'Fell out of her chair': Mayor out after sending obscene 'sexy video' to city attorney
The mayor of North Dakota’s fourth largest city is out of a job after he accidentally texted the female city attorney a video of him performing a sex act on himself – which he intended as a “sexy video” for his girlfriend, the Daily Beast reported Wednesday.
Tom Ross, 60, resigned as the mayor of Minot, population 50,000, effective Monday, after a two-month investigation into the sexually explicit video concluded.
According to a city report of the investigation, Ross contacted City Attorney Stefanie Stalheim shortly after realizing he sent the video to her by mistake and asked her to delete it without viewing it. But Stalheim instead handed over the phone to an HR employee who happened to be in her office consoling her following a police officer’s death by suicide.
But she still “caught a glimpse" of Ross’s private parts, the Daily Beast said.
“When Ross described to Stalheim the content of the video he was asking her to delete, which she hadn’t yet seen, she ‘physically collapsed and fell out of her chair’ due to the ‘combined stress’ of receiving a lewd video shortly after learning of the officer’s death,” according to the Daily Beast.
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Stalheim preceded with a formal complaint against Ross after the HR employee who agreed to delete the video accidentally “hit play” and later said it showed a man performing a sex act on himself, the publication added.
Ross described what he sent to the city attorney as a “sexy video for his girlfriend” that was intended to “express excitement” about an upcoming date."
In his resignation letter, the former mayor, who was elected in a nonpartisan election, said his focus would “be on my physical and mental health.”
“I have had a professional and respectful relationship with every City of Minot Staff member that I have come across. I am proud of that,” according to Ross’s resignation letter to the city council, obtained by the Daily Beast. “Unfortunately, I have let them down as a leader, as I have with many in our community.”