JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — As of Thursday morning, the Secretary of State’s Office had yet to receive the anticipated letter of resignation from Gov. Eric Greitens, yet the felony computer tampering charge against the embattled Republican had already been dismissed.
It was the second felony charge that led to Greitens resignation, it turns out. On Wednesday, the morning after he announced his resignation, Gardner permanently dismissed the case against Greitens for stealing The Mission Continues donor list.
The dismissal was part of a deal struck between the prosecutor and the defense.
“The Circuit Attorney further stipulates that, upon receipt of the defendant’s resignation from office by the Secretary of State of Missouri, the Court may dismiss No. 1822-CR10377 with prejudice,” the stipulation for dismissal reads. Part of the deal was redacted on request from the governor’s defense. The case is no longer listed on Case.net.
However, the Secretary of State’s Office has not received the letter of resignation from Greitens.
In an email sent by Maura Browning, director of communications for Jay Ashcroft, states that she will inform the receipts “when the Secretary of State has received and processed the anticipated letter of resignation from the Governor.”
A follow-up phone call around noon confirmed that the office has not received Greitens resignation letter. She will email out a “scanned copy of the letter when it is received.”
In an abrupt move that caught many by surprise, the man who vowed to continue fighting held a press conference Tuesday evening announcing his resignation as Missouri’s Governor.
“Today I am announcing that I will resign as governor of Missouri effective Friday, June 1, at 5 p.m.,” Greitens said.
The resignation came hours after Cole County Circuit Judge Jon Beetem ordered A New Missouri and Greitens for Missouri to produce documents that had been subpoenaed by the House Special Investigative Committee on Oversight.
The ruling came as Michael Hafner, a longtime GOP consultant and former Greitens staffer, testified to the committee for the second time. Hafner told the committee he had conversations about ways to conceal donors, was instructed by Greitens to use The Mission Continues donor list for fundraising, and that Greitens had to be taught how to present himself as a Republican.
In the previous week, the committee spent hours reading Greitens’ defense teams deposition of K.S. — a woman with whom Greitens had an extramarital affair with in 2015.
The Missouri governor had multiple allegations against him including: stealing a donor list from a veterans charity, lying on a Missouri Ethics Commission form, campaign finance violations, violating the state’s open records and records retention laws, unauthorized use of another elected officials signature, misuse of grant funds for political purposes, and more. He called the allegations untrue and that is was a “Soros-funded” “witch hunt.”
“I know, and people of good faith know, that I am not perfect. But I have not broken any laws or committed any offense worthy of this treatment. I will let the fairness of this process be judged by history,” he said in his resignation speech.
Greitens was charged with two felonies in 2018: Invasion of privacy and computer tampering. The first charge was dropped by the St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner and is in the hands of a special prosecutor who is looking into if charges should be refiled. The latter charge was for stealing The Mission Continues donor list and was dismissed with prejudice.
Read the deal on the dismissal of charges:
Alisha Shurr was a reporter for The Missouri Times and The Missouri Times Magazine. She joined The Missouri Times in January 2018 after working as a copy editor for her hometown newspaper in Southern Oregon. Alisha is a graduate of Kansas State University.
