Mayor Speaks Out About “Secret Tapes”

Monroe Mayor Jamie Mayo is speaking out tonight about being secretly recorded by Chief of Police Ron Schleuter.

Last week, NBC 10 News obtained a secret recording between the Monroe Police Chief and the Mayor.

The mayor says he had no idea he was being recorded.

After the recording of the mayor and the police chief leaked out in the community, many questioned why the conversation was recorded in the first place.

The mayor says he's disappointed that the chief would record him and that's spurred a big investigation.

("But I’ve just decided that I’m a no good son of a gun, no matter what I do from a different perspective, said Mayor Jamie Mayo in the secret recording.”  “Right,” responded Chief of Police Ron Schleuter in the secret recording.”   But if I’m going to be a no good son of a gun, I’m going to be a no good son of a gun trying to do the right thing.  Because we can't do nothing if the city is bankrupt,” said Mayo in the recording.)

That’s just a few seconds of a recorded conversation between Monroe Police Chief Ron Schleuter and Monroe Mayor Jamie Mayo talking about the city's budget.

The entire recording reveals Schleuter was wearing some type of recording device.

"There’s no question there's a trust breach there,” Monroe Mayor Jamie Mayo said Monday.

Monroe Jamie Mayo says he never knew he was being recorded and he's disappointed it happened.

"Not just with myself and the chief but also with the other police officers, also with our city council and also with the public as a whole,” said Mayo.

The mayor even says he's found out since then the police chief has other recorded meetings.

The mayor says he's not talked with Chief Schleuter since the recordings, but he says the incident calls for an internal investigation.

“There are allegedly some recordings out there, so that will be part of the process that we'll go through,” said Mayo.

Chief Schleuter refused comment about the situation.

Dr. Kevin Unter is a political science professor at ULM.

He says it doesn't appear that the chief broke any laws by secretly recording people:

"He's not trying or asking to solicit anyone to commit a crime as far as we know so what you have is an individual recording a conversation with another party,” said Unter.

In fact, Louisiana law states that only one person in the conversation has to know a recording device is being used.

Regardless of what the law says, city councilman Jay Marx says recording someone without consent is simply bad business.

"Anymore that I can go around my business with a tape recorder around my business, it leads to mistrust with your employees,” said Marx.           

I spoke to Chief Schleuter on the phone. 

He told me he's out of town and he doesn't want to comment about the situation until he's back at work on Tuesday.

We’ll be there to see what he has to say about all this.