Dean Plocher's not the first — MO House Speakers have a history of landing in hot water

Missouri has seen its share of political scandals, and recent accusations levied at Missouri Speaker of the House Dean Plocher are just the latest in a litany of controversies.

While many remember the 2018 resignation of former Gov. Eric Greitens following accusations of sexual misconduct and improper fundraising actions, which garnered national attention, there have been a handful of Missouri House Speakers involved in scandals prior to Plocher.

This list, which is by no means exhaustive, spans back to the 1970s, and includes former speakers Richard Rabbitt, Bob Griffin, Rod Jetton and John Diehl.

Plocher faces scrutiny for three reasons — his zealous push for an expensive information management program for the Missouri House, the firing of long-time chief-of-staff Kenny Ross and his requests to be reimbursed with public funds for expenses he already paid for with campaign cash.

Plocher, who announced his intention to run for Lieutenant Governor last month, could not be reached for comment for this story.

In late September, reporting by the Missouri Independent found that Plocher pushed for a private company to receive a lucrative contract — worth about $400,000 annually — to provide a constituent management program for legislators, a service that the staff of the Missouri House of Representatives already provides for free.

Apart from being costly, the system would have been web-based, making it susceptible to hacking and data leaks. In public records uncovered through Missouri Sunshine Law requests, Plocher appears to have threatened the employment of Dana Miller, chief clerk of the House and a staffer since 2001, who disagreed with Plocher’s plan.

A House committee agreed with Miller’s assertions, and unanimously decided against adopting the system. An FBI agent attended this hearing, a fact reported by the Independent and corroborated by three witnesses who also attended.

In the weeks that followed, Plocher fired his chief-of-staff, Kenny Ross, who had served in the role with the last three Republican speakers — Todd Richardson, Elijah Haahr and Rob Vescovo.

Plocher said that this was planned, and no further clarification was given on the staffing shake-up. Ross was immediately hired as director of strategic initiatives for Senate President Pro Tem Caleb Rowden.

On Oct. 23, the Missouri Independent released the findings of a weeks-long investigation into Plocher’s expense reimbursements, finding that on at least nine occasions since 2018, Plocher has requested to be reimbursed for expenses funded from his campaign accounts.

Campaign money can be used for official state business, but that money cannot then be reimbursed by the state government. Only expenses covered with personal funds, not those collected from donors, can be claimed for reimbursement from the Missouri House of Representatives. Doing so could be in violation of state and federal laws.

Plocher faces calls to resign, which he says he will not heed

Since then, Plocher, R-Des Peres, has been plagued by public calls to resign from fellow legislators, primarily Republicans. Republican gubernatorial candidate Bill Eigel said on X, "When people say, throw the bums out, they’re thinking about politicians like Dean Plocher.”

Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft, who is also running for governor as a Republican in 2024, called the allegations against Plocher “significant and serious.”

“I call on the legislature to swiftly investigate and, if proven, to take action to protect the integrity of the House of Representatives and the people’s money,” Ashcroft said on X.

Plocher challenged his critics on social media, levying a personal attack at Ashcroft, who never completed a stint at the United States Merchant Marine Academy.

“Last I checked all dropouts have to pay back the people's money,” Plocher wrote on X. “Jay, don't throw rocks when you live in a glasshouse.”

Will Scharf, a Republican candidate for Missouri Attorney General in 2024, also earned a personal rebuke from Plocher after saying on X, “Speaker Plocher owes Missouri taxpayers an explanation, and if he can’t provide one he should resign.”

Plocher recalled Scharf’s previous employment as policy director for disgraced former Gov. Eric Greitens, who faced scrutiny after using a message-deleting app called Confide to communicate with his staff. An investigation by former state Attorney General Josh Hawley cleared staffers of wrongdoing.

“I hope the investigation into your ethics issues is as thorough as Hawley’s was into the use of confide,” Scharf wrote on X. “Hawley found that I hadn’t done anything wrong. What will the investigation into you find, Dean?”

