The Shadow
Welcome Back, Shadowers! Last week in the Autocratic Empire of Nothingham, also known as the land of the endless Nothing Burgers, Court Jester Shadow was inundated with photos and reports showing Mayor, errr King Tom Sibold allowing his two large German Shepard bodyguards to frolic off-leash at the King’s private gardens, also known as the Jackson River Sports Complex. The King even proudly posted on Facebook to us commoners, a photo of his two K-9s off-leash at the Complex.
Ye Old Press, otherwise known as the Virginian Review, sent a carrier pigeon to the City of Covington’s Animal Control and confirmed with Officer Paxton that, yes, there is a blanket leash law in the city, and the Sports Complex is included. Paxton reinforced that everyone needs to keep their dogs on a leash at the park to maintain the safety of others and in control of their animal.
Sit. Stay. Except for the King’s guards. Carry on.
Lort Hamercy! When will Sibold learn that being the Mayor King of Nothingham means you are chosen to be our exemplary leader, not the bad example? Come now, Jester Shadow! You know this is a stupid, petty little law! The King’s guards are just innocent little territorial K-9s, and pay no mind that they are commonly used as intimidation and tactical weapons by the military and police for a reason. Surely, this is just a little, tiny, one-off oversight from our completely law-abiding King!
What’s that old saying, “The descent to Nothing Burger Hell is easy?”
We all know about King Sibold and his “King’s Hand” Allen Dressler, who apparently love giving their favorite owners at 410 Main St some amazing assistance with illegal building permits and certificates. Remember when the Commonwealth Fire Marshal had to jump into that bubbling cesspool of stinky witch’s butts and shut down both the building department and the 410 building for extremely dangerous behaviors? (Fact, FOIA May 24, 2024.) And have you noticed that 410 on Main owner Gray Lane has ghosted into thin air on a broom? I thought it was just me being tricked by a bad Spell until I looked at the Small Business Coordinator’s Facebook Page, and Mr. Lane’s $20K winnings or mention of him are nowhere to be found. He’s been scrubbed from the main Advancement Foundation website, too.
Well, there’s some new witchcraft brewing at 410. Like a mysterious $5,500 check the City paid in June 2024 to engineering firm CHA to “evaluate” 410 Main St. Wait a minute, the City doesn’t own that building, so why are they evaluating it with $5,500 of our taxpayer money?
Oh, wait! Wonder if it has anything to do with Mountain Rush announcing its move to 410 last week, opening their doors in January 2025? They’ve stated they have a Certificate of Occupancy, so who paid for the renovation work required by the Fire Marshal to get the Certificate? Did owner Gray Lane apply his $20K to fix everything? Or did the King pull out the taxpayer’s checkbook to bail them out? Will Mountain Rush have enough funding to see it through, or have they also kissed the King’s ring to magically keep the taxpayers’ checkbook open?
Or what about the King using the taxpayers’ checkbook to quietly give free rent and utilities to his favorite charity, Recover VA, for 7 months? (Fact, FOIA, July 18, 2024: “City pays all utilities. No lease exists [City is paying rent]”.) Even the King’s Hand Dressler was in on that grift, openly admitting to breaking the law by ignoring the zoning requirements and spending taxpayer-funded time to hunt for new locations for the private organization. (Fact, City Council Meeting video, May 7, 2024.)
But again, we’re all okay with this, right? Would it change your mind if those Nothing Burgers were wrapped in lawsuits?
Dewey Perkins is now suing the City of Covington for “the arbitrary and unreasonable decision of the Covington City Council to approve an ordinance, vacating a public street and right of way located at South Marion Avenue’, between Dewey’s and Wright Way Motors, in the City of Covington.” The reasons the King’s Hand Dressler gave for the ordinance were, (1) That the neighboring businesses should pay taxes on the road; (2) that Wright Way Motors wanted to expand its business; and (3) that there were safety complaints from people at the Middle School regarding wreckers driving in and out of South Marion Street.
There’s another old saying, “Hide poop between two slices of yummy wonder bread, and nobody will know they’re being served a s**t sandwich.” However, Perkins did his homework, and his $55,000 lawsuit is backed with hard evidence from FOIAs showing that the City could not “produce a single document, email, text, or other supporting information that any of Dressler’s reasons were accurate or that vacation was beneficial to the public.” So, if #1 and #3 were the yummy slices of bread, that would allegedly leave reason #2 as the real intent—eluding to the old trick the City administration loves to perform… apparently help out their buddies at the expense of others and the taxpayer.
