Springfield is still on edge.

Even after a judge issued a reprieve that keeps Haitian immigrants there.

Legal for now.

A former Cuyahoga County Domestic Relations Court judge has pleaded guilty to record tampering.

And Cleveland will have a new approach to responding to 911 calls involving mental health crises.

Ideas is next.

Hello and welcome to ideas I'm Mike McIntyre.

Glad you could join us.

Springfield residents held a prayer vigil this week in support of Haitians living there, as concerns persist over whether their temporary protected status will be revoked.

A judge blocked the Trump administration's order ending protections, but it could be a temporary reprieve.

Former Cuyahoga County Domestic Relations Court Judge Lesley Ann Breezy was on the other side of the gavel this week as she pleaded guilty to records tampering.

Two former First Energy executives on trial on the HB six bribery scandal say payments they made to the man who became the state's top utilities regulator, who later died by suicide, were legitimate business, and that he was the crook who pocketed the cash.

And Cleveland will have a non-police response unit for 911 calls involving people in mental health crisis after passing tarnishes law.

Joining me for the roundtable today from Idea Stream, public media reporter Abby Marshall and supervising producer of newscasts Josh Bruce in Columbus.

Statehouse news bureau chief Karen Kasler.

Let's get ready to roundtable.

A federal judge has issued a reprieve for Springfield's Haitian immigrant population, who are set to lose their temporary protected immigration status on February 3rd.

The community remains on edge, and Karen.

Governor Mike DeWine was on CNN with Dana Bash this week.

He also talked to reporters, you included.

What did he say about the Haitians in Springfield and the attempt to sunset their protection?

Well, first of all, I need to point out that that decision that came out from the judge was really kind of it was it was a nice it was an interesting read.

It it got attention.

I mean, at the very end, the, judge really goes after Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem saying she does not have the facts on her side where she ignored them and that she has a First Amendment right as a person to call immigrants killers, leeches, entitlement junkies, and any other inapt name.

She wants.

Secretary Nome, however, is constrained by both our Constitution and the APA to apply faithfully the facts to the law in implementing the TPS program.

So this was quite a quite a smackdown, I guess, from the judge there.

But when, DeWine spoke to reporters about two hours before he went on the air with, Dana Bash on CNN, he talked about how he thinks Trump should be getting credit for securing the border and that Trump should be focused on getting rid of criminals, violent offenders, but that he's kind of gone too far here.

DeWine is on record saying he supports TPS for Haitians, and so he obviously was pleased with this decision from the judge, but he thinks that, it should stay.

And that puts him at odds with Trump and with, Senator Bernie Marino.

And when you say that he went over the line, one of the words that he used with Dana Bash Bash was that we're at a crossroads with our, immigration enforcement that, yes, people want criminals, criminal immigrants out that then you're going to look at people whose status is not legal.

And then the top of the line of that are people who are damaging to the country.

But these folks are here legally, and that is where we start to have a problem.

DeWine says.

Yeah.

And he says that, you know, one of the problems with moving forward is that these are Haitians who are working in businesses every day.

He's talked before about his concerns of the impact on the economy.

If indeed Thibs was eliminated.

And, you know, he says everybody has rights, the right to different opinions explaining how he is different from Trump and Marino, but he really feels strongly that not only are Haitians with TPS in Ohio really needed, but also there's nowhere for them to go because Haiti is a very dangerous country.

The idea that it's somehow safe for them to go back is, he said, just it's not true.

It's worse than it was before now.

And I think it's interesting that we haven't heard from Senator John Husted on this.

He represented the Dayton area near Springfield in the House and Senate for several years, and we just have not heard what he feels about this.

Yeah.

It's interesting.

The federal government says it's temporary.

This is what Bernie Marino said to temporary protected status means temporary.

Temporary is up.

Time to go back home.

But the whole idea for having temporary protected status is the protected part.

That what you're going back to is a dangerous.

It was dangerous when Haitians came here originally after an earthquake in 2010.

It has worsened since then, according to the U.S.

Department of State.

Traveling to Haiti is not advised for Americans due to kidnaping, crime, terrorist activity, civil unrest, and limited health care.

Yeah.

Dwayne's talked about how the airport has been closed down because you've got gang members shooting at airplanes.

It's a dangerous place.

And Dwayne also talked a little bit yesterday about the kids who have been born in this country since Haitians arrived here.

So he says it's at least 1300 kids, according to the hospital in Springfield.

