XPost: la.general, alt.politics.media, alt.business
XPost: dc.politics
Democratic Party megadonor Ed Buck faces new questions this week
after Los Angeles County sheriff’s detectives opened an
investigation into the second death of a man -- identified by a
medical examiner as 55-year-old Timothy Dean -- at Buck's home
in less than two years, and a third man came forward with an
account of what he described as his drug-fueled interactions
with the well-connected Californian.
Deputies in West Hollywood responded early Monday morning to a
report of a person not breathing at Buck's home, and county
firefighters pronounced the man dead. The cause of the death
will be determined by the coroner, according to Nicole Nishida,
a spokeswoman for the sheriff’s department.
But, critics are questioning whether Buck's race — both men
found dead were black — or if his wealth or political ties to
the Democratic Party influenced an initial investigation of the
64-year-old who has donated tens of thousands of dollars to a
slew of liberal causes and candidates over the years, including
Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and a who's who of top California
politicians.
“He definitely has not been cooperative, as his attorney says.
He refused to answer any questions when I tried speaking with
him,” Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department Homicide
Investigator Quilmes Rodriguez told Fox News via email Wednesday
night.
Protesters call for prosecution of Ed Buck after second man
found dead at the Democratic donor's homeVideo
Officials said the investigation of the second death will
include a review of Gemmel Moore's death in 2017. After a slow-
moving investigation that went on for months, Buck was not
charged.
“On July 27, 2017 there was a death investigation of a male
adult, Gemmel Moore, who was determined to have overdosed at the
same location. Mr. Edward Buck was present during both
incidents,” said a recent statement from the Los Angeles County
Sheriff's Department.
The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office said the
“admissible evidence is insufficient to prove beyond a
reasonable doubt” that Buck gave Moore drugs or is responsible
for his death in a document dated July 26 obtained by Fox News.
An autopsy report said Moore died of a methamphetamine overdose.
Meanwhile, on Wednesday, The Daily Mail published an account by
Jermaine Gagnon, a 28-year-old who claimed he narrowly escaped
death in Buck’s apartment. Gagnon claimed to have met Buck
online in April 2018 and said the Democratic megadonor flew him
from Minnesota to Los Angeles.
“He was quite open about being very generous to the black
community,” Gagnon said. “I’m his type, and pretty much half of
the black community is his type — vulnerable, depressed. If
you’re in a depressive state, that’s the energy that feeds him.”
Gagnon claims Buck injected him with crystal methamphetamine at
his sex toy-filled apartment.
“He took my phone. I was so scared. I felt death walked into my
soul. I called my mother. I said, ‘I feel like he’s going to
kill me, I think I’m going to die," he told The Daily Mail.
Following the discovery of the body Monday morning at Buck's
apartment, his attorney, Seymour Amster, said his client has not
been arrested and is cooperating with investigators.
“From what I know, it was an old friend who died of an
accidental overdose, and unfortunately, we believe that the
substance was ingested at some place other than the apartment,”
Amster said. “The person came over intoxicated.”
Amster, however, did not return Fox News' emails and phone calls
about the Gagnon report.
Buck's apartment was the site of a massive protest Monday night.
“Arrest Ed Buck, prosecute Ed Buck, and then a jury needs to
convict Ed Buck,” activist Jasmyne Cannick said to a crowd
during the demonstration. “This man has had two dead bodies in
his house, and he is still in his house.”
“This man is a danger to our community," said another
demonstrator.
Buck’s support of political causes began in 1987 in Arizona.
That year, The New York Times described Buck, then a registered
Republican, as a “33-year-old millionaire entrepreneur who
retired from the insurance service business a year ago” to
become politically active.
He took the reins of a recall drive that year against then-Gov.
Evan Mecham, a Republican who'd drawn widespread publicity for
canceling a Martin Luther King Jr. holiday for state workers.
During the campaign, it was disclosed that Buck had been
arrested twice. He was accused of public indecency in an adult
bookstore in 1983, and in 1987 faced a charge of obtaining a
drug without a proper prescription. The public indecency charge
was reduced to disturbing the peace, and Buck paid a $26 fine.
Prosecution in the drug case was suspended after he agreed to
counseling.
Although Buck has given more than $500,000 to Democratic
candidates and groups over the years, a number of politicians
returned those donations after Fox News’ reporting on Moore’s
death. Buck’s own congressman, Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff, who
received $2,700 in 2016, previously told Fox News that he
donated the full amount to an LGBT nonprofit. A campaign
spokesperson for Arizona Sen. Krysten Sinema told Fox last year
that she donated $18,800 she’d received from Buck to the UMOM
New Day Center.
In addition, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti told Fox News that
he returned a $1,400 donation from Buck last year. The first
elected official to return a donation from Buck was California
Rep. Karen Bass, who gave her $250 donation to Moore’s family
well over a year ago. Rep. Ted Lieu of California recently told
the Associated Press that he was “deeply disturbed” by the
disclosure of a second death at Buck’s home and was giving
Buck’s donations to charity.
Still, not every politician repudiated Buck. West Hollywood
Mayor John Heilman previously told Fox News that he had “no
intention” of returning a $500 donation he received from Buck.
Cannick, on her website, has a list of political figures and
organizations that have received donations from him and whether
or not they have been returned.
Buck is a past candidate for the West Hollywood City Council and
is well known in LGBTQ political circles. In response to the
latest death, the Los Angeles LGBT Center called for a full
investigation. “While much is still to be learned, it appears
this tragedy is linked to substance use. LGBT people and other
marginalized groups are at elevated risk for impacts that result
from the current epidemic uses of opioids, methamphetamine, and
other dangerous drugs,” the center said.
“It says a lot about the dark underbelly of gay culture and West
Hollywood,” Steve Martin, a former West Hollywood city
councilman who is gay, told The Los Angeles Times. “We always
are slapping ourselves on the back about how open-minded and
diverse we are, and frankly the residents know that’s not always
the case. When an incident like this comes up, it makes us
confront a lot of issues that are really uncomfortable.”
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/ed-buck-california-democratic- megadonor-second-death-sharpened-focus
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