DALE H.

MARKOWITZ BRIDEY MATHENEY OF COUNSEL:

JOSEPH R. ZNIDARSIC CHRISTOPHER A. HOLECEK MATTHEW D. WHEELOCK
HEIDI M. CISAN TANJA M. HOLECEK JAMES P. VITALE
TODD C. HICKS* ELIZABETH E. COLLINS
MATTHEW J. DOLAN SAMUEL T. O’LEARY
J. JAREDD FLYNN RACHEL C. DODDS *ALSO ADMITTED IN NEW YORK
EZIO A. LISTATI CHRISTOPHER R. ELKO ** ALSO ADMITTED IN FLORIDA
A LEGAL PROFESSIONAL ASSOCIATION KELLY A. SLATTERY RAY K. THRASHER (1906-1973)
*** ALSO ADMITTED IN PENNSYLVANIA
WWW.TDDLAW.COM
JOHN R. LIBER, II** JAMES W. DINSMORE (1916-1975)
BRANDON D. R. DYNES LAWRENCE J. DOLAN (RETIRED)
LEO M. SPELLACY, JR. DAVID E. LOWE (1937-2019)
TIM L. COLLINS***

[email protected]

August 19, 2024

VIA REGULAR U.S. MAIL AND

EMAIL - [email protected]

Mark D. Griffin, Esq.

Chief Law Officer
CITY OF CLEVELAND
601 Lakeside Avenue, Room 106
Cleveland, OH 44114

Re: The State of Ohio v. Robert T. George

Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas, Case No. BO-24-5678PW

Dear Mr. Griffin,

Thrasher Dinsmore and Dolan LPA is one of the law firms representing Robert George in
connection with potential claims against the City of Cleveland and some of its employees arising from
the criminal complaint filed against Mr. George on or about August 9, 2024. When a lawsuit is
anticipated, federal and state law require a prospective party to take all reasonable steps to preserve
documents, tangible things, and electronically stored information (ESI) that are potentially relevant
to the anticipated lawsuit and that are in the prospective party's possession, custody, or control. The
duty applies equally to hard copy documents and other tangible things, and to ESI.

As ESI can be easily deleted, corrupted, or modified in the normal operations of a business,
preservation measures must be immediately put in place, including disabling any destruction or
deletion protocols ordinarily in place. These measures include, but are not limited to, those explained
in this letter.
Description of ESI to Be Preserved
ESI that may be subject to a duty to preserve includes information electronically, digitally,
magnetically, or optically stored, including, but not limited to:

PLEASE REPLY TO: CLEVELAND OFFICE

100 7TH AVENUE, SUITE 150, CHARDON, OHIO 44024 · PHONE: (440) 285-2242 · FAX: (440) 285-9423
1282 WEST 58TH STREET, CLEVELAND, OHIO 44102 · PHONE: (216) 255-5431 · FAX: (216) 255-5450
August 19, 2024
Page 2

• Word processed documents, including drafts and revisions

• Audio files

• Calendars, diaries, planners, and data created by to-do list and task
management software

• Text messages, voicemail, and other personal or portable electronic

device data

• Instant messaging and chats

• Spreadsheets, including drafts and revisions

• Databases

• Presentations, including PowerPoint slide presentations

• Email and email attachments

• Accounting software data

• Image, video, and animation data

• Internet usage data, including temporary Internet files, cache files,

browsing and download history, and cookies

• CAD (computer-aided design) files, including drafts and revisions

• Faxes

• Data created with project management software, document

management software, or contact management software

• Social media data

• Network access and server logs

• Archived and backup data

• Data that has been deleted, damaged, erased, or fragmented by a user

or system process and can be recovered through forensic methods

• Legacy data created by software or hardware that is outmoded or

obsolete

This list is not intended to be a comprehensive list of the ESI to which preservation obligations
attach.
August 19, 2024
Page 3

Potential locations of ESI include, but are not limited to:

• One-site and off-site computer systems

• Personal computers and laptops

• Network and email servers

• Voicemail and answering machines

• Cameras and camcorders

• Body cameras

• Paging devices

• Personal digital assistants

• Cordless telephones

• Cellular phones, smart phones, tablets, and other portable devices

• Cloud-based storage

• Social media platforms

Magnetic, optical, and other storage media, including archival and backup media, are also
potential locations of ESI. They include, but are not limited to:
• Hard drives

