Annie Goeller and Michele Holtkamp-Frye are reporting for the Johnson County Daily Journal that there a residency challenge has been filed against Sen. Waltz (R-Greenwood). Unfortunately, the article is behind a subscription wall.
Sen. Brent Waltz’s opponent in this year’s Republican primary [Mike Beeles] is challenging whether Waltz lives in the condominium he rents and instead argues that he lives with his parents in their White River Township home, which is outside Senate District 36.
Waltz denies the allegations, saying that his neighbors haven’t seen him because he gets home late and leaves early; and that his electric bill is only $17 per month because he keeps his thermostat low. A Duke Energy employee said that $17 per month is about the cost to keep a refrigerator running.
In his challenge, Beeles said he knows the condominium is vacant by looking into the windows, the mailbox says the unit is vacant and that the senator lives at his parents’ Center Grove area home.
Beeles is challenging Waltz on the issue because many people seem to know that Waltz doesn’t live in the district, yet no one has ever confronted him on the issue, he said.
“It’s illegal,” Beeles said. “If I have to follow the rules, he has to too.”
On the one hand, the reported facts make Waltz’s story sound fishy. On the other hand, who wants to side with creepy, stalker guy?
Isn’t looking in someone’s windows illegal?
I spent some time working with Sen. Waltz when I worked in Indianapolis. I think the comment I said to a co-worker after our first visit with him was:
“That guy could talk you into supporting your daughter’s Playboy photo shoot and make you think it was your idea.” I don’t buy one second of his story.
To answer Brenda’s question, I don’t think it is. Assuming stalker guy was standing on public property, he can look anywhere he wants to. At least that is what they told me in photo school…
Jason said:
I can go with that, but unless it’s dark outside and the lights are on inside (which, I’m guessing isn’t the case here), you typically can’t see enough of the inside of someone’s house from public property to tell they aren’t living there.
My previous house had a picture window facing south. The sun would shine into it most of the day, and I could see my family as I pulled into the driveway with no lights on in the house.
I’m not saying that I think this is LIKELY, but it can’t be ruled out.
Is it illegal to look into a vacant house? I mean, yes, it’s trespassing … but I find it hard to believe Waltz has suffered harm to anything save his ego.
Waltz’s district has many of the same folks who re-elect Woody Burton … so they don’t have high standards for quality. Throw in that Waltz is the nephew of Greenwood mayor Charlie Henderson, and this is Beeles’ best chance to win the district.
I suspect Beeles is right, but the Election committee will swallow their whistle and look the other way. I hope they don’t.
For the record, I have no problem at all with someone calling Waltz out on the issue… I just thought Beeles’s “I looked in the windows” comment was… a bit creepy (and how did he get ahold of Waltz’s electric bill?). I have no idea how you would legally go about determining whether or not someone actually abides at a residence.
Wow, totally missed that before about the electric bill. Good question!
Per the IBJ article:
How do we parse that? Did Duke Energy tell the newspaper that Waltz’s bills were an average of $17/month? Or did they tell the newspaper that $17/month is enough to run a refrigerator?
Sorry… IBJ Article
The Johnson County article says:
So, Duke energy records; employee commenting on the charge and its relation to powering a refrigerator.
As memory serves, Waltz’s campaign flyers stated that he graduated from Wabash Collage.
Jason:
You wrote:
“That guy could talk you into supporting your daughter’s Playboy photo shoot and make you think it was your idea.â€
Imagine how much better the world would be if such powers of persuasion weren’t used for evil (like legislative log-rolling), but for good…like talking people into supporting their daughter’s Playboy photo shoot and making them think it was their idea.
The challenger, being Republican, is probably familiar with voter caging. He should have just sent mail to the address and seen if it was returned undelivered. If he was having it forwarded, then send something certified. Then he could have not only disqualified the guy as a candidate, but he could have challenged his right to vote, too.
Assuming his electric meter is on the outside of his house (and most are), you could determine the amount of electricity used by simply reading the meter on the same day every month and noting the changes. Duke’s per/unit residential rate can be easily obtained with a call to the IURC. Then do the math. Once you have that number (in this case, apparently $17) you could call Duke energy and ask how many appliances an average residential customer could run on $17 worth of electricity in a month.
I’d be surprised if Duke would talk about someone’s bill to a reporter (unless it was the reporter’s bill). But they would likely have no problem generically estimating what you could do with $17 worth of electricity.
