Work computers taken from Republican candidate Brice Stewart in Jackson County executive race

Brice Stewart figured it might be uncomfortable at work after he announced his aim to run against his boss, Jackson County Executive Mike Sanders.

But Stewart, a 38-year-old computer network support technician for Jackson County, didn’t count on becoming the subject of an internal investigation five days after he filed in March to have his name put on the Nov. 4 ballot.

Stewart, a Republican, says his county-issued desktop and laptop computers were seized and searched and his movements restricted on orders of a top appointee in the Sanders administration.

Sanders is a Democrat.

For a month, Stewart was not allowed to have hands-on contact with other county employees’ computers, which was part of his job.

County officials do not dispute Stewart’s account, but they say the probe was not politically motivated.

In a prepared statement, Jackson County Counselor W. Stephen Nixon said the investigation was necessary because of what he called “allegations of unauthorized access to confidential records.”

Nixon added: “Any breach in security could compromise law enforcement investigations or public safety.”

Nixon declined to specify the nature of those allegations or the results of the investigation.

Stewart, however, said that the probe turned up no wrongdoing and that he believes it was politically motivated.

“I think it was a bullying and intimidation tactic,” he said.

Stewart said a supervisor told him that the investigation was prompted by a March 19 blog post on the Tony’s Kansas City website.

The item quoted an anonymous tipster saying that Stewart was “very well informed on Jackson County mismanagement under Mike Sanders” and that he came to the campaign “armed with accounting and policy records.”

It said nothing about confidential records or Stewart’s intentions to share such data. But within hours of that item appearing online, “they came in and took my county-issued desktop and laptop,” Stewart said.

A day later, he said, he was summoned to a meeting with attorney Pat McInerney, who said his firm had been hired to “conduct an investigation into a possible data breach.”

That next day, he said, he was given a new computer with monitoring software and forbidden from remotely accessing some parts of the county computer network that he normally helped maintain.

At times he had felt he had too little to do. After a month he was given his computers back and allowed again to travel between county offices.

Stewart, who is also a part-time police captain in Ferrelview, recounted the previously undisclosed episode to The Star last week during a routine interview about the coming election.

The story is about the only thing remarkable in an election campaign pitting Sanders, 47, the overwhelming favorite, against Stewart and Libertarian candidate Richard Tolbert, 69.

Sanders won his last two terms by landslides.

The suggestion that Sanders considered Stewart a real threat and tried to bully him into pulling out of the race is not accurate, a top Sanders aide said.

However, Mark Anthony Jones, chairman of the Jackson County Republican Party central committee, said the investigation suggested a “shocking” amount of paranoia at the courthouse.

“It does surprise me that Sanders thinks Brice is enough of a threat to go and do something like that,” Jones said.

Sanders is an established politician with a campaign war chest — he had raised $765,000 as of Sept. 3, campaign records show — in a job that has never been held by anyone but Democrats.

Republican Stewart is a newcomer to county politics. As of Oct. 4, his campaign had raised $9,600, almost all of it his own money or cash advanced from an American Express card.

There’s no central issue in this year’s campaign. Not even Sanders’ performance is in question, as far Tolbert is concerned. The former Kansas City councilman and perennial candidate considers Sanders “a bright young man” doing a good job.

Tolbert’s main position is that county government itself has no reason to exist and what duties it has should be divvied up among the county’s 19 municipalities.

“We don’t need two layers of local government,” he said.

Sanders believes he has been a good steward of the taxpayers’ money since he was elected in 2006.

“I am proud to stand on our record of accomplishment,” he said in a prepared statement.

Stewart, on the other hand, is critical of the job Sanders has been doing and thinks he could do better.

“This isn’t for show,” he said. “I’m in it to win it.”

This story was originally published October 11, 2014 at 5:20 PM with the headline "Work computers taken from Republican candidate Brice Stewart in Jackson County executive race."