And those kids, what's going to happen to them if indeed TPS is ended and there's an ice surge and those children, their parents are deported.

So he said the state is trying to work on through children's services and through charitable organizations, trying to figure out how to take care of those kids who might be left behind.

I think if I could just if I could just throw something in here.

Sure.

Yeah.

I think that what's so interesting to me is the political aspect, because politically, DeWine is really walking a thin line.

He really is talking about, you know, he praised Trump yesterday in that interview with Dana Bash.

Oh, the border is secure, but then went on to say, wait a second.

Look, Ohio's growth in the last few years, over half of that has come from immigrants.

We need them here.

We need them working here.

The businesses will suffer, the economy will suffer, and, it's a that's a tough line for him politically to walk that he continues to do and has for some time really.

And Karen, let me ask about that, is politically the right word here because Darren DeWine has done if I were him, I it would be whatever I really believe and that's how I would go fully.

But he seemed maybe at his very heart.

He is one of these sort of sees both sides kind of people.

Well, he basically won in a landslide in 2022.

And so even though he disagrees with Trump on some things, you know, this is a state that supported Donald Trump and voted for him in 2024.

So DeWine has followed along with some of Trump's policies along with this whole period.

But this is an issue, I think, that he really feels strongly about, not only because of the economy in the Springfield area.

Businesses have told him we will not be able to function without these Haitians because they show up to work, they pass drug tests.

We need these folks working in our businesses.

But also he's got deep ties to Haiti.

He's got, there was a school there name for his late daughter.

I think that's still close because of the environment down there.

So he's I think he's looking at this as a kind of a humanitarian situation and saying that these are people who are working, these are not violent offenders and giving Trump credit for going after violent offenders, but saying that's where it should have stopped.

Former Cuyahoga County Domestic Relations Court Judge Lesley Ann Celebrity has pleaded guilty to one felony charge of records tampering and will be sentenced by a visiting judge.

for Abby.

The Marshall Project Cleveland has been following celebrity since 2023.

What did their, reporting reveal about the former judge?

Yeah, and shout out to Mark one day.

He's done some great reporting on this, but it showed that she had a history of assigning cases to a longtime family friend.

Mark to Tory.

And he was someone that helped run her was a finance for her campaign.

And she approved nearly half $1 million in, in fees for cases that he had completed.

And now this is a big No-No.

And there has been a lot of, speculation about this relationship.

And she had resigned in December, but now she will be pleading guilty.

By the way, this is sort of goes back as a family business.

The Tory family has been into receivership business for seven decades.

Her family, obviously James celebrity was her father.

There are other celebrities.

We have a name on the century long of but apparently had also worked with the Tory.

So there had been a relationship there.

And I think, that I want to note that the indictment itself doesn't say that she, that she gave improper money to a receiver.

It simply said that she kind of circumnavigated the rules in order to get cases assigned to her, that she then assigned the receiver to correct.

And, you know, we will see what comes of this.

The prosecutors said that they are not going to be seeking any jail time, but this this does hold up to three years in jail.

So that's not off the table, but we'll we'll just have to see what they seek.

And what is the timeline for for that.

Yeah.

So there will be a sentencing date set sometime.

There will be a sentencing date.

And we will see there, there the Wayne County judge will be coming because there was a lot of obviously conflicts and judges that have recuse themselves.

So he said that he's ordering a pre-sentencing report.

But he says that he's inclined to have probation.

As I said, they are not requesting jail time.

So we'll see how that shakes out.

And I should note that the Tory who was contacted by the Marshall Project, he said none of this is true.

He called it a witch hunt, a witch hunt.

And he said he never took anything from celebrating.

Right.

Opening statements began on the state bribery trial of former First Energy executives Chuck Jones and Michael Dowling.

They're accused of bribing soon to be Public Utilities Commission Chair Sam Randazzo, who died by suicide in 2024.

The defense says Randazzo was the only criminal.

Josh, how did the defense lawyers frame the payments at the center of this case?

Well, first of all, Mike, the both the defendants, Jones and Dowling, have pleaded not guilty.

Opening statements got underway.

The prosecutors, though, say that the men wanted the legislature to pass House Bill six.

This has been a long time coming.

They provided a bill that would provide $1 billion in subsidies for those two nuclear power plants that were owned by that, subsidy of First Energy.

Prosecutors say Jones and Dowling paid Randazzo $4 million.

Not for, not for, a purpose of a bribe, but for something else.

