BENNINGTON — Accused domestic abuser Michael Crawford refers to them as his “get out of jail free cards,” sexually explicit Facebook messages between a woman he is accused of repeatedly assaulting and the Bennington County sheriff.
But the sheriff said they didn’t come from him.
In court Monday, Crawford’s attorney Matt Hart said he plans to call on the Vermont Attorney General’s Office to investigate misconduct by Sheriff Chad Schmidt stemming from the communications with the woman.
Crawford, 45, argues Schmidt shouldn’t have allowed a member of his department to investigate some of the pending assault cases against him because the sheriff had a personal relationship with the woman.
Five years ago, Schmidt allegedly exchanged sexually explicit Facebook messages with the woman Crawford is now charged with assaulting. That’s according to copies of those alleged exchanges provided to VTDigger by Hart, Crawford’s attorney, and the woman herself.
Those nearly 200 messages show that an account from “Chad Schmidt” tipped the woman off about a warrant for her arrest before it was sent to other law enforcement agencies. That tip, allegedly from the Bennington sheriff, enabled her to avoid jail time.
The charges against Crawford, which he denies, include an alleged beating in which she was left covered in blood. Crawford could face life in prison.
Schmidt, in a statement, disputed any involvement in the Facebook exchanges with the woman and denied the messages came from him.
“I deny any allegation that this conversation ever took place,” the sheriff said in the statement. “The victim in this case and I have no relationship whatsoever. I will explore all avenues to clear my name in this matter with the assistance of an attorney.”
He added, “The only purpose this serves is to slander my name and try and bring doubt to a felony assault arrest made by an investigator assigned to the state’s attorney. “
The woman, who spoke to VTDigger this past week, said she is sure that the Facebook exchanges she had were with Schmidt. (VTDigger is not naming her because it does not identify alleged victims in domestic abuse cases.)
She said she knew Schmidt from her former workplace, where he was a customer.
“I’ve known Chad for a while,” she said. “It’s definitely Chad.”
She said Schmidt would stop by where she used to work and ask about going out with her. The woman said she never would because he was married.
The woman showed VTDigger the exchanges that were still saved in her Facebook Messenger account on her smartphone. The other account in the conversation is identified as belonging to “Chad Schmidt,” and appears to show his profile photo, but was no longer active.
VTDigger could not find an active Facebook account belonging to Schmidt.
The Facebook exchange between the woman and the account labeled “Chad Schmidt” took place in 2014, according to the woman. The messages are all dated and time stamped, but lack the year.
The first message in the Facebook exchange allegedly between Schmidt and the woman is his heads-up about her pending arrest warrant. She offers her appreciation to Schmidt for the information, which enabled her to avoid jail time.
“THANK U VERY MUCH FOR THE HEADS UP!!”” she wrote in a Facebook message to Schmidt.
“Your welcome,” said a message from Schmidt’s account. “I think you know I’ve always taken a liken to ya lol. Glad I could help.”
“How did you know so quick,” she asked him.
“I get emails before they ‘get filed,’” said the response from Schmidt’s account.
The message exchanges, often containing sexually explicit language, span several weeks in the spring and summer of 2014. In one exchange, there was talk of wanting to have sex with the woman in his cruiser.
“I wanna hook up with you more than you can imagine lol,” the message stated.
“I just want some milk from the cow before I buy it lol,” said another message.
Other messages in the exchanges included talk of stripper poles, threesomes and Schmidt apparently referring to his penis as Burford.
“What is Burford?” the woman asked at one point.
“Haha. That’s his nickname lol,” was the reply.
“Jeezus,” she responds.
The woman said the two never met as a result of the online exchanges, although they both reference having seen each other around town over the years.
The woman said the series of Facebook messages initially provided by Hart was the first contact she had with the sheriff on the social media platform, with the very first message warning her of the warrant.
On that same day, according to the messages, Schmidt sent the woman a photo of a sheriff’s department cruiser and talked about the work that he was doing to it. The image in the Facebook exchange of the cruiser from 2014 appears to match how cruisers looked at the sheriff’s department at that time, including the placement of the star and style of lettering along the side of the vehicle.
Later that night, another message to the woman asked if she “cleared up the warrant.” The woman responded that she tried, and had to go back to court the following month because the case was still being prosecuted.
She said when she went to the court they handcuffed her, adding, “Aren’t they suppose to read me my rights?”
“No, not if they don’t question you they don’t have to,” she was told in a response.
“Oh that’s dumb,” the woman wrote.
“Lol,” was the reply. “Well I’m glad you didn’t get caught on the weekend and had to go to Rutland. There’s not many people I would warn like I did for you.”
Rutland is home to the nearest jail where someone held on bail in Bennington County would likely be transported.
They each also talked of their relationship status, with Schmidt apparently telling the woman that he’s not single, and has been married for “7 freaking years.”
According to a marriage license obtained by VTDigger, Schmidt married his wife, whose maiden name is also mentioned in the messages, in September 2007, meaning that in 2014 he would have been married for seven years. An announcement at the time of his appointment as sheriff in 2009 by former Gov. Jim Douglas said Schmidt had two children.
“Decent guys are hard to come by these days,” the woman later wrote back, adding, “Especially around the heroin Capitol.”
“Oh true,” came the reply. “This town is full of that shit. My only addiction is well you can figure that out lol.”
“Yup I’ll just leave that one alone,” she responded.
In one of the Facebook exchanges, the woman wrote that she had gone to a doctor’s appointment and sent a photo of a drug disposal poster advising people to drop off expired or unused prescription drugs at the sheriff’s department, listing Schmidt as the contact.
“I saw this at the doctors office today and was thinking we could both use a lil extra money. Lmao jk,” the woman wrote.