Plocher said that his wife, who is also the treasurer of his campaign committee, alerted him to the accounting errors prior to the release of the Independent’s investigation. He began paying the state back on Oct. 20, two weeks after his expense reports had been requested through state open records laws.

“We self-reported and immediately corrected the administrative errors referenced,” Plocher wrote on X. “Missourians deserve complete transparency and accountability from their elected representatives, which I’ve delivered and will continue to deliver as Speaker.”

So far, Plocher has repaid nearly $4,000 wrongfully claimed from the state through these administrative errors.

He does have a few supporters in the Missouri House who have publicly stood behind him. Rep. Brian Seitz, R-Branson, wrote on X, “When mistakes are made, it is our job to rectify them. In this case, that’s what happened.”

He urged his fellow Republicans to “follow Reagan’s 11th commandment, ‘Thou shall not speak ill of another Republican.’” Plocher even earned a bipartisan supporter in Rep. Ian Mackey, D-St. Louis, who supported Seitz’s comments in a post on X.

“There is no reason for Dean to step down,” Mackey wrote. “Donald Trump is being charged with 94 felonies including an insurrection and he’s being given the presumption of innocence. Why not Dean? And as a Democrat I can say Dean’s been a great Speaker to work with.”

But one critic could cause continued concerns for Plocher. Former state Sen. Bob Onder, a Republican who represented parts of St. Charles County, accused Plocher of being “the Swamp,” and called for his resignation.

“That's like the bank robber who gets caught at the door of the bank, hands back the bag of money, and says, 'We're all good now.' Or, the kid who gets caught with his hand in the cookie jar and said, 'I'll give the cookie back,” Onder wrote on X.

Onder has since indicated that he will likely challenge Plocher’s bid for the Republican nomination for Lieutenant Governor in 2024.

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From the mid-70s to the late 90s, two Missouri House Speakers were embroiled in turmoil

The office of the Speaker of the Missouri House of Representatives is often regarded as the second most powerful political position in state government. The speaker is elected by members of the House and has the responsibility of leading proceedings in the chamber. Other duties include assigning legislation to various House committees.

If history has shown anything, it's that occasionally some people in positions of power will use their authority in ways that are unethical or illegal. While all of the following speakers helped accomplish some great things for the people of Missouri through legislation, those good deeds are often overshadowed by their tarnished legacies.

Although there were undoubtedly others before him, Richard J. Rabbitt Sr., who served as Missouri Speaker of the House from 1972 to 1976, leads the look back at former speakers who have found themselves in hot water.

Rabbitt, a Democrat from Des Peres, was first elected to the Missouri House in 1960, serving a total of eight terms. This was prior to the enactment of term limits for Missouri politicians in 1992.

For three of those terms he served as House majority floor leader, from 1967 to 1972 prior to accepting the role of speaker, a position that he vacated earlier than planned when he launched a campaign for Lieutenant Governor.

In 1977, Rabbitt was indicted by a grand jury on eleven counts of mail fraud, three counts of extortion and one count of attempted extortion, all committed during his time in the Missouri legislature.

These charges were levied due to Rabbitt’s acceptance of a bribe to help auto dealers in the state skirt an inventory tax; solicitation of a bribe to be paid in the form of legal services from Rabbitt if he pushed for authorization for Missouri truckers to operate heavier trucks; and agreements to help a law firm obtain state architectural contracts.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit heard his appeal in 1978, dismissing 11 of the charges, but sustaining three counts of extortion and one count of mail fraud. His debt to society was deemed fulfilled through his two years spent in prison.

He was released in 1980, but he was disbarred for 18 years. However, Rabbitt eventually regained his law license and practiced until retirement. In his return to the public sector, he dedicated much of his time to local churches and charities. He died in 2011.

Following just a few years behind Rabbitt as Missouri House Speaker was Bob F. Griffin, who held the position from 1981-1996, the longest term for any speaker in the state. Griffin, D-Cameron, was first elected to the Missouri House in 1971.

Allegations of corruption appeared in 1992, when Griffin allegedly told members of Kansas City construction coalitions to hire Cathryn Simmons as a lobbyist. Griffin was accused of receiving a kickback from Simmons when hired and another when favorable legislation was passed.

