Records and police reports shine light on Sarasota commission candidate's temperament

SARASOTA — Court records and police reports shine a light on Sarasota City Commission candidate Martin Hyde's temperament, which is equally the focus of some opponents' concerns and the punchlines of his own jokes.

Documents filed during Hyde's lengthy 2010 divorce reveal accusations, later dropped, that he threatened his ex-wife, and police reports detail heated exchanges with officers during traffic incidents.

Despite the accounts, Hyde has never been charged, investigated or arrested. Allegations about his threatening behavior during his divorce were included in a request for an injunction, which was turned down by one judge, and a separate motion for contempt, which was withdrawn later, records show.

Hyde dismissed the incidents in the documents as unfounded or one-sided accounts, noting the dropped allegation from his divorce repeatedly has been used politically to try to smear his character.

The outspoken businessman acknowledged he sometimes rubs people the wrong way — regularly joking "you don't have to like me," just his ideas, in his speeches at candidate forums — but he argues any accusations that he is dangerous or an "active social misfit" are unfounded and potentially defamatory.

The court document detailing Hyde's ex-wife's allegations was circulated by email recently to several journalists, after which the Herald-Tribune reviewed the remainder of the documents in Hyde's divorce case. The newspaper then requested police incident records involving Hyde from the Sarasota Police Department and Sarasota County Sheriff's Office. 

The divorce record is regularly referenced privately by city officials and people who have supported other candidates in the city race as evidence that Hyde's temperament makes him unfit for office — something he vehemently denies.

"I’ve not put my hands on anyone; I’ve never been arrested; I’ve never missed a bill," Hyde said. "I might not be the most polite person you’ve ever met in your life, but that’s a long, long way from putting your hands on people.

"And frankly I’m sick of it," he said.

Hyde is one of three remaining candidates in the race for the Sarasota City Commission's two at-large seats, which represent the entire city. He faces Hagen Brody and Jennifer Ahearn-Koch in a May 9 election.

In late 2011, Hyde's ex-wife, Martyna Laciak, filed a petition for injunction for protection against domestic violence. The petition alleged that Hyde repeatedly used unprintable words to describe her, made threats and contended that "there is a history of physical, emotional and psychological abuse." One allegation in the request for an injunction — that Hyde blocked her car while she was trying to leave his home with their son one evening and shined a flashlight in her eyes — is detailed in a corresponding incident report she made with the Sarasota Police Department that night.

That request for an injunction was dismissed the same day it was filed for providing "insufficient facts," according to court records that are marked "confidential" online but are available for public viewing on the computer terminals at the Sarasota County Clerk of Court public access room on Main Street.

The following May, Laciak incorporated similar allegations of threatening behavior and a series of emails between the two into a motion for contempt in their ongoing divorce case, which was later withdrawn after the divorce proceedings went through mediation.

The final agreement ultimately gave Hyde more time with his youngest son, now 9, and was a baseless "scorched earth" legal argument made during the most strained time of a testy divorce, Hyde said Friday.

"It doesn’t mean anything; that is one side of one story and that is it," he said.

"Our relationship was strained, I’ll be the first to admit, but that’s why people get divorced," he continued later. "But I take exception with the allusion that was anywhere beyond harsh words."

Contentious encounters

None of the records obtained by the Herald-Tribune indicate incidents involving Hyde escalated beyond arguments.

But some Sarasota police officers reported that they had several contentious encounters with Hyde over more than a decade, detailed in official incident reports. There were no similar incidents in reports by the Sheriff's Office.

In 2013, officers responded to a traffic incident in the alley behind Hyde's business on Main Street. His and another driver's cars were both facing and blocking one another in the one-way alley, and both refused to move.

When the officer arrived, Hyde reportedly told him he was no "monkey," that he had attended Oxford University and that he would call City Manager Tom Barwin or Chief Bernadette DiPino, according to the incident report. The officer reported asking Hyde if he was threatening him and the officer said that he told Hyde to not be condescending after Hyde "advised this officer he would not say that he pays my salary but he pays a lot of taxes in the city," according to the report.