Now, that's not the prosecutors.

That's the defendant.

Oh, I'm sorry.

Yes, the defense says that.

Yes, yes.

Prosecutors are saying it was a bribe.

Pardon me?

Yes.

Defense attorney said that Randazzo, was the criminal, in this case because he kept that money, and it was, not a bribe.

It was a settlement against a consulting matter.

Yeah.

Karen, you kept an eye on this case.

So what did you make of that argument?

Essentially, they're pinning it on the dead guy.

Yeah, it's really interesting.

And it's.

I guess it's not a real big surprise because.

Yes.

Sam Randazzo was charged with both Jones and Dowling, but Randazzo died by suicide in 2024.

And so yeah, I mean, he can't speak for himself at this point.

But the argument is, is just that, that, Jones and Dowling said this was a legitimate business payment.

He was a consultant, and we were paying him for that work that he was, representing some clients, some industrial users.

We were paying him to pay them for the settlement, and that he just kept the money he stole from them.

And nobody suspected that he was a thief.

Nobody knew that he would do this.

And so that's the argument.

And they're they're defending him, that Jones and Dowling are separate defenses here, but they're kind of tying their argument together.

Though they've said very clearly that you will judge each one of them individually while prosecutors have said no, this was a bribe.

This was clearly done because they wanted Randazzo as the chair of the Public Utilities Commission, and this was the payment right before he became the top utility regulator, just before that billion dollars bailout went through.

And then how it benefited them is that when he is in charge, then eventually with the legislature, too, and there's been a whole thing about householder and, Larry Householder, former House speaker, and his conviction.

But HB six then gets passed that benefits FirstEnergy greatly.

Yeah.

I mean, they said the prosecution said a lot of this was about the stock price that both Jones and Dowling, their compensation was tied to the stock price, obviously, as corporate executives, having the stock go up is a good thing.

And so they viewed, according to the prosecution, Randazzo making decisions as the state's top utility regulator, as something he could do to boost First Energy's stock price.

Now, once again on the defense side, they said that's not what they wanted.

They didn't even want Randazzo as chair.

They wanted another guy, that he was a consultant who just basically stole the money.

They paid him as a settlement that he was supposed to pass along to other clients.

This is not going to be a quick trial.

No, two months probably.

And we're going to see there's going to be some names that, people in Columbus, people at the statehouse will know.

But, you know, on the witness list, I believe we've got, governor DeWine and Lieutenant Governor John Houston.

They're other names that I know.

Yeah, exactly.

But I'm not saying that they will be called.

I'm just saying that they are potential witnesses, and nobody has ever accused them of anything in this case.

And this is just one of other cases that are still to follow because these two gentlemen are also facing federal charges, which is where Larry Householder was convicted in federal court.

He is trying to appeal that.

And we've had heard that he was going to try to get a, pardon from President Trump.

But this case is I mean, it's been in House Bill six passed in 2019, and we are not through all of this yet.

Specially trained social workers will respond to nonviolent 911 calls following the passage of Tunisia's law by Cleveland City Council.

The ordinance honors Clevelander Tanisha Anderson, who died after being restrained when police responded to a call as she was experiencing a mental health crisis in 2014.

So, Abby, what does it change about the way the city responds?

So in the past, if you called and said someone is acting out, police would come.

Now what would happen would be someone trained in this type of thing as a dispatcher would hear that and do what?

Yeah.

So they are required now to hire these dispatchers that can identify those calls.

So, you know, someone might not explicitly say, hey, this person is having a mental health crisis, but they're supposed to understand, in those situations when they can send out licensed social workers and people that are more equipped to deal with, someone experiencing a mental health crisis that isn't police, you know, someone that necessarily doesn't have a gun or doesn't, isn't doing law enforcement necessarily.

It's taking care of the person that's in crisis.

There was, a long time debate about this, about whether that would be a cabinet level position completely separate from the from the police or EMS or fire area.

And that was a sticking point that got resolved with compromise.

It is going to be part of EMS, right?

So originally the idea was the way the legislation had been originally pitched was to have a separate department that would take care of that.

That was something that Mayor Justin Bibbs administration pushed back on.

So through compromise with council, they said that this will be a bureau within EMS.

So basically EMS will divert, that call and there will be a separate bureau of people that will handle this.

I was shocked when I looked at the timeline for this, because I guess I've been in this business too long, but I couldn't believe that Tanisha Anderson, which is sort of how this started her, her death, how that happened 12 years ago.

