Alfred Montgomery is no longer the sheriff of the city of St. Louis—at least for a little while.
At a hearing today in the Missouri Attorney General’s ongoing effort to remove Montgomery from office, Judge Steven Ohmer issued a temporary restraining order removing him as sheriff for at least as long as he remains detained in jail in a separate case.
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Per Ohmer’s order, presiding Circuit Judge Christopher McGraugh was to consult with Circuit Attorney Gabe Gore and Police Chief Robert Tracy to decide who should serve as sheriff in the interim. The trio swiftly announced their interim pick: former police chief John Hayden.
Ohmer, like a lot of St. Louisans, was skeptical that Montgomery was able to serve as the city’s sheriff from a jail cell.
“What concerns me is the day-to-day operations,” Ohmer said. “I don’t see how the Sheriff’s Office can function without his presence.”
Montgomery’s attorneys retired Judge David Mason and Matt Ghio did their best to convey that the office was running fine under a combination of interim Sheriff Yosef Yasharahla’s leadership, frequent trips to jail to have Montgomery sign documents, and a steady stream of jailhouse phone calls between the sheriff and staff. Ghio said he himself is making frequent trips to the jail where Montgomery is locked up to have him sign documents such as reports of sales and others from city land tax, which the Sheriff’s Office oversees.
Ohmer reaffirmed his belief that the case against Montgomery needs to be tried based on the evidence, but in the interim it sounded to him like the office is “wallowing.” Day to day operations, he said, “demand attention.”
“Tell me how many decisions he’s made personally in the last two weeks?” asked Ohmer.
Montgomery’s counsel at times used euphemisms about Montgomery’s whereabouts, referring to the jail where federal authorities have him detained pending his trial as “another location” and “a brick and mortar facility.”
Mason said the circumstances wouldn’t be any different if Montgomery were living at his home “across the street.”
He also at one point compared Montgomery’s incarceration to “a month-long vacation in Vienna.”
Ohmer noted that people in Vienna are easy enough to reach.
Said Ohmer, “I’d find it hard to believe that at the drop of a hat he can have free rein and set up an office down there.”
About two and half hours into the hearing, Ohmer said he would be issuing a temporary restraining order removing Montgomery from his position as the AG’s ongoing quo warranto effort works its way through his court.
Ohmer had previously declined the Attorney General’s requests to issue such an order three times.
The most recent request was made about two weeks ago, when Assistant Attorney General Greg Goodwin noted that each time his office makes the ask, Montgomery is in even more trouble. The comment proved prescient. Montgomery got locked up about five days later by a federal judge after being charged with tampering with witnesses in the previous case against him, some of whom worked for the Sheriff’s Office.
That, to Ohmer’s mind, makes all the difference.
“Yeah the Circuit [Court] can run, but it needs the constant direction of the head,” he observed of the court for whom he serves. “If you don’t get that, things can go willy-nilly.”
Ohmer said it was a shame that Goodwin wasn’t in court today, when the request for a temporary restraining order was successful. Assistant Attorney General Andrew Clark was pinch-hitting for his colleague in the case.
“It’s very unusual, I must say,” said Ohmer. “Across the board.”
