“Sustained” or not, a City report doesn’t discredit Charles Myadze’s accusers

What an investigation into the alder’s behavior means, and what it doesn’t.

This story includes descriptions of sexual harassment, harassment in the workplace, and domestic violence. If you or someone you know is struggling or in crisis, contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 800-799-7233, via online live chat, or via text by texting “START” to 88788; or contact Madison’s Domestic Abuse Intervention Services help line via phone at at 608-251-4445 or via text at 608-420-4638.

Update: Hours after this story was published, District 8 Alder MGR Govindarajan filed a resolution to censure Alder Myadze for “conduct unbecoming of an alder.” As of 1 p.m. on November 20, six alders have signed on to cosponsor the resolution: Alders Juliana Bennett, Regina Vidaver, Derek Field, Yannette Figueroa Cole, Sabrina Madison, and Marsha Rummel.

Nearly eight months after women began accusing him publicly of harassment and abuse, District 18 Alder Iorfa Charles Myadze remains in office, representing part of Madison’s north side on the Madison Common Council. A newly released City report has both brought new allegations to light and generated headlines that minimize the significance of those allegations. 

In March, nonprofit leader Michelle McKoy was the first to go public with a first-hand account, saying in a Facebook video that Myadze abused her during the course of a seven-year relationship that ended in 2012. Shortly after, Myadze’s ex-wife, Jamie Johnson, told Madison365 that Myadze physically abused her in a number of violent incidents between the time the two met in the late 1990s and their divorce in 2002. 

In April, three women—one City of Madison employee, one member of the general public, and one fellow alder—reported to the City that Myadze sexually harassed them and created a hostile work environment. The City’s Department of Civil Rights—which handles all complaints that fall under Administrative Procedure Memoranda 3-5 (APM 3-5)—hired an outside law firm to investigate all three women’s allegations and determine whether there was sufficient evidence that Myadze’s behavior violated the City’s official harassment and/or discrimination policies as outlined in APM 3-5.

Last week the City released the investigators’ initial report from August, and a supplemental report based on evidence Myadze provided after completion of the initial report. While several Wisconsin media outlets have headlined the term “insufficient evidence,” the investigators don’t use that term to describe evidence of whether or not Myadze’s behavior as described by the complainants occurred. Instead it refers to evidence that said behavior met the standards of harassment and a hostile workplace.

The next day, District 2 Alder Juliana Bennett released a public blog post identifying herself as one of the complainants. Bennett told Tone Madison that she went public in part to get ahead of the rumor mill.

“I know that people are going to have their own speculation or rumors about who the person was and what occurred,” Bennett says. “This is my story, and I wanted to have my name on it, because I didn’t want someone else to tell my story for me.”

But primarily, Bennett wanted to “elevate those who have had experiences” with Myadze and felt a “sense of responsibility” to share her story.

“I am aware that as an alder on the Madison Common Council, I might hold some powers and privileges that aren’t afforded to some of the other women that have come forward,” Bennett says. “I really hope that people are able to see, this can happen to anyone. It happened to me too. So I really hope that, the same way that the other women that came forward with their experiences with Alder Myadze gave me the courage to speak up in the first place, I hope that me coming out and speaking out gives them the courage as well.”

The day after Bennett’s public statement, Madison365 published allegations that Myadze physically abused Gloria Reyes, former mayoral candidate, deputy mayor, and Madison school board president, during the course of an off-and-on relationship that took place between 2018 and 2021. Reyes said she had considered speaking out when McKoy and Johnson came forward, but “wasn’t ready at that time.”

“I had just accepted this position. I wanted to move on with my life and not have to have this follow me into this new role, into this new life,” Reyes told Madison365. (Reyes started a new job in June, as a deputy county manager in Ramsey County, Minnesota.) “And I didn’t want people to Google me and find this. I really wanted to start off new, and I just wasn’t ready to come out at that time. I mean, amazing bravery from Michelle and Jamie … I wish I could have stood in solidarity with them at that time.”

Despite ongoing pressure, Myadze has denied all allegations, calling them “baseless, defamatory, without merit, and made solely for the purpose of tarnishing my reputation, in the hopes of influencing the upcoming elections.” Myadze claimed in April that he had “worked tirelessly to advocate for causes such as Safe Harbor,” referring to Safe Harbor Child Advocacy Center, a non-profit on Madison’s north side that works with victims of child abuse. Safe Harbor responded shortly after stating Myadze “did not deliver on any action to benefit the organization, nor respond to our requests for the assistance that he pledged.” 