It was 12 years in the making.

This thing, it wasn't introduced, though, until two years ago on the ten year anniversary.

Tell me about that process.

And and who introduced it?

Yeah.

So Michael Anderson, which is Tunisia, Anderson's uncle, worked with case Western Reserve law students that helped to develop this legislation.

They brought it to council.

Stephanie House Jones, Rebecca Moore, a former council member.

Rebecca Moore, and Charles life, they all kind of steward this through.

Stephanie House Jones was really a huge advocate for pushing this through through the last few years.

But yeah, for those that don't know, Tanisha Anderson was a 37 year old woman.

She was the police were called to her house, for while she was experiencing a mental health crisis, she, resisted getting in the car after she had agreed to go.

And then she died from a takedown move by police.

And it's actually a case that helped get Cleveland in the situation.

It's in right now with its consent decree.

Where the Department of Justice found that Cleveland police was using, too much unnecessary force.

And we should note, though, the consent decree, which is now been around for more than a decade.

Right.

The latest report, which came out Wednesday and Matt Richmond covered, actually has some promising news about use of force.

Yeah, they were looking through the 2024 uses of force.

There was a 772 use of force cases.

And they found that use of force, in 97% of cases was necessary, proportional and reasonable.

That's according to the consent decree.

So they are making progress.

I know Cleveland, because of how, well, obviously, just in addition to having a police force that takes care of its residents, they're also eager to get out because it costs a lot of money to be in a federal consent decree and have this process, progress monitoring.

Right.

That 97% was based on a review of 272 use of force cases, nearly all in 2020, nearly all from 2044.

All right.

And interestingly, on a national level, and I heard a report on this on NPR today, the idea that the administration, the Trump administration, has pulled back on other lawsuits that would compel, consent decrees.

So Cleveland's is still in one, but there are a lot of others that might be in it.

But for the idea of the federal government isn't pushing for these anymore.

There's been a lot of talk about that where, Trump has indicated that, you know, policing consent decrees.

We should pull back on that.

Now, again, like I said, Cleveland is eager to get out of it, but they've also been in it for a decade.

So they have made, progress in some ways.

They've instituted all of these different policies.

And we even just talked about this law that just passed.

So they want to get out of it, but they want to make sure that it's for the right reasons.

You know, that progress has been made, that they have achieved these milestones, that sort of thing.

You know, if I can just add really quick, Abby, you and I talked about this a little bit.

I watch a lot of these meetings for our newscasts, you know, every single week.

And what really struck me about this, about Tunisia's law in particular, everybody was congratulating each other.

There's usually a lot of tension in these meetings, right?

Everybody's at arms.

But this was a little different.

Councilman Brian Casey was really praising How's Jones talking about the dedication?

He even went on to say at one point, I remember, this is going to be your legacy, essentially.

Yeah.

And that doesn't happen at these meetings very often.

So this was pretty this was substantial.

Yeah.

No.

Yeah.

House Jones got emotional.

There was applause in chambers.

It was, very well.

A lot of the council people felt very proud to pass this.

MetroHealth president and CEO Doctor Christine Alexander Rager says the system is stabilizing after a rough financial year.

In her state of the system address, she also opposed Cleveland Clinic's proposed level one trauma center.

Josh, let's first talk about the financial performance.

It was really dire, it seemed.

And when we hear all this news about Medicaid cuts coming through and uncompensated charity care going through the roof for them, it's a win to say we only lost a little.

Big win.

And Taylor Wisner, my colleague here did it.

Our colleague did a fantastic job over the last week when she I think it was just yesterday when she, reported on this.

Yeah.

Look, if these cuts had not come, if these cuts were not put in place, the cuts that we've been reporting on for some time, this would likely be a different story.

And that's what Doctor Alexander Rager was saying, that, you know, they expect to finish close to budget.

The all the hard numbers are not in just yet, but this was a smaller shortfall.

But it could have been much worse.

Far different than the Cleveland Clinic's annual state of the clinic, in which $18 billion in revenue was reported.

And they were clearly in the black.

And still the clinic is now saying, we want to do even more.

We want a level one trauma center.

We want to build that at our downtown campus within the next two years.

That's got Alexander Rager alarmed because Metro Health has traditionally been the level one trauma center.

Metro.

I'm sorry.

Yeah.

Metro health has university hospitals built one as well, which presented some challenges in the last decade, but it has always been known as the hospital for level one trauma care.