Lemming: that’s funny! Did he becomed an oil painting, a watercolor, or an assemblage upon graduation? :)
Wouldn’t reading the electric meter involve trespassing, unless you are a meter reader employed by the electric utility? My electric meter is on the house, next to the back door. There is no way someone could read it without walking into the back yard–and I don’t have a huge yard. Maybe a powerful zoom lens would help, but still I do wonder how the person obtained the information about the electric usage.
Guess I need to learn how to spell, also! There is no “d” in “become.” Is having a cold an excuse for bad spelling?
Judging from what little of the story I’ve seen, the reporters gathered information about the senator’s condo from neighbors. You’d be surprised how informative a nosey neighbor can be.
It wouldn’t look particularly suspicious if a neighbor read the meter (though it may still be trespassing). And I don’t know the geography of his condo building, but if it is in a multi-tenant building, electric meters are sometimes grouped together to make reading the meters easier. Anyone in the same building would have legitimate access to all the meters.
It’s also possible that a political enemy of Waltz’s works at Duke (or has a friend who works there) who slipped him the readings. And sometimes interesting documents just show up in the mail at a newspaper, especially when people find out you’re working on a certain story.
However they got the readings, it appears Waltz is not contesting their validity. Instead, he offers explanations for why the electic usage is so low.
Thanks for the information, Former Reporter. If Waltz doesn’t reside in his district, then there is a legitimate issue, no doubt. There is still a creepiness factor to this story, though.
Here’s an update from today’s paper – Waltz is filing charges against him.
Unfortunately for Beeles, sounds like Waltz is calling in his favors:
However, there’s still the minor issue of Beeles being right:
And the smoking gun:
My dream is that neither of the guys should be on the ballot – one’s a liar, one’s a stalker.
Waltz’s purported safety concerns seem to drop quite a bit if he doesn’t actually live at the subject residence. Lots of evidence on that point could presumably be compelled from Waltz if Beeles was facing a criminal charge on the matter. Deposing Waltz could be a lot of fun, especially if, as rumor has it, there are skeletons in Waltz’s closet.
Doug, I’m afraid I may have left out some stuff that would change your perception. I’m trying to just quote what is needed:
So I’m going to guess Waltz will drop the voyeurism idea real quick – because Beeles has the proof it was an unoccupied residence on camera, and if a judge agrees and says “You don’t live there”, it would seem to me it makes the ballot question an open & shut case. Waltz can’t take that chance.
However, the following Waltz around sure seems like stalking to me. Waltz is trying to make it sound like a continuous two month stalking case, I suspect it was actually just five times over a two month period.
Flip side is, if Beeles had hired a private investigator, does that make it any different? What Beeles has done seems like what a PI would have done, at least on the surface.
Filing charges is a mistake, especially voyeurism charges, since it would require Waltz to admit under oath whether the condo was occupied. Yet another reason why the deposition would be fun.
I did some stalking cases in my previous life, and they are pretty hard to prove. If – as seems to be the case – Waltz didn’t know about being followed until Beeles admitted it, it doesn’t sound like he was subjected to a pattern of harassment that terrorized him and that would terrorize a reasonable person.
Speaking of closets, I think Mr Waltz would be best to prove quickly that he occupies that place.. and allow the reporter to find certain items to bely a lot of the other reports about him. Frankly, in this day and age, I can’t understand why he wouldn’t be living on his own. Why don’t any of these politicians learn? Wasn’t a city councilman from Indy recently kicked off due to residency? That woulda been my first clue to get my house in order, so to speak.
Are you kidding? He probably thinks he can skate on this because his Uncle Charlie runs Greenwood like his own personal fiefdom. One of Charlie’s famous quotes is “There are two sets of laws – one for my friends, and one for everyone else.” He’s a menace.
And he will skate – as best I can tell, coming off the ballot would require a Republican to join two Democrats in finding him in violation – a tie vote means nothing. I’d be stunned if he was off the ballot.
Why not at least get more furniture, spend the night at the condo on occasion, run up the electric bill, etc.? I mean, if you’re gonna pull a fast one, do it right! ;-)
Don’t believe everything you read in the news paper, I know Mike Beeles very well and he is not stupid, I have seen the condo myself and it is empty, Taking pictures of a empty condo is not illegal, I know he has not followed Mr. Waltz, but the Journal News has and related that information over to Mr. Beeles, He was told on Wednesday what kind of car Mr. Waltz drives, and that information came from the journal, Mike has his information that he needs and Waltz is scared, Terry Rice the democrat knew of this 4 years ago and was not able to do anything about it do to the time limit. Mike is a family man and is very upfront about everything.