McKoy and her supporters submitted a statement in April calling for the Common Council to censure and remove Myadze. Since the allegations were first made public in late March, Madison alders, Dane County Supervisors, Assembly Representatives, other prominent community members have pressured Myadze to step down. Even Myadze’s son has called for his resignation, telling the Wisconsin State Journal that his father was “a very temperamental and violent person.” 

Under Wisconsin law, an alder can only be removed for “inefficiency, neglect of duty, official misconduct, or malfeasance in office.” But six women have either spoken out publicly or filed reports with detailed allegations of inappropriate, harassing, or abusive behavior by Myadze, so far. While Myadze continues to assert his innocence, the preponderance of evidence indicates a dangerous pattern of behavior. And yet he is still a standing member of the Common Council.

“The Common Council has a longstanding failure to hold alders that abuse their power accountable,” Bennett writes in her blog post. “There are several notable examples of the Council neglecting allegations of misconduct and protecting men in positions of power from scrutiny and punishment. Even though the Council has made repeated performative statements claiming to believe survivors, when it is time for action, the Council fails to support and protect survivors.”

Allegations across personal and professional lives

Myadze, 49, first won his Common Council seat in April 2021 amid a political backlash to the modest reforms that followed the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020. Those reforms included the removal of Madison Police Department (MPD) “school resource officers” from four Madison high schools, the creation of the City’s still-nascent civilian police oversight agency, and calls for cutting MPD’s funding and reducing its access to riot weapons like tear gas. Fearmongering about those possibilities—from staunchly pro-police Alders and a shady Eric Hovde-funded ad campaign—was a factor in that year’s Common Council elections. During the campaign, Myadze attacked District 18 incumbent Rebecca Kemble for her criticisms of the Madison Police Department. The Madison Professional Police Officers Association, the union representing MPD officers, endorsed Myadze both in 2021 and during his successful reelection campaign in 2023. Before running for Alder, Myadze served on the City’s Public Safety Review Committee.

In March, McKoy told Madison365 that she saw a February post on the Common Council’s Facebook page honoring Myadze for Black History Month. A now-deleted comment on that post alleged that Myadze has abused women. This prompted McKoy to respond in a Facebook video, saying: “I am here to tell you, yes he has.” McKoy and Myadze were together from 2006 on-and-off for seven and a half years. She told Madison365 that she ultimately left after an incident where Myadze threw her on a couch and choked her.

After McKoy spoke publicly, Johnson came forward, alleging multiple incidents from 1998 until their divorce in 2002 in which Myadze choked her or held a knife to her neck. After one incident involving the couple’s 10-month-old child, Myadze was charged with abuse of a child, battery, and false imprisonment. Myadze took a plea deal and completed a deferred prosecution program. Madison365 reported that Myadze’s charges were subsequently expunged from the public record, which is likely why they never came up during his two runs for office.

“Alder Myadze had an argument and physical altercation with Ms. Johnson, his former wife, 22 years ago,” Myadze’s attorney, Andrew Erlandson wrote in an email to Tone Madison. “He took legal responsibility for his role in that altercation. On the advice of counsel, Myadze resolved the matter via [sic] a deferred prosecution agreement, which he successfully completed. All charges were dismissed, and the record of the charge was expunged. With the exception of that one, regrettable incident, Mr. Myadze denies engaging in any abusive or harassing behavior. I have not seen credible evidence to demonstrate otherwise.”

Reyes says her relationship with Myadze began in 2018 and ended in November 2021 after Myadze knocked her unconscious. Reyes shared with Madison365 photos she had taken during the relationship of herself “with black eyes and bruises on her arms, hips and legs.”

The report released last week documents allegations from three complainants: a City employee, a member of the public, and Bennett, who is the only complainant who has publicly identified herself. 

The City employee told investigators that at a conference in Portland, Oregon in April 2022, she “experienced several instances of inappropriate behavior from Myadze.” Her account includes an incident in which she stated that Myadze “surprised her from behind, whispering ‘hello there’ in her ear and attempt[ed] to give her a hug, which she did not reciprocate.” She went on to tell investigators that Myadze says he appeared next to her during lunch one day and asked, “so you’re not here with your boyfriend?” and sat next to her at a keynote presentation and continued to try to talk to her, even though she ignored him. She told investigators that she “felt that Myadze was watching her as it could not be a coincidence that they kept running into each other at such a large conference” and she even “ate alone at restaurants to avoid him.” After the conference, she told investigators, she attempted to distance herself from Myadze and took “measures to avoid him at future events.”

