ISLAND COUNTY: Former chair of county GOP loses job, faces jail over mask mandate defiance
Jessie Stensland reports from Island County Superior Court for the Whidbey News-Times. Read the whole story.
A North Whidbey man who once was the leader of the county’s Republican Party lost his job and faces jail time after a jury found him guilty of a felony charge related to his refusal to wear a mask in the Island County Elections Office last year.
Timothy Hazelo is scheduled to be sentenced in Island County Superior Court on Aug. 25. Island County Prosecutor Greg Banks filed a memorandum this week in which he asks the judge to sentence 57-year-old Hazelo to seven days in jail, place him on probation for a year and order him to perform 80 hours of community service for an apolitical nonprofit entity.
On July 10, a jury found Hazelo guilty of unauthorized access to a voting center, a felony, and criminal trespass in the first degree, a gross misdemeanor. In the sentencing memorandum, Banks agrees to vacate the criminal trespass charge to avoid double jeopardy.
Hazelo is facing a standard sentencing range of 0-365 days in jail.
Hazelo is looking to the courts for salvation. He and his attorneys — he now has three — are asking the judge to order a new trial.
They Said It
“The state’s sentencing recommendation is intended to give Mr. Hazelo an opportunity to reflect upon his misguided behavior from the inside of a jail cell,” Banks wrote in the memorandum. “At the same time, the state has no interest in providing Mr. Hazelo a platform from which to continue to raise money and promote his false self-aggrandizing narrative that he is somehow fighting ‘tyranny.’”
“Mr. Hazelo disrespected the institutions and the orderly processes of good governance by his stunt,” Bank wrote in the memorandum. “He disdained the sacrifice and service of a cadre of elderly election workers, whose only motivation was to ensure the public had confidence in the administration of our vital elections. His jocular demeanor on the police body cameras shows that he is not a serious man. For him, it was a lark, complete with multiple videos produced for social media publication. From a position of leadership, he did not take seriously his responsibility to lead.”
If Snohomish County Superior Court Judge Joseph Wilson doesn’t give him a new trial, Hazelo said he and his attorney may appeal….
Hazelo said the cost of an appeal is an important consideration for him.
“At this point I’m going broke and it’s happening fast since I don’t have any employment,” he said, adding that whether he loses his gun ownership and voting rights will also weigh on his decision to appeal.
In addition, Hazelo said he is exploring the idea of suing the company Valiant Integrated Services for wrongful termination. Hazelo worked as a flight simulator technician for the P-8 Poseidon at Naval Air Station Whidbey Island, a job that required security clearance.
He said he disclosed to his company that he was cited last November for alleged disorderly conduct and later charged with a felony. He claims he was told by a security manager for the company that a conviction would not likely affect his security clearance because of the nature of the charge.
It turns out, Hazelo said, that someone at the company failed to disclose the information to Navy officials as required. When the commodore of Patrol and Reconnaissance Wing 10 found out another way, he was not happy about being blindsided and revoked Hazelo’s security clearance. Valiant officials then fired Hazelo, who emphasized that he didn’t blame the commodore for his decision.
“The problem was that the company didn’t disclose it,” he said. “I don’t think it would have been a problem for me if it had been properly disclosed.”
Hazelo said he received an email from a security manager who admitted the failure was the company’s fault. The union is backing him in an effort to get his job back. He is also applying for unemployment and taking odd jobs.
“I never expected to get charged,” he said, “let alone to get to this point.”
