CLEVELAND, OH – When Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas Judge Anthony Russo selected a mayor from the streets instead of East Cleveland city council to manage the city as “interim mayor” on February 28, 2025, he took no steps to notify the municipal corporation’s officers and residents. Instead, Russo issued a news release and the city’s predominantly American Negro residents were supposed to figure it out for themselves.
The Clerk of Council at the time, Mansell Baker, told this writer he never received a notice from Russo of his order so he could post it for the public and employees entering and leaving city hall to read. Russo’s order didn’t include instructions for it to be placed on the agenda of a regular meeting of council to be read into the record and handed out to residents as a public record.
He held no hearing with the city’s legislative and administrative officers to seek comment on his succession proposal, or to learn its issues. His order was never certified as a “municipal act” by the Clerk of Council pursuant to Section 731.42 of the Ohio Revised Code.
Two council candidates for the interim appointment, President of Council Lateek R. Shabazz and Councilor Dr. Patricia Blochowiak, said Russo didn’t ask them a single question about the city’s charter, ordinances or issues. He wanted to know if they would terminate attorney Willa Mae Hemmons and Michael Smedley. Shabazz said Russo asked his thoughts about annexing with Cleveland, which he thought reflected an agenda that had nothing to do with managing the city under the law.
From a street perspective, Russo basically said “fuck East Cleveland residents” and their rights as citizens of Ohio and the United States. He’d disregarded Section 114 of the home rule city’s charter to handpick the mayor, he wanted, who fit his agenda and not the law. It was an act of bias that voided his required legal impartiality under state judicial canons. Former Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas Judge Daniel Gaul was reprimanded for bias in 2020 and suspended for one year in 2023 when he repeated the behavior.
In his media published so-called order, Russo cited only the section of Section 3.16 of the Ohio Revised Code that he thought would leave his handpicked interim mayor in office past King’s conviction until the city’s November 2025 mayoral election. Section 3.16 of the Ohio Revised Code is captioned “Suspension of local official charged with felony relating to official conduct.” Post conviction King was no longer an official charged with a felony.
Russo made no reference to Section 3.16’s language that her appointment was for the duration of the suspension pursuant to Section 3.16(E)(4) of the Ohio Revised Code. He cherry-picked through the law like an agenda driven amateur who didn’t think the omission would be noticed. What Russo didn’t take in consideration was Morgan would notify Clerk of Council Stacey White by email on May 30, 2025, the day after King’s May 29, 2025 conviction, informing her and other officials that King’s suspension was over and he was being removed from the payroll.
“For the duration of the public official’s suspension, an interim replacement official shall be appointed by the probate judge of the court of common pleas if the suspended public official is an elected official of a municipal corporation, township, school district, or other political subdivision, to perform the suspended public official’s duties.”
In his media circulated order Russo disregarded Article 1, Section 18’s instructions in the Constitution of Ohio that “no power of suspending laws shall ever be exercised, except by the general assembly.” That was the net effect of his order when he called himself suspending Section 114 of East Cleveland’s charter to make Morgan his interim mayor.
Ohioans in 1912 voted to approve “home rule” as a mandate for how Ohio voters could choose to be governed in their cities, villages and townships and under the form of government they wanted. Mayoral appointments through the judiciary was not among the laws authorized for home rule cities. Russo exceeded the limits of his judicial authority when he ignored canons telling him laws were to be obeyed.
Ohio is a combination of a home rule and Dillon’s rule state. Local self-governance is determined by the voters through a charter under home rule. Under Dillon’s rule, named for Iowa state supreme court Justice John Forest Dillon, cities, villages and townships whose voters have not adopted “home rule,” live under the general laws of the state found in Title 7 for municipal corporations in the Ohio Revised Code.
It is only when charters are silent on a matter that the state’s general laws under Title 7 are applicable. East Cleveland city council, as an example, enacted its own open meetings laws and made Section 121 of the Ohio Revised Code inapplicable in the city. Russo had no home rule authority to disregard the office of the president of council as next in line to succeed the vacant office of a mayor who is removed through suspension or conviction for a long-time absence in East Cleveland.
Had Russo not disrupted the flow of succession authorized by Section 114 of East Cleveland’s charter, much of the King crime family that still occupies city hall would have been dismantled. Morgan wouldn’t have appeared in a WOIO video at city hall on June 3, 2025 sitting beside attorney Heather McCollough committing the same criminal acts King committed when he used city attorneys and vendors to represent him and his family. She wouldn’t be recorded, twice, campaigning for mayor from the mayor’s office.
