Macomb Daily columnist Chad Selweski wonders if we're seeing the real side of Jim Fouts?
That would be the unhinged side.
He writes:
Has the real Jim Fouts finally stood up?
The profanity-laced threats by Fouts that were caught on tape, now the subject of a state police investigation, seem out of character with the professorial tone the Warren mayor displays when the TV news cameras are rolling.
But insiders say that Fouts routinely berates his employees and instills fear in fellow elected officials. One Fouts supporter I’ve talked to said he believes the mayor began coming “unglued” in 2011 when questions about Fouts possibly lying about his age became front page news.
At one point, he reportedly threw a chair in anger at the city Clerk’s Office when he didn’t get the answers he was looking for on ways to make the age issue go away. He even resorted to giving up driving for several months rather than renew his driver license and publicly submit a date of birth.
The state police are probing Fouts over some unsettling phone conversations.
The Macomb Daily reported Saturday:
In a recorded telephone conversation between the mayor and an appointee — a copy of which was obtained by The Macomb Daily — Fouts said of one of the former workers: “If I had a baseball bat, I’d beat the fucker down to the fucking ground. I mean, it would take me just a little bit to get a fucking gun and blow his fucking head out. That’s how pissed off I am.”
Earlier coverage: Fouts Spouts: Warren Mayor's Threatening Phone Tirade Spurs State nPolice Inquiry, April 27
