Mayor's Husband Caught Intimidating a Witness, Apparently in an Attempt to Alter His Testimony

In a video posted online, Amarillo Mayor Ginger Nelson's husband can be heard vociferously arguing with Kip Billups.  Mr. Billups was arrested for violation of the City's camping ban, stealing electricity (for plugging in his sleep apnea machine) and arrested again after he did not follow Mayor Nelson's orders to follow her no clapping restrictions at City Council meetings.  A trial is scheduled for September 20, 2018 for violation of the City's camping ban.  The City has not yet filed charges for the theft of electricity or for violation of the clapping ban, but has two years to do so, according to Mr. Billups.  The clapping ban is no longer enforced, but the City Council has taken other steps to limit speech by residents, such as changing meetings to inconvenient times, referring to the public comment period as a "work session", and refusing to record and broadcast public comments. 

18 U.S. Code § 1512 - Tampering with a witness, victim, or an informant

(b) Whoever knowingly uses intimidation, threatens, or corruptly persuades another person, or attempts to do so, or engages in misleading conduct toward another person, with intent to—

(1) influence, delay, or prevent the testimony of any person in an official proceeding;

(2) cause or induce any person to—

(A) withhold testimony, or withhold a record, document, or other object, from an official proceeding;

(B) alter, destroy, mutilate, or conceal an object with intent to impair the object’s integrity or availability for use in an official proceeding;

(C) evade legal process summoning that person to appear as a witness, or to produce a record, document, or other object, in an official proceeding; or

(D) be absent from an official proceeding to which such person has been summoned by legal process; 

Mr. Nelson has also previously accosted local journalist Thomas Warren, III, accusing the journalist of not asking his wife for comment on stories after she had refused previous attempts to get a comment.  Note, the Mayor and City Council have also repeatedly refused requests for comment by Amarillo Exposed.  Amarillo Exposed has reached out to the Mayor and City Council for comments on this story, but have received no response.

(This article has been updated to include more accurate information about the charges Mr. Billups faces at his upcoming trial.)