The second complainant, who is not a city employee, stated that at an event in May 2022, Myadze “made her feel uncomfortable by making weird faces and sticking his tongue out sexually.” According to the account she gave investigators, she  tried to laugh off the behavior, but Myadze said “you know you want this,” to which she responded, “Charles you will never have a chance with me.” At another event in November 2023, she told investigators, Myadze bought her a drink, which she accepted, then he “began speaking to her in a sexually inappropriate manner, sticking out his tongue and saying, ‘I cannot wait to take you to your bed and have sex with you, I can see you rolling your eyes having an orgasm.” She stated that after she told Myadze to stop, he said “you know you want this” and walked away. She told investigators that Myadze then told other people: “let’s talk about something else because all [the complainant] talks about is sex.” The complainant stated she then became upset, yelled “what are you saying” and “what the fuck are you doing?” Myadze left.

Bennett’s issues with Myadze began when the two alders went to a conference in Washington D.C. in March 2022. She told investigators that Myadze made several inappropriate comments throughout the trip, including one incident in which he looked her up and down and said “damn [redacted] you look good, you really know how to clean up.” Bennett told investigators that Myadze insinuated that she was having a sexual relationship with someone who lived in Washington D.C. and, when she denied it, he said “Haha I know what you’re doing with him, wink wink.” The next day, Bennett told investigators, Myadze commented on her outfit, saying “you’re wearing open-toed shoes, I bet you’re wearing a lot less at [redacted’s] place” and told her to “put those [breasts] away and save them for [redacted].” Bennett said these and other comments were not made when others were around, but Myadze continued to make similar comments later at a reception.

The report also states that someone else who attended the conference told investigators that they witnessed Myadze “make inappropriate comments to women attendees.”

Bennett confided in other alders, seeking advice on how to handle the situation. In April, Myadze gave Bennett a ride in his car, but when she entered the car, he locked the doors and said, “I heard you were making comments about me talking and hitting on you and coming at you and I wouldn’t do that. I do not play with sexual assault and assault allegations in general. If I ever hear you say anything like that again, you and me are done.”

Bennett’s account sheds a dramatic new light on an April 16, 2024 meeting at which the Common Council unanimously adopted a resolution expressing solidarity with survivors of domestic abuse. Alder Sabrina Madison clearly introduced the resolution as a rebuke to Myadze, even if it didn’t mention him directly. In a bizarre twist, Myadze even joined 17 other Alders and Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway as a co-sponsor. Bennett asked to be removed as a cosponsor because Myadze joined. During her remarks on the resolution, Bennett criticized the process behind it as “a public display of protecting abusers,” and called the lack of action accompanying the resolution “absolutely infuriating.” She discussed an abusive relationship in her past to illustrate the importance of accountability: 

“As a survivor of childhood abuse—and someone that even has a relationship with my abuser—I can say that honestly one of the most healing moments I ever had was when my perpetrator looked me in the eye and told me ‘I did this to you, and for that I’m sorry.’ I think that an apology means a lot. A public apology, if this is a public matter, means a whole lot more.”

What the public didn’t know at the time was that Bennett had already filed a formal complaint against Myadze, about incidents that took place two years prior. She had discussed those incidents with three other Alders.

What’s “credible” and what’s “sustained”

In a response released with the results of the City’s investigation, Common Council President Yannette Figueroa Cole wrote that the report “reveals a troubling pattern of behavior we cannot overlook, detailing instances of unwanted and inappropriate behavior of a sexual nature that created significant trauma for all complainants.”

“It also uncovers an unwelcome pattern of bullying, repeated aggressive behaviors, and creating an unacceptable power imbalance,” Figueroa Cole writes. “In various ways throughout the report, the complainants describe how to navigate hostile environments, fear paralyzing them, and feeling compelled to appease their aggressor to avoid conflict and more harm while at the same time maintaining a professional environment to accomplish their work and goals. These are all signs of the fight-flight-freeze-fawn responses. These reactions often prevent victims from seeking help, perpetuating a cycle of silence that takes a toll on the mental health of victims of sexual harassment.”

Myadze maintains his innocence. In a statement Erlandson sent to media outlets last week, Myadze says “that the investigator found that none of the complaints against me were sustained by the evidence.” In the City’s supplemental investigative report, investigators write that Myadze “suggested that the sudden emergence of complaints… was not coincidental but part of a broader, coordinated effort to tarnish Myadze’s reputation.” 

“It screams an elevated sense of self-importance that is non-existent,” Bennett says. “Nobody is coordinating to get, to come after Alder Myadze.”

