Peter Schorsch
In Jacksonville, the last 24 hours have been dominated by two stories; the rumors of defeated mayoral candidate Mike Hogan’s return to campaign for (something?) and a grand jury’s recommendation for Public Defender Matt Shirk to resign from his elected office.
With both men in the news together, a source familiar with Shirk’s office has told this publication of another connection between them; Shirk tried to hire Hogan as his chief of staff in recent months.
The source claims Hogan was offered and nearly accepted the position, and Shirk’s plan was to have Hogan in place as a “strong Christian influence” and moral compass for the embattled public defender. Hogan would “help Shirk demonstrate redemption.”
Apparently the talks ceased when Shirk was reminded that Hogan had testified at the sentencing hearing of a child porn collector named Richard Sweat.
As the Times-Union reported at the time, jurors and law enforcement professionals were bewildered when Hogan claimed his good friend was innocent of collecting sexual images of children. They noted that Hogan had not seen or heard the evidence at trial so he couldn’t legitimately claim Sweat’s innocence. Sweat served time in federal prison, lost an appeal, and is currently on probation residing in Duval County. See Sweat’s sexual offender/predator registration here.
Obviously for an elected official facing the allegations of impropriety like Public Defender Shirk has been, it would be unusual to make a personnel choice that could raise even more questions or cast even more doubt about personal relationships.
