{"id":4790,"date":"2013-12-04T13:16:01","date_gmt":"2013-12-04T18:16:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=4790"},"modified":"2013-12-11T13:24:39","modified_gmt":"2013-12-11T18:24:39","slug":"former-mayor-threw-councillor-under-the-bus-testifies-resident","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/former-mayor-threw-councillor-under-the-bus-testifies-resident\/","title":{"rendered":"Former mayor threw councillor “under the bus”, testifies resident"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Jeff Doner & Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

Former mayor Phyllis Morris threw Councillor Evelyn Buck \u201cunder the bus\u201d in events leading up to the Councillor\u2019s lawsuit against Ms. Morris, and members of the last term of Council. <\/p>\n

These were the words of Aurora resident Peter Storms as he took to the stand as one of the final witnesses called to testify on Councillor Buck\u2019s behalf last week. David Boghosian, lawyer for Ms. Morris, Councillors Wendy Gaertner and John Gallo, and former councillors Stephen Granger, Evelina MacEachern, and Al Wilson made their case the following afternoon. <\/p>\n

Mr. Storms, an Aurora resident of 20 years, and a campaign volunteer for former mayor Tim Jones, told the court he reached out to Councillor Buck\u2019s lawyer that weekend after reading The Auroran. What caught his eye were comments relating to a May, 2009 Council meeting where volunteer Sher St. Kitts came to Council\u2019s Open Forum to raise issue with what she claimed was \u201charassment\u201d from Councillor Buck. <\/p>\n

Mr. Storms said he saw the meeting unfold on television that evening and Ms. Morris did not \u201cdefend\u201d her fellow Council member. He then claimed he had a chance encounter with Ms. Morris at a local supermarket soon after where he mentioned the \u201cinteresting theatre in a recent Council meeting.\u201d <\/p>\n

Mr. Storms said he observed Ms. Morris as \u201cagitated\u201d and \u201calmost angry\u201d before she referred to Councillor Buck as an \u201cold cow\u201d, \u201csenile\u201d, and \u201ca nuisance.\u201d<\/p>\n

It seemed to him, he said, that Ms. Morris had thrown Councillor Buck \u201cunder the bus again.\u201d<\/p>\n

Countering his claims, Mr. Boghosian underscored Mr. Storms\u2019 volunteerism with Mr. Jones\u2019 campaign, including his last mayoral campaign in which Ms. Morris handily beat Mr. Jones to the post.<\/p>\n

Ms. Morris disputed Mr. Storms\u2019 claims on Monday.<\/p>\n

Last Tuesday\u2019s testimony included words from Town Clerk John Leach, and former councillor Grace Marsh who served on the 2006 term of Council until her resignation in 2008, who spoke of her relationship with Councillor Buck during their Council time together.<\/p>\n

\u201cI believe Evelyn is extremely honest,\u201d said Ms. Marsh. \u201cI think she has a high level of integrity with me, personally.\u201d <\/p>\n

Ms. Marsh\u2019s testimony was followed by John Rogers, CAO for the Town of Aurora between 2005 and 2008. Mr. Rogers told the court he had known Ms. Buck professionally for over 25 years and characterized her as an \u201cextremely honest person\u201d with an honesty \u201cso strong and direct you don\u2019t want to hear it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIntegrity has always, in the political arena, been there,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Mr. Boghosian pointed out Mr. Rogers was terminated as CAO by the former Council of which six of his clients were members.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Former mayor Phyllis Morris threw Councillor Evelyn Buck \u201cunder the bus\u201d in events leading up to the Councillor\u2019s lawsuit, the court hears. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4790","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-1fg","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-10 18:07:36","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4790","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4790"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4790\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4790"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4790"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4790"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}