Ex Daytona commissioner, teacher charged in sex sting wrote:Ex Daytona commissioner, teacher charged in sex sting
By KARI COBHAM
Staff Writer
DAYTONA BEACH -- A former Daytona Beach city commissioner and a local high school teacher arrested Thursday during a sex sting at a Volusia mall bathroom were released from the Volusia County Brach Jail today, authorities said.
Former commissioner and mayoral candidate Mike Shallow and David Behringer, an athletic trainer and teacher at Seabreeze High School, posted $1,000 bail today after midnight, a jail spokesman said.
Behringer resigned today, according to officials with the Volusia County School District.
Shallow and Behringer were among nine men charged with lewd and lascivious conduct and exposure of a sexual organ, both misdemeanors, police said.
"The reason that we did this sting is we all go to the mall; our kids go into the bathroom," Police Chief Mike Chitwood said. "That they could be susceptible to this kind of behavior is absolutely a disgrace."
Also arrested were registered sex offender Douglas Benson, 48, of Port Orange, who was previously caught masturbating in the restroom of a day care center; and Edgar Millard, 73, Daytona Beach, charged in 2006 with sexual misconduct at a beachside bathroom, police said.
Detectives received a tip from officials at the Sears department store that sexual misconduct was taking place in its second-floor men's restroom, Chitwood said.
Further investigation by police found that encounters at local places like Sears were advertised online on Web sites like Craigslist and one that provides links to other sexually explicit sites, Chitwood said.
"This is a clandestine, subculture event," Chitwood said at a Thursday night press conference. "There's a whole culture that runs under the radar doing their thing."
A team of six officers from the Police Department's criminal suppression team joined forces with undercover officers from Volusia County Beach Patrol to nab the offenders from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Thursday. The Beach Patrol regularly deals with similar misconduct at public bathrooms near the beach, Chitwood said.
"Most everything that's occurring is nonverbal," said Sgt. Jeff Hoffman, supervisor of the criminal suppression team.
Offenders coughed or sneezed, tapped their feet, sometimes under the stall beside them, or made loud zipper noises to attract attention from others interested in engaging in sexual acts, Hoffman said.
"It's scumbags like this that erode the quality of life that we have here," Chitwood said. "What scares me is that these are people that we trust to be political leaders, these are people that we trust with our children."
Shallow, 57, served two terms as a city commissioner from 1999-2003 and ran for mayor unsuccessfully in 2003, 2005 and 2007, finishing a distant fourth in the last race Oct. 9.
The Realtor and real estate broker also served as chairman of the Main Street Redevelopment Board in 2004-2005, and was on the Downtown-Ballough Road Redevelopment Board while he was a commissioner.
Daytona Beach Mayor Glenn Ritchey said he was "disappointed and sad and sorry for him and his wife and family."
"There's nothing I can say. I've known him for a long time. I was shocked. It's such a sad thing," Ritchey said.
Neil Harrington, a personal friend of Shallow's, was shocked at the arrest.
"I just can't believe that; I have no indication that Mike would ever be involved in anything like that," Harrington said.
Others arrested in the sting include Sebastian Bach, 37, Panama City; Larry Brown, 42, DeBary; William Volage, 46, and Kenneth Halpin, 44, both of Ormond Beach; and Ransom Peterson, 73, Port Orange.
Representatives for Sears and the Volusia Mall could not be reached for comment Thursday night.