In an email to Tone Madison, Erlandson writes that Myadze “has taken positions as an Alder that are unpopular in certain political circles, most notably his opposition to making Alder positions full-time and his support from the police body camera pilot program.”

It is worth noting that the Common Council in 2022 voted 16-4 in favor of the Madison Police Department’s body camera pilot program. During her mayoral campaign, Reyes also pushed for the City to implement police body-worn cameras. Bennett voted against body cameras, and has been more willing than any other current alder to criticize and question MPD. Myadze’s accusers span across the local political spectrum. Neither Myadze nor Erlandson has offered solid evidence to back up the insinuation that accusers are mounting a politically motivated attack against Myadze for taking what are in fact majority policy positions.

“The APM 3-5 allegations against Alder Myadze arose at or around the time that the City Attorney’s office informed the Common Council that online allegations made by two individuals with whom Mr. Myadze had prior relationships (Ms. Johnson and Ms. McKoy) were not grounds for his removal from the Common Council,” Erlandson says. “The APM 3-5 harassment allegations, which were strikingly coincidental, were investigated. None was sustained. Now, another allegation [from Reyes] has come out, in the press.”

Tone Madison asked the City Attorney’s office if Erlandson’s statement about Myadze’s behavior in previous relationships not being grounds for removal is accurate but did not receive a response.

Myadze criticizes Figueroa Cole’s statement, saying her statement suggests “that the result of this investigation was due to a problem with the City’s policy, not with the credibility and substance of the complaints against me” and calls it “needlessly antagonistic, inflammatory, misleading, and irresponsible.” But Figueroa Cole’s analysis of the report is accurate; it’s Myadze’s statement which mischaracterizes what the report actually says. 

In fact, the initial report, completed in August, says that Bennett’s account of the incidents was “credible” and that “her descriptions of the incidents were consistent and corroborated by Myadze’s own statements.” Meanwhile, investigators stated that Myadze’s account was “less credible due to selective memory and inconsistencies in his statements.” The initial report ruled that Myadze’s behavior toward Bennett had violated City policy. 

But after the initial report was submitted to the City, Myadze shared with investigators correspondence between the two that illustrated an ongoing cordial, professional relationship. The supplemental report, which investigators submitted to the City in late October, shows that investigators interpreted the correspondence as evidence that Myadze and Bennett’s relationship was not altered by Myadze’s behavior and Bennett was not experiencing a hostile work environment. 

Erlandson writes that “reading the initial investigative report in isolation is misleading; that’s the reason there was a supplemental investigation and report.”

“The APM 3-5 investigative procedures are not well-defined, particularly as it concerns the collection/provision of documentary evidence pertinent to an investigation,” Erlandson writes. “When the initial report [was] issued, I immediately wrote to Investigator Obviagele to express concern that there existed documentary evidence that was material to certain events/sequences discussed in the initial report, which had not been requested or provided, that refuted certain claims, findings, or inferences drawn in the initial investigative report. That is precisely what the supplemental investigative report reflects, in reversing the investigative finding from ‘sustained’ to ‘not sustained.'”

But the reversal of the investigators’ conclusions—about whether or not Myadze violated a specific City policy—does not negate Bennett’s account of events. The report reads: “[Redacted’s] discomfort with certain interactions, particularly the car incident, is acknowledged and her account of the events is consistent. Additionally the timing of Myadze’s submission of supplemental materials, particularly after being asked to provide information earlier is noted and raises concerns about procedural delay.” 

“Mr. Myadze is disappointed and disagrees with many of Investigator Obviagele’s observations concerning complainant credibility,” Erlandson writes. “On this point, I would note that the APM 3-5 investigative process does not afford the respondent/accused the right to confront accusers, an opportunity for cross-examination, or the opportunity to call witnesses.”

This sequence of events also adds to Bennett’s frustration with the investigation.

“He had ample opportunity to present all of this information in the first place,” Bennett says. “Mind you, he literally had a lawyer throughout this whole process, so he had ample time, plenty of legal advice, and, yes, dragged out the process… I can’t say why he did, but it definitely did seem to me like he obstructed the legal system and got away with that.”

Bennett says the investigators “handled the situation with a high degree of professionalism and did their best to be fair within the process.” But the process is limited in its scope, which is reflected in the findings.

“While there are oftentimes cases where things people do are absolutely wrong, what’s wrong in a moral sense, in a societal sense, is not always reflected in a legal sense,” Bennett says. “[The investigators’] charge was to look at this from a legal standpoint.”

