White seeks ex-aide's cell-phone records

TAMPA -- Attorneys for Hilllsborough County and Commissioner Kevin White are seeking the cell-phone records of his ex-aide, who has sued him on claims of sexual discrimination. Their aim: To question her credibility.

The attorneys told a federal court judge Friday they are looking for records of calls to and from the aide, Alyssa Ogden, and a prominent businessman that she and White met on a trip to Atlanta.

Ogden, who was 22 at the time, claims White paid a late-night visit to her hotel room and asked to sleep in her bed during the April 2007 Atlanta trip that took place during her first week on the job. It's a central claim in her lawsuit.

But White has testified in depositions that Ogden accompanied him on a trip to Atlanta at the request of businessman C. Blythe Andrews Jr., the 78-year-old chairman of the Florida Sentinel Bulletin newspaper, the lawyers told U.S. District Court Judge Richard Lazzara.

"One of the issues here is indeed whether it's Mr. Andrews who wanted to have a physical relationship with Ms. Ogden," said Claire Saady, an attorney for the county. "And whether it's Mr. Andrews who showed up at her hotel room."

Steve Wenzel, an attorney for White, asked the judge for records of calls between Ogden and Andrews for the seven-month period she worked for White, but also for the week preceding her hiring. He told the judge that White had introduced the two March 26, 2007, a week before she started work.

He said he was attempting to see whether there was a pattern of interaction between Ogden and Andrews both before and after she took the job.

"Mr. White's testimony is that Ogden was asked to come to Atlanta by Mr. Andrews," Wenzel said.

The two attorneys had sought access to all of Ogden's cell phone records between February 2007 until the present. Her attorney, Ronald Fraley, objected, saying the request was overly broad. He did relent on limiting their access to include records of calls to and from Andrews "if that is what their defense is going to be, that Mr. Andrews is the bad guy."

An attorney for Andrews, Jeraldine Williams Shaw, told the St. Petersburg Times on Thursday that her client has done nothing wrong and suggested that White is trying to divert attention away from his own troubles.

-- Bill Varian, Times Staff Writer

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