A small Florida town is in chaos as locals try to oust a foul-mouthed commissioner who has reportedly berated colleagues and accused his political rival of being armed at a government meeting.
Pembroke Park’s Geoffrey Jacobs has been accused in lawsuits and by employees of viciously bullying his co-workers and dipping into the town’s pot to revamp his own property.
He has been roundly condemned by his colleagues and faces a lawsuit from one of several ex-employees whom he has insulted publicly.
He allegedly called a Jewish staffer a ‘Nazi’ after she tried to address a half-a-dozen formal complaints against him.
The Republican tried to have her fired, and more complaints have piled up since. Clips from the town’s meetings, meanwhile, give an idea of the commissioner’s temper, which has made appearances during public proceedings.
Jacobs’ attorney has blasted the claims against his client as ‘ridiculous’ and described it as a ‘witch hunt’ against the commissioner.
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Pembroke Park’s Commissioner Geoffrey Jacobs has been accused of viciously bullying his co-workers. He is known for wearing a First Amendment T-shirt at meetings and for outburst targeting others
A former Arizona cop, Jacobs has also been accused of fostering a hostile work environment, sending a homophobic TikTok to an ex-town attorney, and hurling slurs like ‘c*nt’ at colleagues on the regular, the Daily Beast reported.
He’s also been charged with using his town credit card for several ‘questionable’ transactions, including work on his Hallandale home.
The town was informed about the accusation – which has since been disproven – by a concerned resident, who sent a letter to the five-member Town Commission late last year.
In it, the citizen complained about what appeared to be an unsanctioned, ongoing makeover to the mobile home.
‘I need to bring to your attention some information I have come across about one of the elected officials that currently sits during your meetings,’ the resident wrote, offering photos of the then ongoing renovations as alleged proof.
‘Commissioner Jacobs always talks about how he is always doing the right thing for the town,’ they went on, citing the litany of viral clips showing Jacobs’ viral vitriol.
‘He did recodification to his house. Please, you all must deal with this,’ the letter – addressed to Mayor Ashira Mohammed, Vice Mayor Erik Morrissette, Clerk Commissioner William Hodgkins, Actin Clerk Commissioner Musfike Kashem, and Acting Town Manager Aleem Ghany, among other – reads.
‘The pictures show the outside, but I also saw lots of materials being brought inside,’ it continues, as attached snaps showed the work being done.
‘Look at all this,’ the person continues, before eventually asking, ‘[W]as he permitted to do this[?]’
An investigation – ordered by the town and carried out by an outside attorney – found the man who has donned shirts flaunting the ‘First Amendment’ while noshing popcorn at meetings did not use town funds on the refurbishment.
As for the alleged lack of permits, that claim was proven correct – with the town handing Jacobs a violation claiming he installed multiple windows to the once-assuming property without the proper signoff.
Exterior repair of the west side wall without the proper permit was also cited – meaning Jacobs must now obtain and produce ‘detailed’ plans of his previous work after the fact.
If he does not comply, he ‘will be required to appear at the prosecution of this matter by a special magistrate,’ a court order viewed by DailyMail.com states.
Jacobs’ lawyer insists the correspondence is the result of a liberal-led ‘witch hunt’ by his client’s mayoral successor.
‘The small city of Pembroke Park is spending more money on outside special counsels than they have investigating President Trump,’ attorney Michael A. Pizzi said in a statement Monday.
‘It’s ridiculous and it’s all part of this twisted witch hunt,’ the lawyer added.
His client, he further claims, was elected by the people thus making it illegal to impede on his duties as commissioner.
Jacobs has been roundly condemned by his colleagues and faces a lawsuit from one of several ex-employees whom he has insulted publicly
He’s also been charged with using his town credit card for several ‘questionable’ transactions, including work on his Hallandale home. The town was tipped off about the spending – which has since been disproven – by a concerned resident, who sent a letter to the five-member Town Commission late last year
Since assuming the position of Pembroke Park commissioner in 2019, Jacobs has clashed with almost every department head, and even his fellow commissioners
During an attempted interview with Jacobs in November, Jacobs refused to speak to a WPLG Local 10 reporter when asked repeatedly about the unlicensed work.
‘You’re the commissioner who always wants to do things right – by the book,’ the reporter tells him in the clip filmed outside the town hall at the time.
‘Can I show you pictures?’
‘No,’ Jacobs replies.
‘Why not?’
Upon being followed into the building, an exasperated Jacobs replies: ‘I have nothing to say to you.’
In the same room, Jacobs has been filmed berating town officials for years.
Since assuming the position of commissioner in 2019, Jacobs has clashed with almost every department head, and even his fellow commissioners.
‘It’s not my job to do your job,’ Jacobs says in a soundbite from one such exchange at Pembroke Park meeting.
‘This town, historically, likes to hire the most incompetent people it can,’ he snipes in another.
In another snippet, he calls the town he moved to in 2016 a s***hole, and in another, he defiantly tells attendees: ‘I will not be silenced.’
‘I am tired of the false and bullsh*t allegations on behalf of this f*cking commission,’ he is heard saying in one segment filmed last year.