In 2005, a different officer reported Hyde was "irate" after a similar dispute he had with another driver about parking in the spots in the alley behind Hyde's business where he typically parks, according to that report.

In two other incidents, years apart, officers describe Hyde as "belligerent" to the point they requested back up to the scene.

In late 2015, one SPD officer called back up to help with what an incident reports describes as a "belligerent" and intoxicated Hyde during the officer's investigation of a collision between a shuttle bus and a parked car on Hyde's street.

Hyde was demanding an apology from the officer because he said he had been mistreated and again named a series of officials and a community activist who Hyde told officers he would complain to, including Commissioner Susan Chapman, DiPino and paralegal Michael Barfield. Hyde's oldest son, a Sheriff's Office deputy, was present and off duty, telling officers they had been polite and that his father would "probably be embarrassed in the morning," according to the report.

In a 2007 incident, officers encountered Hyde after his vehicle was rear-ended at a red light at Osprey Avenue and U.S. 41. Hyde was "very belligerent and aggressive" toward the officer and the other driver, insisting the driver undergo a sobriety test, according to the report. When officers refused, Hyde continued to be "obstinate and argumentative to the point where Officer felt it necessary" to call a police sergeant to the scene.

The report notes the second officer "settled the issue" and nothing came of the incident, but the report concludes with the note that "there have been two previous incidents over the years where Hyde has displayed the same aggressive manner towards Officer."

Hyde dismissed several of those reports as one-sided accounts by officers who had been disrespectful to him. He recalled the driver who rear-ended him in 2007 was "stoned" and "staggering wasted," causing $20,000 in damage to his car, although the officers' report notes "both parties agreed that there as (sic) not any damage" and that the officers believed the other driver was "not under the influence of anything."

"The only reason they write that report is because they’re worried I’d make good on calling their boss, but I’m not that petty," Hyde told the Herald-Tribune, specifically referencing the 2013 incident report. "It’s not news that I'm strident. It’s not news that I can be sarcastic. That’s something I've made crystal clear."

"I’ve got nothing to be ashamed of," he continued. "People can agree to disagree. My right to speak stops at your face and yours with me. I have by nature upset plenty of people over the years because I call things as I see them."

A frank tone

While some opponents have raised questions about Hyde's temper, his frank tone has been the hallmark of his campaign and he has embraced it in candidate forums and his comments to the current City Commission before each of their meetings.

Hyde frequently jokes about being loud and brash and is typically unapologetic for his tough tone toward the City Commission.

In the run up to the March 14 election, Chapman was the primary target of Hyde's ire for the current leadership in City Hall. He regularly lampooned the lone incumbent for her ongoing open-government lawsuit, criticism of downtown development and comments about ambulances driving by her home. He ultimately defeated her by 52 votes.

In one incident backstage at the Sarasota Underground Town Hall forum, according to an SPD report, Chapman claimed Hyde threatened her by saying, "I'm coming after you." During the forum, Hyde was seen and captured on video mockingly acting out shooting himself in the head during one of Chapman's answers.

Chapman told an off-duty police officer of Hyde's comments after the event. Hyde explained to the same officer that he would never harm Chapman and meant only that he was coming after her seat on the commission, according to a report. The officer noted Hyde appeared disturbed by the allegation and took no further action.

Hyde has tried to apologize to outgoing commissioners Suzanne Atwell and Chapman since, including at public forums.

He argues that he is strongly opinionated and unafraid of saying things others might not, which might make him intimidating and occasionally rude, but not threatening. The balance of the allegations "doesn't amount to a hill of beans," he said.

"I am 51 years old, I have never been arrested or charged with anything criminally which is hardly indicative of someone with a violent nature or predisposition," Hyde wrote in an email last week. "I'm running for a City seat and clearly my opponents have run out of intellectual steam and now are resorting to personal slurs.

"I am strident to the point of rudeness in some people's opinion on matters about which I'm passionate which I make no bones about ... It does not make me a bad person or a dangerous one. It makes me human and for that I make no apology."