Attorney who sued Ed Murray says council members ’embrace pedophiles’

It’s likely that the City of Seattle settled a lawsuit that accused former Mayor Ed Murray of sexual abuse to try and limit the revelations that would come out of continued litigation, according to attorney Lincoln Beauregard.

Ed Murray’s spokesperson secretly worked against him

The city paid $150,000 to settle the lawsuit brought by Delvonn Heckard. Under the settlement, Murray was protected and only had to pay for his own legal costs.

Though the lawsuit was settled before the end of 2017, some of that information the city likely wanted covered up was released by The Seattle Times on Wednesday.

Now Beauregard, who represented Heckard in his case against Murray, says people should come to the realization that there are other politicians still working within city government who defended the former mayor. That includes several council members, who stood up for Murray, even after it was reported that a child welfare investigator in Oregon concluded in 1984 that Murray sexually abused his foster son.

Beauregard told Dori:

For [Councilmember] Sally Bagshaw, she apparently embraces pedophiles and child molesters because she came out early on and stood next to him in front of a camera before anyone could make a seasoned judgment … and then she perpetuated that narrative even after Oregon records came out. There’s a pedophile enabler if I’ve ever seen one. I don’t think it ever would have crossed the point where somebody would have taken action as long as she was sitting in office and [Council President] Bruce Harrell wasn’t any better.

RELATED: Councilmember González calls for Murray to resign

The only two council members who strongly encouraged Murray to resign were Lorena González and Kshama Sawant. It was González who was the recipient of text messages from Murray’s former spokesperson that sparked the call for Murray’s resignation. González’s texts also reveal that Murray attempted to gain favor with the council as the allegations continued, writing: “Ed worked Bruce [Harrell], Sally [Bagshaw] and Debora [Juarez] pretty hard yesterday.”

Bagshaw, on the other hand, texted: “Shame on those who want a political witch hunt for their own political gain.”

In July, shortly after Councilmember González called for Murray to resign, Bagshaw stated that she agreed the “charges” against Murray were serious, but pointed out that the findings from the child services investigation are decades old. She hoped the council could avoid “grandstanding” on the issue.

Murray has continued to maintain his innocence since the allegations first arose back in April of 2017. He said the accusations were part of a witch hunt and went so far to say it was part of a political conspiracy.

Councilmember Sally Bagshaw had not responded to a request for comment from KIRO Radio by the time this article was posted.