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By Mary Ann Kuhn
Rappahannock News Writer
Two Rappahannock County candidates for office have been disqualified and their names will not appear on the Nov. 4 ballot: Tbdd Brown, candidate for county sheriff and Wesley Mills, candidate for the School Board.
Because of discrepancies on their petitions and the way some signatures were obtained without being witnessed properly, both men wound up without the necessary names needed to qualify to run.
This is the first time in official memory that county politics has taken this turn.
That's part of the story.
The toll in human terms has left Wesley Mills. 41, chairman of the Rappahannock County School Board since 2001, devastated and in tears.
Mills sat on a park bench outside the courthouse Tuesday morning, visibly shaken and wiping tears from his face.
Minutes before, he had pleaded guilty before General District Court Judge Charles Foley to a reduced charge, a misdemeanor, of "willful neglect of duty. "
Mills was fined $500 with no jail time, for not witnessing every signature on one of his petitions, a violation of the state election law. The maximum for this misdemeanor is 12 months in jail and a $2,500 fine.
The irony, and Mills brought this up, is tha't he usually is on the other side of the law. For the past 20 years he said he has had top secret security clearance working as a contractor at the FBI Academy in Quantico.
"I want people to know what I did wrong. Really, I did not have the intention to deceive. My lack of attention to detail as far as the petitions go has brought me to this point," he said.
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