“Lol,” was the response from Schmidt’s account. “Yeah and when the time comes that I need Viagra it won’t cost me 15 bucks a pill haha.”
Bennington County State’s Attorney Erica Marthage said last week Crawford’s case was an ongoing criminal matter “and therefore I will not issue any extrajudicial statements.”
At a hearing Monday in Bennington County Superior criminal court, Hart told Judge David Howard he planned to file a complaint with the Vermont Attorney General’s Office regarding Schmidt’s conduct.
He said the complaint will deal with the allegations of misconduct against the sheriff “involving the victim in this case.”
Marthage told the judge that Schmidt had no involvement in any of the cases, explaining that it was handled by Bennington County Sheriff’s Department Sgt. Lloyd Dean. He is assigned as an investigator with the Bennington County State’s Attorney Office.
“The state’s position is pretty plain. The sheriff’s involvement is zero in any of these cases,” Marthage said. “Investigator Dean worked for the sheriff’s department, he is certified through them, but he is employed in my office. There’s never been anything to do with Sheriff Schmidt on any of the cases that he had filed regarding this defendant.”
Marthage said the cases investigated by Dean were domestic violence related.
“I’ve always had a domestic violence investigator in my office,” the prosecutor said. “They work solely at my discretion and my direction.”
Crawford said in recent interviews that both he and the woman had printed copies of the messages years earlier, and referred to them as their “Get out of jail free cards.”
The woman said she never talked to Schmidt while the investigation of Crawford was taking place years later.
Crawford was arrested Oct. 2, 2018, by Vermont State Police at his home in Pownal on charges of two felony counts of aggravated domestic assault and misdemeanor charges of interference with access to emergency services and violating the conditions of his release.
According to an affidavit filed in that case by Trooper Justin Walker, Crawford grabbed the woman by her hair and threw her against a wall, and then grabbed her by her throat and slammed her against the wall again.
“While speaking to (the woman) she received messages from Crawford, to include that he will get the best lawyer money can buy and also made a comment that he has enough money to ‘get off,’” the trooper wrote in the affidavit.
Crawford faces a slew of charges in Bennington County, including four counts of aggravated domestic assault brought against him later in October 2018, all for separate incidents that happened a year earlier in 2017.
A five-page affidavit was later filed in support of four additional aggravated domestic assault charges against Crawford by Dean.
That affidavit includes photos of the woman she took at the time of those alleged assaults.
Dean wrote that he met with the woman just days after Vermont State Police arrested Crawford. He wrote during his meeting with the woman she talked about other assaults that took place.
And in two of the incidents, according to the affidavit, Vermont State Police had been involved but no charges were ever brought.
In one case, on Sept. 2, 2017, the affidavit stated, the woman told police that Crawford had bitten her face and her finger. She reported that Crawford told police her injuries were caused by falling off an all-terrain vehicle.
The woman then got mad and said she “wanted to let it go and the State Police took her away for the night,” the affidavit stated.
Another incident occurred in spring 2017 in Shaftsbury, the affidavit stated.
The woman said that she was visiting friends and Crawford came to pick her up, and he arrived drunk in his vehicle. She said she got behind the wheel of the van to drive and Crawford punched her in the face, according to the affidavit.
The woman said she ran and hid under another vehicle. Crawford came up to her and said he was sorry, Dean wrote in the filing.
She got back in the vehicle and drove Crawford back toward their home and she said she was “covered in blood” because he had hit her in the nose, the affidavit stated.
“They were headed down the highway and she turned left at Burger King and blue lights came on and she has state police, sheriffs,” the affidavit stated. “They saw (her) covered in blood and they knew he had done it again and she wouldn’t tell on him.”
Each of the four additional aggravated domestic assault charges against Crawford outlined in Dean’s affidavit include habitual offender enhancements. Each of those enhancements carry up to a life sentence, if convicted.
Crawford also faces three counts of false swearing for allegedly stating he had no real estate when he is the listed owner of a property valued at $330,000, Dean wrote in an affidavit in support of those charges.
For each of those false swearing charges, Crawford also faces habitual offender enhancements.
Hart, a private attorney representing Crawford, said he was taken aback by the false swearing charges, saying that he had never seen such counts filed related to a public defender application.
Crawford’s criminal history includes past convictions for aggravated domestic assault with a weapon, conspiracy to distribute narcotics, unlawful mischief, drunken driving and negligent operation of a motor vehicle, according to court records.
Crawford vehemently denies the pending charges against him, and said the sheriff’s department’s involvement in some of the cases made him question whether they could be fair and impartial, given Schmidt’s connection to the woman he is charged with assaulting.
“I would certainly say it’s a conflict,” Crawford said, adding he had no direct evidence that he was targeted by Schmidt.
“I don’t know, I can’t even figure it out at this point,” he said. “It doesn’t sit well with me and never has.”
Hart said he’s never heard of a sheriff warning someone about a warrant that hadn’t even been issued yet.
“He’s telling her stuff about things that haven’t even been filed yet. That’s totally inappropriate,” the defense attorney said. “Officers should never be in this kind of situation where they are using confidential information in this way.”
At the very least, Hart said in an interview, Schmidt should have sent the cases handled by Dean to another law enforcement agency to investigate.
“He couldn’t do that because if he did that he’s probably going to have to explain why there’s a conflict,” he said of the sheriff.
Hart — who noted he was no prude — said the explicit messages sent by the sheriff made him more than uncomfortable.
“This is something that the people of Bennington, and people of Vermont should know,” he said.
Read the story on VTDigger here: Defendant plays ‘get out of jail free card,’ says sexting sheriff taints case.