Darryl Moore’s silly lawyer, Jazmyn Stover, cries discrimination because Councilor Juanita Gowdy asked her thieving client about his federal fraud convictions, garnishment and no bid contracts

CLEVELAND, OH – Attorney Jazmyn Stover had to do something to help the federally-convicted mortgage and securities fraud thief known as Darryl Moore keep the $160,000 in contracts Richmond Heights resident Brandon King, Beachwood resident Willa Taylor Hemmons and “community development director” Melran Leach followed no federal laws to the letter to deliver to him.  So Moore’s bargain basement shyster concocted a crazed letter and argued that East Cleveland Council Vice President Juanita Gowdy did not ask any other contractor the same questions as those asked of her criminally-minded, “no-bid-contract-receiving” client.

Stover was fired as a Human Resources consultant by Middleburg Heights city council in November 2018 when she worked for Seeley, Savidge, Ebert and Gourash Co., LPA.   Middleburg Heights Mayor Gary Starr is a partner in the firm.  Stover lasted a year.  Starr, like King, obstructed council from obtaining receipts, contracts and other documents associated with the money his law firm was being paid.  He resigned before council voted to remove him the same month they showed Stover the door.

When Starr fired the city’s police chief, John Maddox, this dummy, Stover, described the “civil servant” as an “at will” employee.  The city paid out roughly $500,000 in settlements and about $380,000 to Maddox.  Stover left Starr’s firm and joined Fisher Phillips in March 2019.  There are a lot of “foreign names” with Stover’s new employer.

Moore, Stover ignorantly concluded in her correspondence to Hemmons without citing any supportive statute, was a victim of discrimination.  Stover completely ignored the truth that he’s the only contractor known to Gowdy and the council to be convicted of federal securities and mortgage fraud.  He’s thus far the only contractor known to council whose $2.8 million in restitution is being paid with garnished HUD funds he’s receiving in no bid contracts from King, Leach and Hemmons.

Moore’s shyster should know she would be Rule 11’d into a suspension by arguing that the city’s “law makers” should not be concerned that Moore’s 3D Moore, in conspiracy with King, Leach and Hemmons, has been the recipient of illegal no bid HUD-funded demolition contracts.  “Thieves gotta eat … too.”  Winky Dinky Dog.   The Hollywood Shuffle.

Stover then published and disseminated maliciously defamatory information that EJBNEW’s coverage of her client’s crimes with public funds was “both false and misleading and, quite frankly, are an attempt to interfere with 3D Moore’s business relationship with the city.”  In Stover’s stupid mind, investigative journalism is “tortious interference with a contract” instead of protected by the free speech provisions of the 1st Amendment she also ignored.

Moore’s attorney, in my opinion, functions intellectually like she was educated online as her advice appears to be guiding her already-once-convicted client back to prison.  She obviously has no knowledge of Frisbie Co. v. City of East Cleveland (1918) like she didn’t know civil service police chief’s don’t sign “employment contracts.” Reading is so very fundamental.  Class Act.  Kid n’ Play.  No bid demolition contracts with federal funds is not lawful.

“Where a statute prescribes the mode of exercise of the power therein conferred upon a municipal body, the mode specified is likewise the measure of the power granted, and a contract made in disregard of the express requirements of such statute is not binding or obligatory upon the municipality.” Frisbie Co. v. City of East Cleveland (1918), 98 Ohio St. 266 [120 N.E. 309], paragraph one of the syllabus.”

While Stover may not think Moore has an “individual” duty as a “contractor” to avoid the crime of accepting no bid contracts from King, Hemmons and Leach, an Ohio case captioned Welch v. City of Lima, 89 Ohio App. 457 (1950) says otherwise.  Contracts made outside statutory mandates are invalid.  The recipient has no collection recourse as they should have known better.  They are also imbued with the duty to validate before receiving a contract that the government officials who gave it to them obeyed federal, state and local procurement laws.

“Persons dealing with municipal corporations are charged with notice of all limitations upon the authority of the municipality or its agents, and they are required, at their peril, to ascertain whether statutory requirements relating to the subject of the transaction have been complied with.”

In her incriminating correspondence to Hemmons, Stover focused on only one EJBNEWS assertion affecting her client that she claimed was false.  To give her falsity claim the “appearance” of credibility, Stover recklessly and maliciously disregarded the true statement I wrote and altered the exact language I’d used to describe Moore’s ineligibility to receive no-bid federal block grant contracts.  The following unedited language is what was published by EJBNEWS about Moore’s unlawful receipt of federally-funded contracts as a mortgage and securities fraud felon.

HUD’s website features a list of offenses that automatically excluded Moore from applying for or receiving the never-ending stream of no-bid contracts and “grants” King, Leach and Hemmons delivered to him between 2017 and 2021 without RFP’s, advertising or council approval.  As East Cleveland council members read the HUD procurement regulations I’ve shared, its members should view all of Hemmons’ legal opinions as her criminal misuse of a usurped public office to protect how she’s been enriching herself by obstructing and violating the civil rights of their elected public offices.  Hemmons has never discussed what she knew about Moore’s garnishment with council; and she’s never ensured King and Leach were obeying federal procurement laws.  

