Sumter City Hall Audit turns into Assault

In recent news Jody Barr investigates a local City Hall Audit turned Assault. Although, police reports were made the case was eventually dismissed after 15 months due to lack of evidence. Despite video footage showing Joe Perry City spokesman harassing local auditor Joshua Roberts and attempting to shove/push Mr.Roberts no further action has been taken by local officials. The case seemed to have vanished until local News Investigator Jody Barr decided to research the incident and conduct an audit of his own.

In February of 2021, Joshua Roberts was conducting a peaceful audit of Sumter City Hall. Before entering City Hall Roberts had recorded an interaction with the building manager Dennis Powell permitting his team to record inside. Roberts and his team had been recording in City Hall, when Mr. Perry aggressively interrupted the video tour. Joe Perry proceeds to yell at Roberts and his team to stop filming stating he is the Counties Media Liaison claiming they are trespassing. Although the team offered the video footage of the building manager granting them permission Mr. Perry denied stating they “lie consistently.” After arguing with Mr. Perry regarding his physical actions towards Roberts, Mr. Roberts then leaves City Hall. The two proceed to argue outside while Mr. Perry makes a series of 911 calls while following Mr. Roberts and his team despite being advised by 911 to stop. The dispatcher describes to the responding officer that Mr Perry is so irate he does not want to follow the advice. Both Mr. Perry and Mr. Roberts were met at a gas station by officers and Sumter Police Chief Russel Roark. Despite allegations of the attack, footage of Perry's actions and remarks from dispatcher on his ‘irate’ behavior Mr. Perry was not questioned at the scene. Mr. Roark is seen driving Perry away while his officers are investigating his assault allegations. Roberts voices concern of law enforcement's response to the situation allowing Perry to leave the scene of the crime. In fact it wasn’t until Roberts filed a criminal complaint two days later that law enforcement decided to interview both men for investigation and in March of that year the case was sent to a Third Circuit Solicitor Ernest Finney.

Despite numerous attempts to reach Finney regarding an update on the case, Finney did not respond. That is until Local News Emailed him stating the public could view this delay in response as an effort to protect one of their own. A response from Solicitor Finney was sent a few hours later closing the case stating there was a lack of ‘substantial’ evidence to prove Joe Perry assaulted Mr. Roberts. Mr. Finney has since made a public response regarding the delay in the case itself, stating “it took this long due to other high priority cases.”

During the investigation interviews Perry claims his actions stemmed from a place of fear. When asked why he was fearful he declares the men looked like what he believed to be ‘insurrectionists.’ Although authorities questioned Perry regarding his physical actions in the situation; Perry denied. When questioned again regarding video footage of the physical attack Mr. Perry proceeded to attempt to validate his actions to the investigating officer stating he was just ‘waving’ his hands. In any fashion Queencity News conducts their own investigation to a case that like many other would have been swept under the rug. No statements have been further made by Solicitor Finney, Mr. Perry or Chief Roark regarding the case.