• Floppy disks

• USB flash drives

• Tape drives

• Cartridges

• CD-ROMs

• DVDs

• Blue-ray disks

• Microfilm and microfiche

• Cloud-based storage
August 19, 2024
Page 4

ESI that is potentially relevant to the contemplated action, and that the City of Cleveland and
its employees should preserve, includes, but is not limited to, ESI generated since the investigation
of Mr. George was initiated that relate to the City’s investigation of Mr. George, all communications
relating to Mr. George, including but not limited to any and all communications that the City believes
to be covered by attorney-client privilege or the attorney-work product doctrine, and the criminal
complaint filed against Mr. George. In addition, potentially relevant ESI should be preserved where
it is in the possession of, or was authored or received by, the following individuals: (1) Aqueelah
Jordan and any other prosecutor from the Cleveland Prosecutor’s office involved in the investigation
of Mr. George, the decision to charge Mr. George criminally and/or had communications regarding
the same; (2) you and any other employees of the Cleveland Law Department involved in the
investigation of Mr. George, the decision to charge Mr. George criminally and/or had
communications regarding the same; (3) staff from the Domestic Violence Unit involved in the
investigation of Mr. George, the decision to charge Mr. George criminally, and/or had
communications regarding the same; (4) employees of the City of Cleveland’s Sex Crimes Unit
involved in the investigation of Mr. George, the decision to charge Mr. George criminally and/or had
communications regarding the same; (5) employees of the City of Cleveland that work in the First
and Third District Police Department that were involved in the investigation of Mr. George, the
decision to charge Mr. George criminally and/or had communications regarding the same, including
but not limited to Detective Emily McKenzie #236, Sgt. Adonna Perez #9324, Detective Courtney
Evans #1672, and Officer Benson #773.

The City of Cleveland and the above-referenced individuals should also preserve any and all
communications related to the attached December 2, 2023 letter sent out to Cuyahoga County
Democratic candidates on behalf of, among others, the Cleveland Stonewall Democrats, of which Ms.
Jordan is an Executive Board Member.

Preservation Duties

To satisfy its preservation duties, the City of Cleveland and the above referenced persons must
take all reasonable measures to preserve all hard copy documents, tangible things, and ESI that are
potentially relevant to the aforementioned anticipated lawsuit, including the ESI described above.
These measures include, but are not limited to:

• Halting the routine document preservation or retention policies and its

backup recycling policies.
• Instituting a litigation hold and monitoring compliance with the hold
on an ongoing basis until this legal matter is fully resolved. A litigation
hold ensures that all sources of potentially relevant information are
identified and preserved.
• Documents and tangible things must be preserved in their original,
unmodified condition. ESI must be preserved in the form in which it is
normally maintained (its native format) with all metadata, both system
metadata and application metadata, intact.
• Preserving all hardware, portable and personal storage devices, and any
other electronic storage devices that contain potentially relevant
August 19, 2024
Page 5

information. The City of Cleveland and the individuals named above

shall not replace, destroy or modify such hardware, and other electronic
storage devices in any manner that could delete, damage or alter the
ESI they store.
• Preserving all support information needed to access potentially relevant
ESI. Support information includes, but is not limited to, operating
systems, installation disks, legacy and other software, operating and
user manuals, user IDs, passwords, security and license keys, and
encryption/decryption information.
Preservation Duties Extend to Departing Employees

The City of Cleveland's preservation duties extend to potentially relevant information in the
possession of employees who depart from the City of Cleveland following the issuance of this letter
or another earlier circumstance that triggers the duty to preserve. Caution should be taken to preserve
the ESI of departing officers, directors, and employees whose data is subject to litigation hold
requirements.
Preservation Duties Extend to Information Controlled, but Not Actually Possessed by
the City of Cleveland

Since a potential party "controls" documents or information when it has the legal right to
obtain them upon demand, the City of Cleveland's preservation duties extend to ESI possessed by its
current and former attorneys, accountants, third-party information technology vendors, business
service providers, and other agents and contractors.

Please do not hesitate to contact us to discuss any of the matters set forth above. We also
welcome the opportunity to discuss with you a mutually agreeable, forensically sound protocol for
preserving information relevant and potentially relevant to the anticipated lawsuit.

Sincerely,
THRASHER DINSMORE & DOLAN, LPA

Leo M. Spellacy, Jr.

