Text messages cast new light on Flowers’ probe

Text messages obtained by Vero Beach 32963 raise doubts about Sheriff’s Maj. Eric Flowers’ claim earlier this year that his friendship with School Board member Tiffany Justice didn’t fuel his decision to launch what proved to be a questionable investigation of a school district employee.

In fact, the texts indicate that Flowers led the charge to unmask the employee, Vicki Sidles, who was suspended with pay for five months despite being cleared by a Sheriff’s Office detective of any criminal conduct.

Relying on two anonymous, non-threatening, social-media posts that Justice said caused her “substantial emotional distress” – which, coincidentally, is one of the elements necessary to establish a criminal cyber-stalking charge – Flowers convinced the State Attorney’s Office in January to issue a subpoena requiring Twitter to disclose Sidles’ identity.

Flowers also obtained a court order prohibiting Twitter from informing Sidles of the subpoena.

He then handed the case to Sheriff’s Detective Aaron Scranton, who confronted Sidles with the tweets, which implied Justice was engaged in an inappropriate relationship with former School District Superintendent Mark Rendell, who has since left the district under a cloud and now is a principal in Cocoa Beach.

After a four-month investigation, Scranton was unable to build a case strong enough for the State Attorney’s Office to prosecute.

Still, when asked about the text exchanges, which covered January through March, Flowers insisted that neither his friendship with Justice nor her public endorsement of his campaign for sheriff in 2020 influenced his actions.

Just as he had in May.

“I didn’t do anything extraordinary because of our friendship,” Flowers said last week. “What I did for her, I would do for anybody.”

Certainly, that’s what we want to believe, but the text messages between Flowers and Justice include many exchanges in which both public servants appeared to be overly eager to help each other – her with his campaign, him with her desire to out the anonymous tweeter.

Justice’s support for Flowers’ campaign was obvious as she would alert him to opportunities for him to attend civic, political and educational gatherings throughout Indian River County.

“I think you are great for IRC,” Justice wrote in a text in January. “I will do what I can to help when I can. You deserve it.”

“Thank you!!!” Flowers replied. “I am honored to have your support.”

She then responded: “I am thankful that good people like you still want to be a part of the governance process … If I feel that I have been able to make a positive difference, I may run again.”

To which Flowers replied: “I will support you either way. I know the toll that it takes on a family. I’m fortunate that my little guy is small and my wife is 100 percent on board with my dream.

“When the time comes, a bunch of people are going to jump out and think they ‘deserve’ the position but none of them have or will work as hard as I can and do.”

In one March text message, Justice reminded Flowers to attend a gathering at John’s Island and warned that Fellsmere Police Chief Keith Touchberry had mentioned to officials from The Learning Alliance that he planned to run for sheriff.

“I want you to be around as much as possible,” Justice wrote, “so we can make that difficult.”

Throughout their exchanges, Flowers expressed his appreciation for Justice’s help. On a few occasions, the pair sent messages with thumbs-ups and heart symbols.

It was on the night of Jan. 22 that Justice first mentioned Sidles’ Twitter posts in a text to Flowers: “Just had to have a conversation with my daughter who saw the horrible tweets about me.”

“I’m so sorry,” Flowers replied, adding, “I’ve been thinking about it quite a bit. I have some ideas I want to run by you tomorrow if you have time.”

In his supplemental report that accompanied the findings of the Sheriff’s Office investigation of Sidles’ tweets, Flowers acknowledged that Justice had contacted him about “ongoing harassment from a Twitter account” as far back as last December.

“Specifically, she referenced the allegations of sexual misconduct which were seen by her daughter,” he wrote, adding that Justice said the allegations were “all lies being spread about her.”

Flowers wrote in his report that Justice told him she feared for her safety and that of her family “because the account was an unknown user,” and in late January requested an investigation into the account. He told her he would discuss the matter with the State Attorney’s Office.

In the text exchanges that followed, Justice continued to ask whether Twitter had complied with the subpoena and identified the account holder, and Flowers kept her updated.

“I truly appreciate you handling all of this,” Justice wrote.

“Glad to help,” Flowers replied.

At one point, Flowers had to explain to her that crime analysts were busy working on homicides that had occurred on consecutive days.

“OK, I get that in the grand scheme of things my issue is nothing,” Justice wrote. “But my family is everything to me and this person is trying to hurt my family.”

Flowers, the third-highest-ranking member of the Sheriff’s Office, replied that her case was “at the top of my list.”

Flowers also rode to Justice’s rescue in late February, when he asked an on-site deputy to check out a man whose looks she didn’t like attending a School Board meeting.

Justice texted Flowers a surveillance-video photograph of the man, accompanied by a message that read: “Not loving this tonight.”

Flowers texted back, informing Justice that School District Public Information Officer Cristen Maddux already had sent him photos of the man and that the deputy assigned to the meeting would run his automobile tag number.

“I feel so vulnerable sitting up there,” Justice responded.

Asked about the incident, Flowers said the deputy approached the man, who was wearing military boots and carrying a pocket knife, who alternated between sitting and standing and occasionally walked in and out of the chamber.

“We were a little uncomfortable,” Maddux said, “because nobody knew who he was.”

As it turned out, the visitor was affiliated with the Communication Workers of America – the union that represents the school district’s support staff – and was in town for a meeting the next day.

We can only wonder if he knows his tag was run.

While it might be difficult to fault Flowers for erring on the side of safety at that School Board meeting, it’s easy to understand why Sidles is convinced his friendship with Justice contributed mightily to the Sheriff’s Office invading her privacy.

“She could’ve gone to the Vero Beach Police Department,” Sidles said, “but she knew she had a friend at the Sheriff’s Office.”

Sidles, who said Flowers and Justice “abused their power and position” and invaded her privacy by forcing Twitter to disclose her identity, filed a complaint with the Sheriff’s Office’s Internal Affairs Division, which cleared Flowers of any wrongdoing.

After the school district’s five-month investigation, Rendell’s henchmen concocted a couple of bogus administrative charges and recommended that Sidles be suspended for a week without pay, but she left to take a job in the private sector.

Sidles said she has moved on with her life, but she’ll never forget how Justice tried to have her arrested and fired, or how Flowers was a more-than-willing accomplice.

“I already knew she was endorsing him and helping with his campaign, so I can’t say I’m surprised by what was in the texts,” Sidles said. “What did surprise me was finding out that if you know somebody at the Sheriff’s Office, you can get someone investigated without any evidence or probable cause.”

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