This marked the beginning of a succession of alleged kickbacks between Griffin and Simmons, some of which Griffin defended by saying he was doing outside legal work for Simmons. After facing scrutiny for these dealings, he resigned at the end of January 1996.

He was indicted on October 31, 1996 with two counts of mail fraud, six counts of bribery and one Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, or RICO, violation. He was found innocent on three charges in the first trial, with no verdict given by the jury on the remainder of the charges.

However, in a second trial in 1998, Simmons and another party involved were set to testify against Griffin. On the first day of the trial, he pled guilty to two counts of bribery and one count of mail fraud, earning a sentence of 48 months in prison, a $7,500 fine, and a $100 special penalty assessment.

In 2001, former President Bill Clinton commuted his remaining sentence in his final days in office. Griffin refrained from reentering the political fray and died in 2021.

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Scandals with two more Missouri speakers since the turn of the century

Another former Missouri House Speaker who made headlines for all the wrong reasons was Rod Jetton, R-Marble Hill. He was elected to the House in 2000, and served as speaker from 2005-2009.

In late 2009, Jetton was charged with felony assault after engaging in sadomasochistic sex with a woman named Mary Elizabeth Lowe, who alleged Jetton choked her to the point of unconsciousness during intercourse. At this time, Jetton had left the House and was running a political consultant business.

The two had exchanged text messages planning to meet up for “rough sex,” but Lowe later alleged that she struggled against Jetton’s advances, eventually succumbing to unconsciousness from either choking or wine that was poured for her out of her line of sight.

The two had established a “safe word” — "green balloons" — that would have indicated to the other that the activity had gone too far and should stop. Jetton is said to have told the woman the next morning following the encounter, “You should have said green balloons.”

After initially pleading not guilty to the felony assault charge, Jetton entered a guilty plea for a lesser misdemeanor assault charge and was sentenced to probation, as well as to pay restitution to Lowe and court fees to New Madrid County.

Following this ordeal, Jetton told a St. Louis Post-Dispatch columnist that he couldn’t even get hired as a garbage truck driver. He worked his way out of despondency by authoring a book on navigating political crises and other works on personal crises with Christian overtones.

Jetton recently reemerged in the public sector, and he now works as Deputy Director of the Department of Revenue’s motor vehicles and drivers’ license division. When current Missouri Speaker Plocher fired his chief-of-staff, Jetton’s name was one mentioned to fill the position, though there is no word on whether Jetton is considering the position.

Perhaps more familiar to some is the 2015 controversy surrounding John Diehl, R-Town and Country. He served in the Missouri House from 2009 to 2015, finally gaining the office of speaker in 2015.

His ascension to power was short-lived and mired in controversy, as he was found to have sent sexually-charged text messages to a 19-year-old intern from Missouri Southern State University in an investigation by the Kansas City Star.

The day after the Star’s article was released, including damning screenshots of text messages between Diehl and the college freshman, he resigned from office.

Diehl reemerged on the scene in 2018 as the part owner of a cobalt mining company, Missouri Cobalt LLC, hoping to set up operations in southeast Missouri.

He has stayed mostly out of the public eye, although he also serves as vice president and general counsel for Environmental Operations Inc., a St. Louis-based company specializing in environmental remediation projects.

This company was at the center of an FBI investigation concerning contracts it won to demolish a power plant in Missouri City, even though its quote was far above the next closest bidder. No criminal charges have been filed as a result of the investigation.

However, in May, Diehl was fined $47,000 by the Missouri Ethics Commission. His campaign committee still has funds, which the body governing campaign finance found he had misused for personal, non-campaign expenses.

Ironically enough, when Diehl resigned from office in 2015, Plocher was elected to succeed him in a special election. And, during a live-streamed interview on Oct. 26 with “This Week in Missouri Politics,” a weekly state political talk-show, Plocher’s phone received a call from Diehl’s number.

“Sorry about that,” Plocher said in the video. “I got a call coming in. I didn’t mute that.”

This article originally appeared on Springfield News-Leader: Power corrupts? A history of Missouri’s scandalous House Speakers