U.S. Rep. Frank LoBiondo for 24 years, includes the counties of Cape May, Atlantic, Cumberland and Salem and parts of Camden, Gloucester, Burlington and Ocean counties.  Donald Trump won the district by five points in the 2016 election.