Tim Ryan, tryan@shawanoleader.com
Two Shawano County supervisors have put the county on notice that claims might be forthcoming against Sheriff Randy Wright as a result of a search warrant executed at one of their homes in April.
District 1 Supervisor Deb Noffke and her father, District 14 Supervisor Marlin Noffke, each filed a separate notice of injury or circumstances with the Shawano County clerk.
The notices, which have been referred to the county corporation counsel, are the first step in a process that could be followed by claims of civil rights violations or a civil suit seeking damages.
Noffke has also asked the Shawano-Menominee County district attorney’s office for an investigation into the circumstances that led the Sheriff’s Department to obtain a warrant from Langlade County to conduct a search of her home.
District Attorney Greg Parker said it would be a conflict of interest for his office to decide whether there should be an investigation. However, Parker said the matter should be reviewed by another prosecuting agency in the interests of public integrity.
“I have been in contact with the attorney general’s office regarding this request and will be sending the information to that office for their review,” he said.
Shawano County sheriff’s deputies executed a search warrant at Deb Noffke’s home on April 15 after an anonymous tip and a search of her garbage turned up what the Sheriff’s Department claimed was evidence of marijuana.
The warrant request was reviewed by the Langlade County District Attorney’s Office and granted by a Langlade County judge.
Wright said the request was taken to Langlade County to avoid any conflict of interest.
The search warrant was executed but turned up no marijuana or any signs of drug activity.
Wright said Thursday he couldn’t comment on the Noffkes’ claim notices.
Wright said, however, that he still feels the search warrant was justified.
Timing questioned
Wright also said he found the timing of the notices suspicious.
“It’s very strange,” he said. “Here it is only four days away from the election. It makes a person wonder.”
Wright is facing Shawano police officer Adam Bieber in Tuesday’s Republican primary for sheriff.
The Noffkes are both supporting Bieber, and Deb Noffke has contributed to his campaign.
Deb Noffke said Thursday her filing took so long because she was awaiting documents requested from the Sheriff’s Department that would support her claim.
In her notice, filed Thursday, Noffke called the April 15 incident an “unreasonable search” of her home that included her “detention, seizure and holding” two hours before she was due for a reorganizational meeting of the County Board and election of board chairman.
Marlin Noffke’s notice, filed Tuesday, claims the search was timed to keep both away from the meeting.
“I believe Sheriff Wright thought I would come to Deborah’s aid and we would both be detained and unable to provide the majority votes needed to elect Jerry Erdmann chairman of the Shawano County Board,” Noffke wrote in his notice.
Noffke also claims Wright subsequently made “false and malicious statements to the press,” which Noffke said were intended to defame him and damage his reputation.
Ethics complaints filed
Noffke also cites an ethics complaint Wright filed against him on May 6, “which was deemed baseless and rejected by the Shawano County Ethics Committee.”
That ethics complaint was one of four filed against county supervisors in recent months and obtained by the Leader through an open records request with the corporation counsel’s office. Ethics complaints can be released if the subject of the complaint waives the right to confidentiality.
In the May 6 complaint, Wright sought the resignation of Marlin Noffke from the County Board because of an alleged pattern of “threatening, malicious and vindictive” comments aimed at Wright and the Sheriff’s Department.
Those include a statement allegedly made while the search of Noffke’s home was in progress on April 15.
Noffke was allowed to use her cell phone during the search provided the phone’s speaker was on, according to reports by a Shawano County detective and a Stockbridge-Munsee police officer who participated in the search.
She called her father to inform him her house was being searched.
According to the reports, Marlin Noffke said Wright had more to worry about, “like me shooting him with my shotgun.”
Wright also cites statements stretching back to 2007, shortly after he took office, including Noffke’s statement at a County Board meeting that sheriff’s deputies were out of shape and too fat to run and catch criminals.
Also on May 6, Wright filed an ethics complaint against Erdmann, citing comments Erdmann made to the Leader in the wake of the search warrant incident.
Erdmann told the Leader he had replaced two members of the Public Safety Committee, which oversees the Sheriff’s Department, because they had been too sympathetic to Wright’s requests and replaced them with supervisors who would hold him accountable.
Wright’s ethics complaint alleges Erdmann has been “malicious and vindictive towards myself and my office.”
Wright said Thursday he had hoped the complaints would change the dynamics on the County Board.
“What I was hoping to accomplish with those was to have some kind of change of attitude,” Wright said. “It came to a point as to how much further would it go, how much more was there to take?”
Two more ethics complaints were filed in June.
Sheriff’s Detective Keith Sorlie filed a complaint over Deb Noffke’s wearing of a Bieber for Sheriff T-shirt at a May 28 County Board meeting.
Another complaint was filed by Terry Knope Sr. over a gathering of several County Board supervisors at the Studio Lounge restaurant in Shawano on May 28.
Knope alleges the supervisors discussed county business and one of them said deputies should not be issued gas cards “because they use them to buy coffee and donuts when they fill the squad cars with fuel.”
Wright said he was aware Knope was considering an ethics complaint, but he was not involved in it, and that he was unaware of the Sorlie complaint until he was shown it Thursday.