Mayoral candidate dismisses campaign manager found guilty of assault

Saint John mayoral candidate Darrell Bastarache has dismissed his campaign manager after the man was found guilty of assaulting a woman.

Ed Hoyt was found guilty by Judge David Walker on Monday, and is scheduled for sentencing June 25.

"Immediate dismissal," Bastarache said when reached by phone Monday afternoon.

Bastarache initially refused to comment on the charges in an interview with Information Morning Saint John at the end of March, saying he wanted to wait and see what happened in court before he made a decision.

On Monday, Bastarache said he had already decided to fire Hoyt, even before he was found guilty.

"I don't condone anything Ed has done," he said. " I spoke to Ed a couple of weeks ago saying that I was going to let him go either way because of all the unforeseen publicity that we've been getting."

He said he had started decreasing Hoyt's responsibilities a few weeks ago, but will now fire him. He said he hasn't found a replacement.

Community reaction

Bastarache said he initially didn't want to fire Hoyt "for the sake of fairness."

"I don't know the full details, and ... innoncent until proven guilty sort of thing," he said.

But he said he got "hundreds of emails", including some from women asking him about the assault allegations against Hoyt.

"They say, 'But I still advise you that he's not good for your campaign'," he said.