What’s insulting about Russo’s extra-judicial overreach is that Shabazz had filed a civil malfeasance and misfeasance in office complaint against King in Russo’s probate court that was assigned to Judge Laura Gallagher last March 11, 2024. Twice the probate court refused to direct prosecutors to proceed to authenticate the more than 40 exhibits that confirmed King’s criminal acts. It wasn’t until this writer in his official capacity as East Cleveland’s Clerk of Council submitted a complaint with the same facts to the Ohio Ethics Commission that its investigators compelled prosecutors to act.
Unlike Morgan, Shabazz knew attorney McCollough, who is usurping the prosecutor’s office, and East Cleveland’s unauthorized acting chief of police, Kenneth Lundy, were dirty players. Shabazz wouldn’t have made the mistake of keeping them and relying on either to act ethically and within the law as Morgan as done to her detriment . Russo’s appointment of Morgan kept the King crime gang intact.
Backed by Cuyahoga County Prosecuting Attorney Michael O’Malley’s endorsement of Russo’s appointee, Sandra Morgan, as the city’s new mayor, which he also made public through news release, East Cleveland’s president of council, Shabazz, was supposed to step aside and let Morgan serve out the remainder of convicted ex-mayor King’s term as mayor from the office he vacated. Morgan, as a statutorily defined and limited “interim mayor,” has no legal authority to enter the vacated office of a mayor elected by the voters of a home rule city.
Russo’s handling of his official duties through the media poses similar issues for him as they did ex-Judge Daniel Gaul who the Supreme Court of Ohio’s disciplinary counsel caused to be sanctioned once and then removed him from office with a suspension of his law license. Russo may have thought his “lord-like” orders would be meekly obeyed by the East Cleveland residents he disrespected, but among them are the intellectually sophisticated who know Russo’s conduct violated canons in Ohio’s Code of Judicial Conduct that the prosecutor’s office can’t defend him against.
From a cursory review and analysis of the canons Russo violated, four are standouts.
Canon 1.1 & 1.2 – Integrity and Public Confidence. Russo’s decision to circumvent the East Cleveland charter and use the press as a proxy for official notice undermines the integrity of the judiciary. The absence of formal filing with the city council clerk and his reliance on extra-judicial means to impose a leadership change erodes public trust and gives the appearance of political favoritism.
Canon 2.2(A) – Compliance with Law. Russo exceeded his lawful authority by disregarding the succession provisions of East Cleveland’s Charter and assuming powers to appoint a municipal executive. His invocation of R.C. 3.16 to appoint a mayor contradicts the statute’s intended application, which provides only for suspension, not for judicial appointment of successors in a home rule city.
Canon 3(B)(1-4) – Duty of Competent, Diligent, and Impartial Judicial Function. Russo failed to competently and transparently exercise his judicial authority. His order was not directed to the appropriate municipal officer, was not published through formal channels, and did not cite any resolution of council or supporting legal authority from the city. The result was a judicial action that appeared to further a political agenda rather than a lawful interpretation of the charter.
Russo’s authority ended with his appointment of Morgan. Shabazz is arguing through his attorney, Kenneth Myers, that nothing in Section of 3.16 of the Ohio Revised Code gave him extra-judicial authority to appoint a person as mayor to fill a vacancy created by King’s conviction. Morgan’s time in office expired with King’s conviction as she informed Clerk of Council, Stacey White, by email on May 30, 2025 of his May 29, 2025 conviction. Morgan should not have returned to city hall on May 30, 2025.
Shabazz said his fight does not end with the quo warranto he’s filed to end Morgan’s usurpation of the office of mayor past King’s conviction. He’s contemplating taking action with the Supreme Court of Ohio’s disciplinary counsel against Russo for his issuance of orders through the media instead of directly to the municipal corporation of East Cleveland’s and its officers.
Shabazz is pissed because Russo’s judicial bias and lack of impartiality created an unnecessary public relations drama for the city of East Cleveland that made the officers his orders confused look bad. So many of East Cleveland’s problems are created by malicious outsiders throwing rocks and hiding hands.
“I’ve spent the last three years battling the corrupt players in and involved with East Cleveland and Judge Russo exposed their agenda. It explains why all our reliance on outside support failed,”: Shabazz said. “East Cleveland is being regentrified and people leading the city to its demise are helping the gentrifiers. Judge Russo has no business violating our charter to place their agent in charge of our continued destruction. All he really wanted to know from me is whether I supported annexing East Cleveland to Cleveland. Obviously, my answer didn’t please him. In his mind their agenda supersedes our charter, but that’s not what the Constitution of Ohio says.”
“Everyone in government has a higher authority to whom they report. So does Russo,” said Shabazz. “The Supreme Court may have ratified his disregard for our charter, but it can’t ratify his disregard of Ohio’s judicial canons for judges. I will use every legal tool at my disposal to protect the sovereign authority of the residents of East Cleveland to decide, through their charter, just who should serve as mayor.”
