Viola Plummer

On July 6th, a lawyer for the City Council sent out a request to members asking them to preserve all documents related to "VIOLA PLUMMER "AND THE PROPOSED CO-NAMING OF STREETS FOR SONNY CARSON" because of a lawsuit that Plummer -- the chief of staff to Charles Barron who was recently dismissed from her job by Christine Quinn -- filed against the Council Speaker.

Yesterday, according to sources in one member's office, City Council staffers went looking for those documents.

Aides to one City Council member in the Bronx said that computers in their district office were searched yesterday by members of the “computer services” division of the City Council. Those same aides said they expected to have the computers in their City Hall office searched today.

Plummer filed suit to overturn Quinn's decision to terminate her employment with the Council for saying that a Councilman who opposed a plan to rename a street after black nationalist Sonny Carson should be "assassinated." Plummer said afterwards that she was referring only to killing the Councilman's political career.

I'm still waiting for a comment from Quinn's office about the computer searches.

The email is after the jump.  read more »

Viola Plummer's brief-but-triumphant return to the City Council chambers was greeted with, well, a lot of police.

I got there just after a welcoming committee of officers escorted Plummer to the balcony, since, technically, she doesn't work here anymore. I caught up with Plummer and her boss, Charles Barron, as they were leaving. Barron told me he thought the whole incident was "totally disrespectful" and that the Speaker of the City Council, Christine Quinn, "has lost her mind."

A federal judge ruled just now that the City Council can move forward and fire staffer Viola Plummer if she does not sign a statement promising to behave herself. Plummer, who works for firebrand councilman Charles Barron, landed in this trouble after making outbursts during a Council meeting in May, after which she expressed the hope that someone would "assassinate" one of her opponents. After Council Speaker Christine Quinn moved to punish Plummer last week, the city employee filed a lawsuit.

But losing this legal round didn't prevent Plummer and Barron, from leaving the federal court house in Manhattan with their arms raised in victory. Speaking to reporters after the judge's ruling, Plummer said: "I feel this is a continuation of white supremacy that began when we were kidnapped and brought here."

When asked about the "assassination" remark attributed to her, she said, "In my heart, I believe the words that I used are the words that I said. Straight up, okay?"

Barron, not for the first time, ripped up the apology letter that Plummer had been ordered to sign by 5 p.m. today. Although Plummer's lawyer said his client will likely be fired by the end of this afternoon, Barron predicted that she would be back to work starting Monday (and joked he may even ask her to work the weekend).

Plummer may not return to City Hall, but she will get a day in court, it seems. A jury trial for her civil case is set to begin September 24th.

The unofficial street renaming for black nationalist Sonny Carson is going forward in Brooklyn this Saturday at 4 p.m., according to a City Hall source. And leading the unofficial event will be Charles Barron.

The fact that the City Council already rejected this plan isn't stopping supporters. In fact, I'm guessing this is going to end quite well, politically speaking, for Barron and the Carson supporters: The event is going to draw a crowd, and reporters. The attention could be used to strengthen supporters' claims that the will of the people is being crushed by City Hall. And the (inevitable?)images of the sign being removed by city officials or the police will only add to that perception.

That is, unless Barron's chief of staff Viola Plummer steals the show. Again.

The City Council is beefing up security for two Council members who were the subject of separate (but related) death threats, Christine Quinn told reporters at a press conference earlier today.

The first threat was directed towards Leroy Comrie by Viola Plummer, who is the chief of staff to Charles Barron.

The second was directed at Barron by an anonymous commenter on a popular police chat board.

Quinn said, "We are taking both of these sets of statements incredibly serious. In both matters, we have spoken to the Council member in question. My director of security has spoken to both Council member Comrie and Council member Barron and offered them whatever additional security they believe they need. We’ve offered to do security assessments of their offices."

Quinn said she's spoken to top police officials about whether a police officer may have made the comment about Barron. As for Plummer, Quinn said they are looking into whether she, as an employee of the City Council, can be punished.

"We are researching what our legal options are as a speaker and as an institution to take action," Quinn said.

“If it takes an assassination of his ass, he will not be borough president in the borough where I live.”

That was the chief of staff to Charles Barron speaking about another City Council member, Leroy Comrie, who is black and voted to abstain today on a failed proposal today to rename a street after black nationalist Sonny Carson.

The chief of staff, Viola Plummer, was speaking outside City Hall to a group of reporters and advocates for Carson. When asked about her comments, Plummer later said, “So, to assassinate Leroy Comrie’s ass, because that’s what I said, means his whole stuff, his whole run for Queens Borough President.”

When Plummer was asked by a reporter to identify herself, she first indicated that she lived in Queens and ran a community program in Brooklyn. Later she identified herself as a Council employee.

Plummer’s “assassination” remark was very much in the tradition of the sort of militant language employed by Carson himself. (“I’m not anti-Semitic, I’m anti-white,” he once said.) Carson's supporters have said that it's unfair to judge his entire life by his most extreme comments.