A
AALARD
Guest
Mayor resigns after e-mailing nude photos
TONGANOXIE, Kan., The mayor of a small northeast Kansas city resigned after getting caught for a second time using a city-owned computer to e-mail photographs of a nude woman.
Mike Vestal of Tonganoxie -- a city of 2,800 about 30 miles west of Kansas City, Mo. -- said he resigned so his misdeeds would not sidetrack city business.
"I wanted to get the focus off of me and back to where it really should be," The Kansas City Star quoted him as saying. "The things I did were in the past and I'm not going to do them again, whether people believe that or not."
Vestal told the Lawrence (Kan.) Journal-World he would devote his life to Jesus Christ and hoped to continue serving on an economic development committee.
The e-mail -- which Vestal sent July 14 to the police officer brother of City Councilwoman Paula Crook from a computer Vestal uses for his city-contracted answering service -- contained 14 photos of a nude woman, the Journal-World said.
Cook said she was with her brother at a bingo parlor when he received the e-mail on his BlackBerry mobile e-mail and smartphone device. She said she considered the images "hard-core pornography."
Vestal e-mailed similarly risque images in September 2007 to several friends and, inadvertently, to a Lawrence, Kan., TV reporter.
Tonganoxie City Council President Jason Ward took over as acting mayor, officials said.
Crook called on the City Council to end Vestal's contract to provide the answering service for the city. Vestal receives $1,200 a month to answer non-emergency and administrative calls.
TONGANOXIE, Kan., The mayor of a small northeast Kansas city resigned after getting caught for a second time using a city-owned computer to e-mail photographs of a nude woman.
Mike Vestal of Tonganoxie -- a city of 2,800 about 30 miles west of Kansas City, Mo. -- said he resigned so his misdeeds would not sidetrack city business.
"I wanted to get the focus off of me and back to where it really should be," The Kansas City Star quoted him as saying. "The things I did were in the past and I'm not going to do them again, whether people believe that or not."
Vestal told the Lawrence (Kan.) Journal-World he would devote his life to Jesus Christ and hoped to continue serving on an economic development committee.
The e-mail -- which Vestal sent July 14 to the police officer brother of City Councilwoman Paula Crook from a computer Vestal uses for his city-contracted answering service -- contained 14 photos of a nude woman, the Journal-World said.
Cook said she was with her brother at a bingo parlor when he received the e-mail on his BlackBerry mobile e-mail and smartphone device. She said she considered the images "hard-core pornography."
Vestal e-mailed similarly risque images in September 2007 to several friends and, inadvertently, to a Lawrence, Kan., TV reporter.
Tonganoxie City Council President Jason Ward took over as acting mayor, officials said.
Crook called on the City Council to end Vestal's contract to provide the answering service for the city. Vestal receives $1,200 a month to answer non-emergency and administrative calls.