I’m Mike Beeles, The information that you have been reading are the words of the daily journal, the journal has been working on this issue for about a month, most of the information that I got was from the Journal, I have not followed him and it was on tuesday that I was told what kind of car he was driving, and that came from the daily journal, the Journal ask me how many times was I aware of him being followed, I know of 5 or 6 times.
I did go by his parents house to see what district they lived in, I did take pictures of a empty apartment, that was after I talked with the other residents about the apartment which they told me it was empty, the Duke bill information came from the journal, I’m not a staker, all the evidence I have been made aware of,points to the fact he does not live there, as well as his neighbors, the apartment, sorry, Condo is about a half block from my house.
you may ask away if you like, some things I may not be able to anwser.
Thanks Mike
See, this is one of the things I really like about having a blog — occasionally people who actually know what is going on drop by to give first hand accounts.
It also serves as a reminder that, when I’m holding forth about something I’ve read in the newspaper, it’s not the same as offering opinions about the latest work of fiction I’ve read. There are real people involved.
Mike:
Why not post the pictures on Flickr or another photo sharing website?
They were given to my attorney, we are work on the case for the Indiana Election Commission, right now I want the news media to convince him in to showing the condo and prove to all of us that he realing lives there. he won’t and because I know it’s empty, the part that bugs me the most and maybe you all can help out, why, in every statement that he gives he states that he has a gun permit, a passport that relate to him living there???????
I will be watching for any reply
Thanks Mike
Yeah, those confuse me too. Presumably the issuing authorities for those things simply trusted his representation that he lived where he said he lived. They would seem to prove nothing. If, as you are saying, he doesn’t live there; the issuing authorities for the gun permit, passport, etc. would presumably take a negative view of any misrepresentations he would have made on his applications.
Maybe he’s trying to say he wouldn’t have lied to the state or the feds in order to obtain a gun permit and a passport. Admittedly, it’s a lousy defense, but when you don’t have a leg to stand on, you’ll offer up anything and hope that people don’t think about it too much.
I’m lost…what does where you live have to do with a passport at all? Your address isn’t on it; you don’t get a new one when you move; you don’t report a change of address to the passport agency. In fact, at least as recent as three years ago (my last passport was issued in April ’04) the instructions say to write in your contact info in pencil.
I don’t know anything about gun permits – are you supposed to inform the permitting agency when you move?
Mike,
A bit of well-intentioned advice… when you post to the Internet, your response may be there for a LONG time. It would be wise to run it through a word processor first for grammar and spelling and then copy and paste it into the response window. I freely admit I’m guilty of mistakes and typos myself, but I’m not running for public office.
Brenda,
Good advice for Mike. I’m glad I’m not running for office, I’m sure I’ll even have spelling mistakes in this post.
My personal protection (gun) permit says the following:
“You are REQUIRED BY LAW to notify the State Police within 60 days of a change of your name and/or address.”
(caps were from the permit)
Jason,
Ha – you can bet I ran *that* post through the carwash (uh.. word processor).
So Waltz’s gun permit comment does pertain. If this goes south on him, it opens him up to another stream of investigation (penalty?).
The disconnect between Beeles’s comments above and the vibe many of us got from the various media articles (including those of the Journal) is very interesting. Leaves you with the feeling that parts of the story were left on the cutting room floor.
I work with his former girlfriend and she had previously said how it was odd that he still lived with his parents. After this story came out, she said that he uses that condo for storage and all his mail goes to a post office box.
Sorry forks, been busy with the inside portion of the issues with my attorney, going to court, filed yesterday in Johnson County, getting ready for March 12th with the Indiana Election Commission. plus been busy getting our campaign on the right track
LISA, contact me via my e-mail at msbeeles@yahoo.com I would like to talk with his ex-girlfriend.
Thanks Mike
What kind of grammer can you expect from a high school drop out?
Becky wrote:
The kind that’s comparable to the spelling we can expect from Becky?
/grins, ducks, and runs
An update:
Looks like Beeles had the right idea, should have just hired a PI to do it.