Shawnee puts city manager on leave after employees receive sexually explicit video

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The Shawnee City Council on Wednesday placed the city manager on administrative leave after learning that several city employees received an email from an outside account with a sexually explicit video of him masturbating.

After meeting in closed session for two-and-a-half hours, the council voted unanimously to place Doug Gerber, the city’s top leader, on leave for an unspecific amount of time. The council will meet again on Monday to appoint an interim city manager.

The meeting came two days after The Star filed a Kansas Open Records Act request of emails related to the incident and any subsequent investigations.

Former Shawnee mayor Jim Allen, who also served as a Johnson County commissioner, said during the public portion of the meeting that the incident is “one of the biggest black eyes in the history of Shawnee.”

The Star’s records request is how multiple City Council members and the current mayor said they learned of the incident a month after it happened. The elected officials said they were frustrated that Gerber didn’t inform them of the issue, worried it could be a liability for the city.

“I do personally hope that he resigns. If he doesn’t, we’ll have to take other actions,” Councilwoman Angela Stiens told media after the meeting. “…The people of Shawnee also have a right, and they have to have trust in us as a governing body. And so we have to do the right thing. It does show poor judgment.”

Stiens added, “No one on this council is happy about this. We had no idea whatsoever. This video just came out of nowhere from my understanding.” Stiens questioned and criticized the timing of the news coming out less than a week before city elections.

“Ethically, it was certainly the responsibility of the city manager to advise us that this email did exist at City Hall and with the staff. He really needed to tell us,” Councilman Eric Jenkins told The Star ahead of Wednesday afternoon’s meeting.

A few employees said they were unhappy that no one offered an explanation after they viewed the explicit video. They were unaware of any investigation into the events.

Gerber, who was hired as city manager in March, did not personally send the video to employees. It was emailed to some staff on Sept. 29 by an anonymous third party who, in recent emails with The Star, said they wanted to reveal Gerber’s online behavior.

Gerber can claim victim status under a state law that says it is unlawful to disseminate “any videotape, photograph, film or image of another identifiable person 18 years of age or older who is nude or engaged in sexual activity and under circumstances in which such identifiable person had a reasonable expectation of privacy, with the intent to harass, threaten or intimidate such identifiable person, and such identifiable person did not consent to such dissemination.”

After the video was emailed, a Shawnee information technology employee sent a staff-wide email, obtained by The Star, saying the message had gotten through the city’s email filter because it was a standard video file from a generic outside account. The account was blocked. The email said it was sent by a “disturbed individual trying to cause issues with the city.”

It is unclear when or where the video was taken, or whether it was directly recorded or screen recorded. Gerber has declined to provide details about how it came about, telling The Star at City Hall on Wednesday morning, “I think it’s not in the city’s best interest right now to comment.”

City spokesman Doug Donahoo declined to comment Wednesday.

Reached by the Star through email, the holder of the account that disseminated the video refused to speak by phone. The sender said in an email, “We don’t hesitate to expose people involved in these dubious and un-Catholic practices.”

Gerber was hired amid tension at City Hall, with Shawnee losing several department heads and top staffers over the past couple of years. That’s been a main talking point ahead of the city election on Nov. 7.

Many council members have touted Gerber’s hiring as an example of the city moving forward with strong leadership.

Gerber joined the city in March, where he’s earning a $190,000 annual salary, plus perks, according to his contract. He previously worked for the city of Topeka, where he was hired in 2014 to be financial and administrative services director, and later worked as deputy city manager. His position was terminated in 2020 along with two others, according to the Topeka Capital-Journal. The city said it eliminated the jobs to cut costs during COVID-19.

He later worked for JEO Consulting Group. He also previously served as city manager of both Goodland and Beloit, Kansas.