by Guy Page
Ahead of a 1 pm scheduled appearance by Franklin County Sheriff John Grismore at a legislative impeachment hearing, Grismore’s attorney declared the impeachment process undemocratic.
Also, the Vermont Sheriffs Association Monday called for Grismore to resign. VSA President Mark Anderson cited Grismore’s “inability to provide the professional leadership necessary to fulfill the duties and responsibilities of the office he was elected to withhold.”
The decision was made Friday at a VSA winter conference, Anderson said at a State House press conference.
Grismore is subject to possible impeachment following his kicking (or pushing) a handcuffed suspect in the groin area in the summer of 2022. A state law enforcement oversight panel last week revoked his law enforcement license, but he is still allowed to perform a sheriff’s administrative functions.
Kaplan said he and Grismore will appear at the 1 pm panel hearing at the State House, but only if it’s open to the public. All testimony heretofore has been held in executive session, purportedly to protect the witnesses from any blowback.
In a letter to impeachment panel chair Martin LaLonde (D-South Burlington) published by WCAX, Attorney Robert Kaplan called the committee “an undemocratic attack:”
“Sheriff Grismore regards the Impeachment Committee as an anti-democratic attack onrepresentative government in the State of Vermont and a repudiation by extremist Democratic Party partisans of the will of the voters of Franklin County to select their elected leaders.
“The Vermont State Constitution created three distinct branches of government that were designed to implement checks and balances on each other to prevent the rise of autocratic tyranny. While impeachment of elected officials of the Executive Branch of government in Vermont is authorized by statute, this measure has virtually never been pursued in Vermont before now. The restraint in the pursuit of the extreme measure of impeachment would appear to reflect the sober judgment of Vermont legislators of prior generations that supplanting the will of the electorate in subordination to the passions of a few Representatives in Montpelier is certain to cause great harm to our government and society by undermining public trust in the electoral process and representative government.
“The history of Vermont politics is littered with questionable characters who have held all manner of office, yet the sort of partisan hit-job the Impeachment Committee brings to our politics is unprecedented, and for good reason.”
Kaplan added:
“Despite the shaky foundation, questionable legitimacy and autocratic conduct of theImpeachment Committee, Sheriff Grismore is willing to appear before the Impeachment Committee and answer questions. However, Sheriff Grismore will not appear before the Impeachment Committee in secret, closed proceedings from which the press and public are excluded.”
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