SAN ANTONIO – For one week this month, any individual strolling during the basement between the Paul Elizondo Tower and the Bexar County Justice Center handed by huge gift baskets on show as a part of a silent public sale.
The baskets had been made up of things donated by workers from the more than a few departments inside the Bexar County District Clerk’s Office, group of workers informed .
Some of the hampers, which incorporated the names “Liquor Basket” and “Lotto Basket,” contained bottles of laborious alcohol, beer, wine, premade blended cocktails and lottery scratch-off tickets.
Some pieces had bids over $200, in step with sign-up sheets positioned in entrance of the hampers.
The public sale’s proceeds would have long past towards an off-site “Christmas Party” for the office run by first-year District Clerk Gloria Martinez, a banner promoting the development displays.
The week-long public sale, which have been scheduled to run between August 8-15, was once all of a sudden canceled after Investigates started asking questions on it.
District clerk workers showed to that they had been tasked with tracking the public sale whilst at the clock. Others informed they had been uncomfortable webhosting an public sale with those kinds of pieces.
The baskets had been in a public thoroughfare that ends up in a courthouse that hears hundreds of playing and alcohol-related prison circumstances every 12 months.
And whilst a county spokeswoman showed the district clerk’s office were given permission to make use of the distance following a request to the county’s amenities division, the development didn’t move to the Bexar County District Attorney’s Office for a moral and felony assessment.
“Nobody contacted us about that.”
Bexar County District Attorney Joe Gonzales declined to inform whether or not he was once on board with the public sale, since he’s the lawyer for the county’s elected officers and didn’t wish to say “anything that might compromise that relationship.”
“Nobody contacted us about that,” stated Gonzales, who showed his office would have introduced a moral and felony opinion at the match had his office been requested.
A district clerk worker who known herself as the pinnacle of the fundraising committee defended the auctioning of alcohol, telling the pieces had been closed and now not being ate up on county assets.
Bexar County’s coverage on playing, having a bet and lotteries prohibits promoting or buying a numbers slip or price ticket whilst on county-owned or leased assets.
Martinez, who took office on Jan. 1, didn’t reply to a telephone name or emails in quest of remark for this tale.
Three district clerk workers who informed they had been tracking the development, showed being at the clock whilst doing so.
A group of workers member known as Martinez’s leader deputy informed this month workers had been intended to be observing over the development most effective whilst on their breaks.
Both occasions recorded photos of the development a couple of district clerk workers requested what we had been doing and if we needed to bid at the pieces.
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