What is her argument that another trauma center would be bad?

Well, spreading it, spreading the cases out essentially against different hospitals, making it difficult for providers.

Obviously, when you go from one system to another system from Cleveland Clinic to the metro.

So, that's that was her main concern.

She spent a lot of her speech, though, talking about that, very frustrated.

The Cleveland Clinic, though, said just, a couple of weeks ago when they gave their state of the clinic speech that this is something that they need.

This is something they want for the exact opposite reason.

They want it to be within their system.

So it's easier to manipulate, their patients within their, within their system.

I thought it was interesting that Alexander Rieger, in addition to the idea that patients would move to different hospital systems, were saying that to have a level one trauma center, you need to have regular business.

The idea is you need to practice, you need to have that.

And they're not appointments.

These are level one trauma.

These are massive car accidents and other types of things.

And so that if you have it spread out, then perhaps you're going to get fewer of those cases.

You don't have as much of that experience, which is really how this thing goes.

And then moving it to your surgery center and those types of things, that having more is not necessarily good for the community.

Having fewer might be better because the people doing it then are more practiced and more skilled, and it would be in a concentrated area.

Interesting.

Also, they talked at Metro Health.

They didn't talk during this speech, but we should note they are facing two lawsuits from both of their previous CEOs, Erica Steed and Akram Boutros.

So there are a number of, of headwinds that, Metro Health is navigating.

We aren't able to see then what will happen in the next year if these if these lawsuits don't go their way, if the, if the Medicaid does get cut, there's still a lot of concern about the safety net hospital.

Yeah.

And I think there's just a lot of concern too in the community, people looking at this thing.

What exactly is going on.

Because it's been a tumultuous, past few years here.

Erica Steed, the former president and CEO, alleges that she was the target of discrimination.

She was a target of harassment since day one.

Really?

That lawsuit that came out saying, immediately upon commencing her job is the quote, that that she faced discrimination and harassment.

And she was also, she claims, subjected to a heightened degree of scrutiny.

So, not only that, but then this other with, Akram Boutrous, the former former CEO, there's a lawsuit that's on hold right now as they go through, the lawyers go through different evidence.

In that case.

All right, House Bill 524 would levy fines of up to $50,000 on software companies if their AI models suggest, or encourage self-harm or public violence.

Karen, let's talk about the bill's sponsors, what they intended to do, and also are AI devices or chat bots or those types things.

Are they telling people to hurt themselves?

Well, I think there was a pretty high profile case.

I think it was out of Massachusetts where, a family of a young man who died by suicide claimed that it was, some sort of a chat bot or something that kind of led him down that path.

And I think there's been a concern that these chat bots, sometimes they can suggest things that maybe would not be the best choice for a person.

And so this bill from Representative Christine Coakley, who is a Democrat, and Ty Matthews, who is a Republican, would aim to protect kids and also have some fines attached.

And that fine revenue would go to the 988 suicide and Crisis Lifeline.

So you've got the Ohio Suicide Prevention Group that's saying this is a really good idea and we support this.

Right.

You mentioned the one case, Tony Coder, who is the CEO of the Ohio Suicide Prevention Foundation, says he knows of at least four cases where victims used AI to write suicide notes before taking their own lives.

He also noted that only 22% of teenagers who turn to AI for mental health advice get an appropriate response.

So it's another thing they're using AI as their therapist and it isn't adequate.

Yeah, and that's really part of the whole problem here about access to mental health treatment.

I mean, it's it's when when you can't get an appointment or you feel that there's too much of a stigma to ask your you're ashamed to ask what you shouldn't be, but it's still out there.

Maybe you turn to AI and that's shown to be not the greatest idea, especially if you're a young person who could be very vulnerable to some of these suggestions.

So this is this is the kind of bill that I think having a Republican and Democrat on it means that it might move, because quite often if there are only Democrats on bills, they don't move.

But this is one I think that's going to get some support, though.

There are some, advocates who want to see fewer regulations on things that might have some concerns.

And of course, advocates for free speech might have some concerns.

Monday on the Sound of Ideas on 89 seven WKSU.

We begin a week of in-depth coverage through each day as part of Idea Stream explores artificial intelligence.

We'll examine all kinds of ways AI is impacting our lives in Northeast Ohio, and Monday Show will focus on how to prepare young people for careers as AI transforms the workplace.

I'm Mike McIntyre.

Thank you so much for watching and stay safe.