December 2, 2023

Dear candidates:

As Democratic voters, we expect our candidates to represent our values. We support

them because they share our vision of the kind of county, state and country in which we
want to live.
1
Assessment by voters of a candidate s judgment and ethics is best done by examining
their deeds, not what they say. In any campaign, "actions speak louder than words,"
especially when it concerns who candidates accept money and where they decide to
spend it.

\lie are wnting to draw attention to a serious lapse of judgment and incongruent values
some candidates manifest when they redirect campaign contributions. to fund raising
venues owned by people with views antithetical to those professed by the candidates.

For example, in 2018 Cuyahoga Count1• wa6 con;;kJ~i"ing ar1 on:.Un&nc-e that made it
illegal for businesses in our county to discriminate against any person based on their
sexual orientation or gender identity..

Would you give money to someone who said the following to the committee considering
the legislation:

"Everybody knows I own 37 res~urants and bars, I'm not dealing with this. You're
going to have us as restaurant and bar owners go to other counties right across
the border because we don't want to deal with these situations."

Interestingly, the speaker, Tony George, expressed that the restaurants and bars owned
by other family members were, in fact, his or under his control and issued a threat that
one journalist says he makes "on a regular basis" when he does not receive what he
wants.

Special caution is also advised when choosing a fundraising venue that fills the coffers
of those known for spreading copious amounts of cash around to candidates including
Donald Trump and numerous other right-wing politicians.

Naivete regarding the role that the George family plays in local politics is unacceptable
-- especially when you consider the following evidence.

Tony George is "Individual B" named in FirstEnergy's deferred prosecution agreement.

Individual B was revealed in the media "to have served as an intermediary between top
FirstEnergy executives, including CEO Chuck Jones, and former GOP Ohio House

1
Speaker Larry Householder" - now serving a 20..year sentence for his part in the $60
million corruption scheme.

This is how Cleveland.com put it:

"New documents reveal a close relationship between Cleveland restaurateur

Tony George and FirstEnergy in the House Bill 6 bribery scheme, with George
acting as an intermediary between top FirstEnergy officials and now-indicted
former House Speaker Larry Householder.

George, who has extensive financial connections with FirstEnergy, was so close
to Householder and FirstEnergy executives that they together attended Donald
Trump's presidential inauguration in 2017,according to Tracy Ashton,
FirstEnergy's assistant controller... " •

Even more worrisome are the exchanges between FirstEnergy CEO Chuck Jones and
Tony George where Jones emails G.eorge that "He's [Larry Householder- the recipient
of the massive bribe] an expensive friend." •

Over the years George and "a dozen.entlties·linked . to George[received] $t0.7.million in

payments" and "while the [PUCO] audit didn't implicate Geor~ in any way" itdid
recommend "that $6.6 million be returned to ratepayers." Qf$pecial note was the
$400,000 the restauranteur received as an "altemative energy ,oon$ultant:'

Another cautionary tale is when Tony George appeared in front <>fCtevel~ndCity

Council to berate them for not choosing.his group, 'fPleffidency, ;vhich ha~ partnered
with bankruptcy~headed FirstEnergy •. sotutionsl .• for.·a.COt'ltraQtbid ..• ~Qt~t.trprisingly,
George and surrogates.continued theirfighttorfKiUQflth~ si~Etand payotce>µncil
members - the· people who had not granted his group the contract~

We would also recommend that.beforedoigg bu~inessWith'the Georgf!s, thatyou·do

your due diligence and examfnetheiractions,.>Thelist••·i~•··•Jong: lri~h.•·prowrtBet:td
controversy; the butlhom--assaultcase at.JoyvnHaH Where ' t>ullhorn-wieldif"lgprotester
faced an 8-year prison term for h~ruse of a btdlh<>rn during. a. prot~ton public>grounds;
and funding candidates with.views diamet~lly opposectto . . youre>wn.

Of special interest. may .be the.obscen1ty-ladE!"'••·t~re«:1tenin9.phon~ cau . • Bobby George

made to the Cleveland police because. they did·. n9t immediately arresttht:l protesters at
his establishment.

As an aspiring candidate and a ffagbearer ofthe pemocrcttic Party, youarewho you

surround yourself with. A heightened sense of due diligence iE> therefore expected of
you. You must ask yourse,lf this question: Are.these the ~ople l want to be associated
with, let alone finance?

2
Sincerely,

YOUNG
DEMOC:RATS