Six days before the story broke that Democratic gubernatorial nominee Paul Davis was at a Coffeyville strip club when a 1998 drug raid occurred, the chief of staff for Republican Lt. Gov. Jeff Colyer requested the incident records from the Montgomery County Sheriff�s Office.



Timothy Keck is chief counsel for the Kansas Department of Health and Environment and, starting in June, added the duties of chief of staff for Colyer. Mark Dugan, formerly Colyer�s chief of staff, is running the re-election campaign of Gov. Sam Brownback and Colyer.



Keck requested the records Sept. 15. The sheriff�s office mailed them Sept. 17, according to records obtained by The News. The strip-club story broke in the Coffeyville Journal on Sept. 20.



The author of the Journal�s story, executive editor Corey Kneedler, said he had received a news tip. He requested the records Sept. 15, too, according to the Montgomery County Sheriff�s Office.



�That�s crazy,� Kneedler told The News on Thursday, about Keck�s request the same day. �I�ve never even heard of him,� Kneedler said.



Keck wasn�t the man who gave him the tip, Kneedler said. His source wished to remain anonymous and had �no political agenda whatsoever,� Kneedler said. Associated Press reporter John Hanna, based in Topeka, requested the same records two days after Keck and Kneedler, but they were mailed after the story came out.



The Davis campaign criticized Keck�s action. Campaign spokesman Chris Pumpelly issued this statement:



�This is a disgusting revelation that puts a public employee in the middle of a smear campaign, and likely using taxpayer money to fund it. It is shameful that Sam Brownback is laying off teachers, but paying partisan hacks with state funds to dig up dirt on his opponent. Keck should be fired immediately. Both Sam Brownback and Jeff Colyer should apologize to the taxpayers of Kansas. This might be the kind of politics practiced in New Jersey or Washington, D.C., but it is beneath Kansas.�



John Milburn, communications director for the Brownback-Colyer campaign, defended Keck.



Milburn said the campaign �received a phone call from the Montgomery County attorney�s office notifying us that the Coffeyville Journal had made an open records request� for police records related to the 1998 strip-club drug raid.



�Being a legal matter,� Milburn said in an email, �the campaign asked attorney Tim Keck to return the phone call. Following the conversation with the county attorney�s office, he made a similar open records request to receive the same documents as the Coffeyville Journal.� Milburn didn�t provide an explanation about the �legal matter.� Efforts to reach Keck were unsuccessful.



The Montgomery County attorney is Larry Markle, a Republican elected official. He also is county attorney for Chautauqua County. The News was unable to reach him.



Davis must have spent too much time in strip clubs back in law school, Milburn said, �because, as an attorney and candidate, Paul should know full well that the law allows personal staff of the Governor�s office to work on campaign issues.� Milburn said a Davis government staffer in the Statehouse, Haley Pollock, legally conducted campaign work �up until March of this year.�



Carol Williams, executive director of the Kansas Governmental Ethics Commission, earlier told The News that state law allows some staff members to be designated personal staff and they can handle some campaign-related work. The example she gave was the scheduler who handles an elected official�s schedule that includes a mix of official and campaign events.



Davis was not arrested in the Coffeyville drug raid, but his name was included in the thick stack of papers detailing the raid. Davis was 26, unmarried, and an attorney in Lawrence. He said after the story broke that he and his boss had gone to the club because the owner was a client.



In the Montgomery County records, an officer at the scene documented he saw �a white male sitting in a couch with a white female standing over him. She was apparently a dancer in the club, because she did not have her top on and was only wearing a G-string.� The man was Davis, and he told the officer he was the attorney for the club owner. That individual was arrested during the drug raid.



Clay Barker, executive director of the Kansas Republican Party, said Saturday the incident �demonstrates a total lack of judgment and is the kind of behavior that Kansans will find totally unacceptable in someone who wants to be governor.�



Kansas Democratic Party Chairwoman Joan Wagnon said she was unaware of the strip-club incident until the story surfaced. She noted that Davis wasn�t married and wasn�t doing anything illegal. �Much ado about nothing,� Wagnon said.



�It just makes the Brownback campaign seem desperate,� Wagnon said Thursday about Keck�s records request.



The Coffeyville Journal story quickly jumped into the national press. The Politico website carried a story over the weekend. The incident was mentioned during a discussion of the Brownback-Davis race on NBC�s Sunday morning show �Meet the Press.�



�There may be more Davis stories coming out. I do not know for sure. My understanding is that several media groups are investigating his past,� the GOP�s Barker said Monday. �We do not have the people or funds to do this; we rely on the media to vet candidates,� Barker said.