‘I’m tired of this stupidity and the incompetence that continues in this town,’ he shouts in another.
‘Free speech! Free speech,’ he adds in one clip while wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with the phrase ‘Fist Amendment.’
‘There are commissioners here who are going to end up in jail,’ he adds.
Such assertions spurred a visit from a police chief from the Broward County Sheriff’s Office in November, after Jacobs called the department to report that his biggest rival in the hall, current Mayor Ashira Mohammed, was toting a gun.
‘It has come to my attention that the police have been called because there is an allegation by the commissioner that I have a weapon on me, particularly that I have a gun on me,’ the Democrat reelected this time last year explained.
‘So, with that, I’m going to allow the chief to search my purse, on the record, so that everyone can see.’
A search of the woman’s form-fitting dress yielded no weapon, spurring Broward prosecutors to hit the commissioner with a misdemeanor offense for misusing 911.
Jacob’s lawyer, meanwhile, alleges Mohammed’s friends and family had at one point threatened Jacobs and his family, hence the 911 call.
His lawyer later filed a notice of a $10million lawsuit against the town and demanded the 911 misuse allegations be dropped.
DailyMail.com has reached out to both Jacobs and Mohammed for comment.
Jacobs even accused the town’s former mayor of having a gun, but police did not find a weapon. Jacobs was then charged with misusing 911, an allegation he has denied
Jacobs’ history of controversy dates further back than just in Florida – it includes his days as a part-time motor cop for Arizona’s Department of Safety in the 2000s
Jacobs’ history of controversy dates further back than just in Florida – it includes his days as a part-time motor cop for Arizona’s Department of Safety in the 2000s.
Then, he had a relationship with the daughter of the agency’s director, according to court papers and a report in the Phoenix New Times – triggered by pictures the director took of his daughter’s bruised arm and leg.
Jacobs was eventually fired from the department.
But the scandal in his current town did not start until 2020, some four years after he relocated following a failed bid to become a justice in Maricopa County – that time as a Democrat.
At that point, he began to butt heads with Democrat Mohammed, after the Broward Inspector General’s Office found she improperly used her office to self-advertise an unsuccessful bid for state representative using the town’s Facebook page.
The state declined to prosecute Mohammed, but Jacobs filed a lawsuit demanding she resign.
He was then appointed mayor by the commission when she stepped down in November 2021. But, Jacobs became commissioner again in March of last year after the commission opted to have Mohammed resume her old post.
Jacobs was once appointed mayor by the commission when Mayor Ashira Mohammed (pictured) stepped down amid her own scandal in November 2021. He became commissioner again in March of last year after the body opted to have Mohammed resume her old post
Babette Friedman (pictured) is one of the people who filed complaints about Jacobs. She was formerly the town’s human resources director and attempted to speak to Jacobs, but was rebuffed and victimized by the then mayor in a bid to have her fired
An investigation into Jacobs – which was called in the summer of 2023 and cost the town $19,000 – found his one-and-half-year mayoral stint was riddled with scandal as well, with officials writing his reign was marked by a ‘pattern of bullying, threatening harm, intimidation, public humiliation, and retaliation.’
More than a dozen current and former employees claimed Jacobs would regularly lash out at staffers, all while using intimidation tactics to drive people out.
As the complaints piled up, Babette Friedman, formerly the town’s human resources director, attempted to speak to Jacobs, but was rebuffed and victimized by the then mayor in a bid to have her fired, the investigative report alleged.
Then, after Jacobs was ousted from office in March 2023 and became commissioner, he allegedly called Friedman, who is Jewish, a ‘Nazi’ in front of fellow colleagues and residents.
The outburst prompted the commission to censure Jacobs for violating the town’s code of conduct.
Jacobs responded by calling Clerk Commissioner Bill Hodgkins ‘stupid’ and ‘ignorant’ at a subsequent June meeting, where he hit Friedman with another insult.
‘But there are other choice words, four-letter words that I would use to describe you,’ Jacobs said at the June 14 meeting, referring to the HR worker.
She went on to file a $2 million lawsuit against Jacobs in December, which Pizzi recently called ‘totally meritless.’
Former town attorney Melissa Anderson, meanwhile, told The Daily Beast that during her two stint as a civic servant for Pembroke Park, Jacobs was always a domineering presence
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Former town attorney Melissa Anderson, meanwhile, told The Daily Beast that during her two stint as a civic servant for Pembroke Park, Jacobs was always a domineering presence.
However, she said she did not feel victimized until the politician failed in his push to create a police department for the town. She said Jacobs’ behavior became ‘increasingly aggressive and bizarre.’
In text messages included in the intendent investigative report, which concluded in June, Jacobs is said to have slammed Anderson as a ‘fucking c***’ in a comment to the town clerk.
On October 1, 2022, the then mayor went on to send her a TikTok, she claims, showing video of a bouncer bashing ‘masculine women’ as ‘super confrontational’ -that is, until they realize a man can beat them up.
‘I was so baffled. And freaked out,’ Anderson, an openly gay woman, told The Daily Beast.