Valley Voice
A letter to California’s governor from Assemblyman Devon Mathis (R-Visalia) appears to have been partially plagiarized from a letter written by his opponent two months earlier.
The letter from Mathis’ office to Gov. Gavin Newsom–dated May 1 and regarding Senate Bill 743–appears to have been copied verbatim from a letter written by Drew Phelps. Phelps is Mathis’ opponent for the 26th Assembly District.
Phelps’ original version of the letter, sent to Newsom on March 10, was composed as part of Phelps’ role as a project manager, policy researcher and analyst with Granville Homes. Phelps’ letter was then reproduced by the Central Valley Business Federation, a Fresno-based lobbying organization also known as BizFed, without listing Phelps as the original author. The BizFed version of the letter is dated May 22.
The alleged theft of intellectual property was revealed by Phelps on his Facebook page, where he presented Mathis’ version of the letter next to his own.
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