Don’t forget the second legal action knocking on the City’s door that seems to pertain to the alleged bad behaviors of two Parks and Recs employees who abruptly “resigned.” And how can we forget the $5M lawsuit involving the Alleghany-Covington Department of Social Services? They also just engineered a board change (coup?) that is allegedly rife with favoritism and nepotism, setting them up for further lawsuits. And finally, the other $5M lawsuit against Deputy Wright for allegedly beating a guy to a pulp in 2022. Recent word from the representing attorney stated that the lawsuit is waiting for Judge Dillon to rule on the Defendant’s Motion for Summary Judgment.
Commoners, that’s four lawsuits of alleged unethical and bad behavior of this administration, with potentially more to come. And on top of that, there have been at least eight resignations from this administration for all that alleged bad behavior in this year alone.
What’s up with all this bad behavior? It’s not normal and quite frankly, it’s exhausting.
Maybe it’s because our leaders only know this kind of behavior and consider it normal? Did you realize that a good many of our public leaders have rap sheets consisting of unethical and illicit behavior? Everything from speeding tickets, illegal behavior, beating people up, harassment, public intoxication, drug felonies and more?! Honestly, when did a rap sheet become a requirement for holding a public office in the Alleghany Highlands? Oh, right, we live in the Autocratic Empire of Nothingham. It’s expected!
Let’s take the Alleghany County Sheriff as an example. Sheriff Moore was arrested and convicted in 2018 for not tagging a deer. Oh, Come now, Shadow… it was a harmless little thing. Yet how is it that our own Sheriff has been arrested and convicted of a crime, and then we pass it off as a Nothing Burger and elect him anyway? How did we miss this small thing, then put him in charge of upholding the laws in our county, when he himself apparently can’t figure out which side of the law is right?
Maybe small things do really matter.
Remember when Sheriff Moore of Nothingham visited the Virginian Review back in July 2024 in an attempt to personally shield King Sibold from the wrath of court Jester Shadow? The Sheriff seemed confused about which side of the law he was supposed to follow, so apparently he chose his personal opinion and weaponized that against the Virginian by stating he wasn’t going to send any more press releases. That’s illegal, and he knew it. He walked his statement back and has been sending releases.
Well, apparently, he’s continuing to use his personal grudges as an official position of the Sheriff’s department. Recently, the Sheriff ran a legal advertisement for a new deputy in the Alleghany Journal and the Recorder, but refused to publish in the largest newspaper and news outlet in the county, the 16,000+ daily reader-strong hometown newspaper and news channel called Virginian Review. They asked him why, and he stated that he has the right to decide where to advertise and that he sends us press releases and that is all. Due to the Shadow, he will not spend money with The Virginian Review.
Wait a minute. That’s a using a personal grudge and opinion to deny a legally mandated action. We’re in big trouble if that’s truly his professional worldview. While the Sheriff might have the right to decide where to publish, the real question is, why is he allegedly using his personal opinions and grudges to drive that decision? If there wasn’t a personal grudge, don’t you think there wouldn’t be any question on whether he’d be advertising in the Virginian? I wonder what a higher authority would think of his behavior?
And then there’s AHPS School Board incumbent Jacob Wright who put out a statement last week, “…if you believe in what I’ve done, I hope you’ll tell someone else about it…” OK, sure! Let us recount the ways.
Mr. Wright’s publicly available criminal/traffic history shows he has more than 20+ arrests, violations, and infractions on his public record. Among those, he has been arrested four times for public intoxication in Oct 2001, Nov 2004, December 2007, and December 2014. Wright even got a ticket for speeding through a school zone! Then, there was the party in Cool Valley where Wright was allegedly severely intoxicated and partying along with minors and then later, beaten for some reason that no FOIA can touch.
Most upstanding citizens only need once, if any, to learn to remove bad habits. Apparently, that is not the case with Wright. He sure had a busy summer by adding another new speeding ticket to his rap sheet. Then, on July 15, 2024 at the Alleghany Highlands Public School board meeting, Rylee Reynolds publicly accused Wright of inappropriate comments made about her while he was at a local restaurant also in June. She stated Wright was apparently drunk, and repeatedly asked Reynold’s sibling and cousins, “Does anyone know Rylee Reynolds”, “Does anyone know where Rylee Reynolds is”, and “Rylee is so touchy-feely.” And so on. “He did not stop here, but continued to mention my name and how I wouldn’t be coming to pick him up that night.”
Well, of course, Jester Shadow! That’s a Nothing Burger, too! Heck, apparently the AHPS School Board approved of Wright’s performances by giving him a standing, Nothing Burger ovation. Meanwhile, “Rylee the Wrong” was banished to the Wall located in the Wintery North for being a lying, over-imaginative, silly little wench.
Winter’s coming.
I’m out of time, out of coffee, but dear commoners, in reality, we live in a democracy, and it’s completely in your hands whether our Autocratic Empire of Nothingham continues, or not. Will you continue to eat Nothing Burgers, or, with a brave stroke of your voting sword, strike down this darkness and end it? Happy Halloween!
