Judge: Assemblyman Norby's motel stay legal - Total Buzz - The ...

Judge: Assemblyman Norby?s motel stay legal

March 15th, 2012, 3:03 pm ? ? posted by Martin Wisckol, Politics reporter

An administrative judge has found that Assemblyman Chris Norby?s weeklong stay in a cut-rate Fullerton motel was a legitimate use of $340 in campaign funds.

The Fair Political Practices Commission, whose lawyers argued the case against Norby, gets the final word, deciding whether to accept the ruling or to reject it and fine Norby as much as $5,000 for misuse of campaign funds.

FPPC lawyers had claimed that Norby was having marital difficulties in 2007 and sought refuge at the Fullerton Inn. Norby was a county supervisor at the time.

Norby testified that he was researching problems related to homelessness and poor families who stay in budget motels. He also produced a paper he had written on the issue. Campaign funds can legally be used for governmental purposes, including research.

Administrative Law Judge Ralph B. Dash found that Norby had other, more pleasant places to spend the night if he needed them. Among them were an ex-wife?s home, which Norby was looking after while his ex-wife was in China. Norby testified that he?d actually slept at the home four of the seven nights he was booked into the motel, and his ex-wife testified that she?d been aware that he slept there.

?One would be hard-pressed to find any ?personal? reason to stay there if it was not necessary to do so,? Dash wrote in his decision. ?The only reasonable conclusion to be reached, based all of the evidence, is that Norby?s stay of a few nights at the motel was for the purpose he claimed it to be.?

Norby had earlier rejected a settlement offer from the FPPC, he said, because it required him to sign a declaration of wrongdoing.

Central to the FPPC lawyers? case was a report in the Los Angeles Times that characterized the motel stay as being due to ?marital problems.? Dash was dismissive of the newspaper story.

?Little weight is given to the contents of the Times article,? he wrote. ?The reference to the motels as a ?bed and breakfast,? coupled with the reporter?s rehashing of rumors derogatory to Norby, lead to the distinct impression that the reporter was less interested in the facts than in somehow implicating a public figure as having committed illegal activity.

?In any event, even if Norby?s entire testimony was disbelieved, that does not mean that other evidence is true or inferences appropriately drawn.?

Read the story about the hearing and Norby?s testimony.

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Source: http://totalbuzz.ocregister.com/2012/03/15/judge-assemblyman-norbys-motel-stay-legal/83319/

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