Bootlegging mayor?

Posted by Alaska_Politics

Posted: August 4, 2008 - 8:07 pm

From Kyle Hopkins in Anchorage –

Troopers arrested the mayor of the tiny Norton Sound village of Shaktoolik recently for bootlegging.

They say Edgar M. Jackson Sr. was trying to fly from Nome to Golovin, where he crab fishes, with 12 bottles of liquor packed beside his frozen steaks and burgers.

(Jackson said he bought four bottles of rum and four bottles of vodka, but doesn’t know where the other liquor came from.)

The arrest was July 26. Shaktoolik is a 200-person village about 125 miles outside of Nome.

So what on the local City Hall’s plate?

City councilwoman Carole Sookiayak said they’re trying to move the city landfill. “It’s right in front of the airport and there’s a lot of seagulls and ravens that hang around there.”

She said Jackson’s a good guy who is always helping people, and to keep an open mind. “In small communities I think we should look for the good in people instead of the bad, and he’s been that kind of person ever since I’ve known him.”

Trooper investigator James Sears writes in his report that Jackson mentioned several times that he was mayor.

“I think he threw it out there hoping I wouldn’t look in his box.”

One interesting thing about any new bootlegging case: The punishments have gotten a lot tougher, even for misdemeanors, since July 1. Someone convicted of a first offense now faces a mandatory fine and jail time, kind of like a first-time drunken driver.

It’d be nice to see a poll in rural Alaska on what people think about the effectiveness of wet-versus-dry villages.

“We prefer it this way and if it went wet again, I think we’d have more problems,” Sookiayak said.

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