A hearing to determine whether the mayor of DeBary is in or out will go forward as scheduled, a circuit court judge ruled Thursday.

  • DeBary mayor hearing to see if he violated city's charter to go forward
  • Judge denies request for temporary injunction
  • City attorneys say Clint Johnson broke rules by telling staff to conduct business

Mayor Clint Johnson’s lawyer failed to show why the court should stop the hearing scheduled for June 1, which resulted in two denials from the judge.

“I am denying the motion, and I am deny the request for a temporary injunction,” ruled Judge Sarah Upchurch with the 7th Judicial Circuit Court in DeLand.

By denying the injunction, a hearing to see whether Johnson violated the city's charter will go forward.

City leaders allege Johnson broke city rules by directly ordering city staff to conduct business, which only the city manager and staff can do.

The city attorneys argued the hearing was to let the public decide whether proceedings should continue to remove the mayor, not the courts.

“I think the judge just wanted to see the process play out,” said Johnson’s attorney, Doug Daniels, a Volusia County councilman as well as a lawyer.

This comes one day after the State Attorney’s Office and Florida Department of Law Enforcement officers confiscated more than 30,000 emails regarding a land acquisition deal between council members and City Manager Dan Parrot to see whether any Sunshine Laws were broken.

Daniels says only council members’ and Parrot’s emails were named in the search warrant, not the mayor’s.

“Why are they so determined to get rid of Mayor Johnson? Why are they determined to get rid of the only city commissioner who was not mentioned in the subpoena, whose email was not subpoenaed?” asked Daniels, with the mayor at his side.

Upchurch told Daniels that was a separate issue and did not permit it to be entered as evidence.

Elected at age 28, Johnson says dealing with council members has been a continual uphill battle, but he remains optimistic about the June 1 hearing.

“To meet this much opposition has been very frustrating. But I intend to give it 100 percent until the very last day, that I am capable, or that I am in a position to do so,” said Johnson before returning to DeBary.