The question the investigation pursued was whether or not Myadze’s behavior violated the City’s official harassment and/or discrimination policies as outlined in APM 3-5, which “involves unwelcome and persistent behavior that unreasonably interferes with an employee’s work performance or creates a hostile work environment.” The report’s findings describe Myadze’s alleged behavior as “unwanted,” “distasteful,” “odd,” “inappropriate,” or “offensive,” but concludes the incidents lack the persistence or severity needed to be considered a violation.

“I’m not surprised,” says Ryan Poe-Gavlinski, professor at UW-Madison Law School and deputy director at the Restraining Order and Survivor Advocacy Clinic (ROSA), who has extensive experience working with victims of domestic abuse. Poe-Gavlinski says the investigation did what she calls “splitting the baby.” As she sums it up: “They said, ‘Yes, your actions were absolutely wrong, but it didn’t rise to the level of sexual harassment under the statute.'”

“What the investigation seems to say was, ‘yes, it appears that these things probably did occur, but because of the actions of the complainant, they didn’t seem to really affect their work,'” Poe-Gavlinski says. “They said they were uncomfortable, and it made them not want to be around [Myadze], and those types of things [but] that it didn’t rise to the sexual harassment under the statute needing action from the city.”

Poe-Gavlinski says that the systems we have for addressing sexual harassment in the workplace put victims “in a Catch-22”: there’s an expectation for them to report the harassment immediately, but these systems don’t acknowledge the risks involved in speaking out, particularly for people in public life. 

“They don’t want it to affect their work,” Poe-Gavlinski says. “And I think honestly, as women, we are told a lot of time—I mean, we’ve been told from the very beginning—we have to buck up. We have to not be so sensitive. We have to play in a world that doesn’t always support our needs.”

Bennett noted that her text messages to Myadze were weighed heavily in the supplemental report and were “misconstrued.” Once she texted “Merry Christmas” to Myadze, and the supplemental report cites this as evidence that the two maintained a mostly “cordial and professional” relationship. But the report skips over an important piece of context: Bennett points out that she sent that message to all of her fellow alders, and didn’t want to single out Myadze by not sending him the message.

“Weighing very heavily on the professional tone of our communication, they interpreted that to mean that there wasn’t a significant impact on our dynamic,” Bennett says. “I don’t think that the legal system really takes into account the many ways people that experience things like this handle it.”

Poe-Gavlinski also points out that the expectation for victims to immediately report is divorced from the reality of what it is like to report and undergo an investigation.

“You’ll see a lot of domestic abuse victims, sexual assault victims not report right away, because a they’re still processing for themselves what happened, and now they’re really making themselves vulnerable if they decide to open up and talk to other folks about it,” Poe-Gavlinski says. “In our court system, it is not a very supportive environment for victims of sexual assault, domestic abuse, harassment, to go in and talk about these things, because they’re not treated very nicely in the system. It opens them up to their whole entire lives being torn apart. Everything they’ve ever done that may have been questionable to social standards are now brought up, and it just makes it awful. And so not everyone wants to go through that, but that doesn’t make the behavior that’s happening to them okay, and it doesn’t mean that people should just have to live in that work environment, either.”

Poe-Gavlinski says that Bennett didn’t do “anything different than so many other women, or even honestly, really, anyone in this situation,” particularly considering her position as a public figure.

“Because they’ve got to continue to work,” Poe-Gavlinski says. “Their work is their livelihood and their credibility. And yeah, victims don’t always want to talk about things right away either. It’s not uncommon, even in domestic abuse situations, where you’ll see a lot of cordial behavior back and forth after the abuses occurred. And I think this is very similar.”

Bennett says that one of the hardest parts of going public was having to tell her father, who has a chronic heart condition. “It was absolutely heartbreaking to me that even after my dad was in the hospital, like on a hospital bed, that this is the thing that he was thinking about,” Bennett says. “This is the thing that he was having anxiety about. And even in his end-of-life stage of congestive heart failure, this is the thing that we keep talking about. And it’s really painful to see my dad experience that secondhand pain of not being, not feeling as though he could protect his daughter, or feeling worried about me.”

The current system and actions taken by the City are not serving anyone. Not victims, not City employees or alders, nor the constituents. Bennett says she still feels “very confident in [her] decision to come forward.” But she’s frustrated that Myadze is still on the Common Council. 

“Every time I see him on the council floor, I cringe every time he speaks,” Bennett says. “I feel that rage bubble up in me that he’s still able to be in a public-facing role.”

She also feels “really, really badly and scared for any woman that has to interact with Alder Myadze.”

“Because I am certain that he will continue this behavior,” Bennett says. “He does not acknowledge any of his wrongdoing, and he thinks it’s okay. And it’s not.”