After middle-finger gesture, leaders want Bridgeport official removed

“I think I have been more of a disciplinary council president than any before me,” Nieves, who has held that position since December 2017, said in an interview. “(And) it is consistent.”

But two other council members, Alfredo Castillo and Eneida Martinez, who are awaiting trial on unrelated criminal charges, never faced the same level of public admonishment from Nieves and other peers on Bridgeport’s legislative body following their arrests. They are also, like Nieves, supporters of Mayor Joe Ganim’s reelection, while Pereira has been backing the mayor’s chief rival, John Gomes.

Castillo was arrested in August 2021 and charged with second-degree breach of peace and second-degree threatening for an incident involving Public Facilities Director Craig Nadrizny in the parking lot of the Wonderland of Ice skating rink.

Martinez was arrested in October 2020 after police say she operated the Keystone bar/strip club during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown where a young man was killed. At that time, pandemic rules had shuttered operations like Keystone, but Martinez had received permission in summer 2020 from the municipal health department to re-open as a bring-your-own-alcohol social club.

Castillo and Martinez have each pleaded not guilty and their separate trials have been continually delayed, most recently to Jan. 26 and Feb. 6, respectively.

Nieves and the six other council members with leadership titles on Thursday released a letter, calling on Pereira to step down by Jan. 16. The council consists of 20 members, two from each of 10 districts, elected every two years. All of them are Democrats.

Council leadership’s unusual decision was in response to an email Pereira sent Wednesday morning to Nieves and Thomas Gaudett, Ganim’s deputy chief-of-staff. The email was obtained by Hearst Connecticut Media Group.

Upset over the council’s vote Tuesday to pass a resolution calling for a cease-fire in the war between Israel and Hamas, Pereira referred to members of the Islamic community who attended the meeting as a “Palestinian mob” and “Palestinian thugs,” called Police Chief Roderick Porter and his officers a “pig and his piglets” and mocked a Ganim aide’s weight.

In her email, Pereira also admitted that at the end of Tuesday’s meeting she twice stuck up her middle finger at an individual she said “repeatedly yelled out my name and was waving some propaganda poster at me.”

“In light of Councilwoman Pereira’s recent actions, City Council leadership calls for Councilwoman Pereira’s immediate resignation,” Nieves and the other council leaders wrote in their statement Thursday. “It is imperative that our elected officials uphold the highest standards of conduct, treating all members of our community and our sworn law enforcement officers with the dignity and respect they deserve.”

Hearst Connecticut Media contacted Pereira on the email and phone number listed for her on the city’s website. She responded, but did not provide a comment about the resignation demand.

Nieves has not sought the same punishment for Castillo and Martinez. Her reaction to both incidents was to temporarily strip Castillo and Martinez of some of their powers and responsibilities on the council, such as assignments to council subcommittees. Unlike the situation with Pereira, neither was ever publicly advised to step down.

“The difference is that she (Pereira) did these things in her role as a councilwoman,” Nieves said Friday. “Eneida’s thing was private. That had nothing to do with the council.”

“It was one person’s word against another,” Nieves recalled Friday. However, the police report stated Wonderland’s manager, John Ferguson, witnessed the incident and described the altercation as verbal and not physical.

Nieves has also argued the charges against Castillo and Martinez remain allegations, which have yet to be proven in court and that, unlike with Pereira, council leadership was never unified in wanting either to step down. 

“I have nothing in proof,” Nieves said, in contrast to this past Wednesday’s email from Pereira to her and Gaudett.

“She admitted she flipped off individuals from her (council) desk,” Nieves said. 

Ganim on Thursday also condemned Pereira’s email and backed calls for her resignation, but in contrast, campaigned last summer alongside Martinez. Asked in August about his public support for her despite her still-pending case, the mayor said he is “sensitive” to the situation, but Martinez is “one of the most active and effective council members” and her political future should be left to the voters.

“There is a process where the people have the right to select their elected official in this democracy,” Ganim said. “At the end of the day, it’s up to the residents.” 

And in a response Friday, the mayor added that any “prior allegations” against Castillo and Martinez “are matters handled and/or addressed by appropriate authorities.”

“This (Pereira’s email) is written hate speech by an elected official that is an outspoken operative for a candidate for mayor — John Gomes — calling law officers in the city ‘pigs’ and ‘piglets.'”

Gomes on Thursday did not call for Pereira to step-down, describing it instead as a council matter. He did distance himself from the email, saying it was “not condoned by myself or my campaign. As elected officials, we have to not only support our residents but those within the public safety sector.” 

Nieves acknowledged Friday another situation involving Martinez that in retrospect she might have handled differently. 

In 2017, council members were battling with the city’s law department over what they viewed as Bridgeport’s too-strict process for collecting delinquent sewer-use fees and foreclosing on properties that fail to pay up. Martinez was one of the most vocal critics of that process and during a public meeting that December took aim at the two lawyers involved in debt collection — municipal attorney Russell Liskov and private counsel Juda Epstein.

“Both men are Jews and buddies and they go to the same synagogue and they are buying up these (foreclosed) properties,” Martinez had alleged.

Liskov and Epstein accused her of antisemitism but, unlike with Pereira this week, there was no significant public action by Nieves or other council members. 

In late January 2018, Martinez said in response to the two lawyers, “I bear no animosity toward anyone based on his or her race, ethnicity or religious tradition. As a person of faith, and a minority woman, I respect all religious traditions and detest bigotry in any form.”

Nieves on Friday said when Martinez made the allegations against Liskov and Epstein she had only been council president for three weeks and had relied on advice from the municipal law department that the matter could be mediated behind the scenes. Looking back, Nieves said, she may have instead removed Martinez from some of her committees.

“I might have handled it differently,” Nieves said.