Either Stover did not fully read or comprehend the entirety of the paragraph above she fecklessly butchered by adding language I did not use and repeating it in writing to the private attorney impersonating the City of East Cleveland’s criminally-complicit director of law.  The remainder of her response can be read in its entirety in the images I’ve shared.  Readers will see Stover lacked the capacity to correctly repeat the first sentence I wrote before I described Hemmons violations of R.C. 733.57.  Below is her mischaracterization of the paragraph I cited above.

EJB asserts that Mr. Moore’s 2008 conviction automatically renders 3D Moore, ineligible from receiving HUD fundings.  This is false.  HUD regulations do not include any provisions rendering an individual or entity “automatically debarred.”  

Stover recklessly and maliciously inserted the words “automatically debarred” for “automatically excluded” in the correspondence she crafted to obstruct Gowdy’s investigative oversight authority as council’s vice president during the Contracts & Properties meeting she attended with Moore.  What Stover completely missed or ignored was how the focus of the EJBNEWS story was on the statutory duties King, Hemmons and Leach were failing to discharge as their criminally derelict acts leaves her client even more vulnerable to fraud charges.

Instead of offering her stupid discrimination claim, Stover should have advised Moore to obey Welch v. City of Lima, 89 Ohio App. 457 (1950).  Had she known anything about municipal law instead of employment and union “prevent’ tactics, Stover would have been operating within Disciplinary Rule 1.13 to advise her “organizational” client of one that Hemmons’ was not discharging the following statutory duties regarding the no-bid contracts Leach was setting him up to receive.

When an obligation or contract made on behalf of a municipal corporation, granting a right or easement or creating a public duty, is being evaded or violated, the village solicitor or city director of law shall apply for the forfeiture or the specific performance thereof as the nature of the case requires.

The “oath” and “contract-less” Hemmons admitted during the meeting how she had failed to conduct an investigation of Moore’s background as the city operates on a 90-day budget with spending levels cut by the Financial Planning & Supervision Commission to 85 percent of what King requested and council appropriated.

The mere fact that federal prosecutors had no knowledge at the time of Moore’s 2008 conviction, that he was going to create a demolition company in 2013, does not obviate Gowdy’s duty to question the convicted mortgage and securities fraud criminal now that his receipt of illegal no-bid contracts is known.  It also does not obviate Assistant United States Attorney Alex Rokakis’ duty to report and investigate the King administration for delivering Moore the no-bid HUD money even if it added to former United States Attorney Justin Herdman’s restitution collection numbers.

Moore operated his pass-through company from 2013 through 2019 out of the basement of a Noble Road beauty shop with no construction equipment.  He only recently purchased an excavator and a low-boy to carry it.  Other contractors who have registered with the city, and who actually own equipment and possess licensing to demolish structures, have complained without avail that King’s awarding of no-bid contracts to his friend and campaign donor violated their rights and federal procurement laws.

One contractor called after reading EJBNEWS’ first in a series of a stories about Moore’s unlawful interactions with corrupt East Cleveland officials and asked if contractors could file a class action claim for the fraud.

“They had us register and post bonds.  Melran Leach told us we’d be emailed about bids and never received them,” the contractor said.

HUD requires bids to be advertised in newspapers of general circulation as another duty Stover should have advised her client to ensure his “inside” benefactors obeyed.  When Gowdy questioned Leach about the published advertisement for the work he wanted to deliver to Moore he produced an email to the Plain Dealer saying one had been requested.  He didn’t know if the advertisement was published.

Stover correctly referenced HUD’s Departmental Enforcement Center as the federal authority charged with the duty to place Moore and his company on HUD’s suspension, debarment and limited denials of participation.  But the way she did it now opens the door for the information council now knows exists about Moore’s no bid deals with corrupt East Cleveland officials to be shared with HUD’s DEC as well as the federal agency’s Inspector General.

The DEC’s regional office in Chicago can be contacted at 312-913-8059.  HUD’s Inspector General in the Cleveland office can be reached at 216-357-7800.  HUD’s OIG accepts calls about fraud from anonymous sources.

Stover had better learn this nation and state’s “defamation” and libel” laws before she tosses out claims that EJBNEWS published information about Moore and his 3D Moore that are false and misleading.  Discovery during defamation proceedings can be rough on a criminal with a lot to hide; and Stover’s legal background doesn’t show she has the tools to keep from incriminating him even further.  That’s my personal opinion as the city’s former mayor.

Stover’s reputation on the web appears to be self-created social media hype and glamourized pictures.  Anyone these days can make themselves look good if their names are not “tagged” in news stories that share otherwise.  She’s lucky her Lee Road Cleveland Heights “bar and restaurant” client didn’t move forward with the complaint she considered filing with the Cleveland Metropolitan Bar Association before Disciplinary Counsel Scott Drexel’s death. She felt sorry for a “Sister.” That would have been just another story for EJBNEWS.

As someone who successfully managed East Cleveland’s department of community development, twice, and who worked under a HUD contract for the Cuyahoga Metropolitan Housing Authority as the chief of communications and a project planner in the construction division, Moore would be smart to run from another no-bid contract he’s offered by King and “Set “Em Up” Leach.   He’s already “In Too Deep.”  Omar Epps.  LL Cool J.