Marion, Kansas, Vice Mayor Ruth Herbel wants the police chief suspended following a series of "illegal" raids that included her home and the office of a local newspaper.
Herbel said during a City Council meeting on Monday that her computer and phone were seized with "no justification" during the raid.
She also said the Aug. 11 search at her residence was "illegal."
Herbel's home, the Marion County Record’s newsroom, and its publisher Eric Meyer’s home were all searched following Marion Police Chief Gideon Cody's stated belief that a reporter had committed identity theft by accessing the driver records of a restaurant owner, according to court documents previously released by the paper's attorney.
Cody wrote in affidavits that "downloading the document involved either impersonating the victim or lying about the reasons why the record was being sought." Marion County Attorney Joel Ensey later said that police did not have enough evidence to justify the raids and asked them to return any property that was taken.
Herbel accused Cody of falsifying the documents used to obtain the search warrants.
"The county attorney withdrew all search warrants and then he falsified the documents by changing the warrants after it had been served to me by changing the words 'identity theft and unlawful acts concerning computers' to 'identity theft and official misconduct' before filing the warrant in district court," she said. "This is criminal fraud."
She said Cody needs to be suspended while the Kansas Bureau of Investigation completes its investigation.
The police department did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Wednesday.
The newspaper has also said that the raid was unjustified. A day after the search at Eric Meyer’s home his 98-year-old mother, Record co-owner Joan Meyer, died. He blamed her death on stress caused by the police search.
The reporter, Phyllis Zorn, found the restaurant owner Kari Newell’s driver’s record by routinely using the state Revenue Department’s online search engine, the newspaper said. Zorn looked into the records after the newspaper said it received a tip that Newell was convicted of a DUI in 2008 and wanted to know whether that would prevent her from having a liquor license. The newspaper said it even asked police about the tip.
Herbel has received the same tip about Newell’s DUI.
After the newspaper confirmed Newell's DUI it did not initially report on it. The information wasn't published in the newspaper until Newell revealed it at a City Council meeting where she accused the paper of using illegal means to obtain the information.