Sex Video of New City Manager in Kansas Sent Out to Random Employees

A city official in Kansas has been placed on indefinite leave after video footage of him masturbating was emailed to some of his co-workers in late September by an anonymous third party.

The Kansas City Star reports the Shawnee City Council voted to place City Manager Doug Gerber on indefinite leave during a closed-door meeting held Wednesday night.

Gerber, who was hired by the city in March, did not send the offending video, the Star reports, and the sent email did not originate from the city's internal computer server.

The paper has exchanged emails with the account behind the original anonymous email, and it appears to be more than one person, claiming they wanted to expose Gerber's alleged online behavior.

The Star indicates reporters learned of the video last week, and on Monday, filed a Kansas Open Records Act request for emails related to the incident and any subsequent investigations.

Prior to that records request, several City Council members — as well as Mayor Michelle Distler — were unaware the video existed and had been sent to city workers.

The move by the council comes days before the city's elections on Tuesday.

"I find it incredulous that nobody told the City Council," said Eric Jenkins, the council president, after learning of the video. "We've got an HR director, two assistant city managers, department heads, the city manager. I mean nobody would bother to tell the elected representatives this is percolating down here at City Hall?"

Jenkins added it was ultimately Gerber's responsibility to alert the council's members about the emailed video.

When asked for comment, Gerber told the paper, "I think it's not in the city's best interest right now to comment."

The Star did review the video, describing it as self-filmed by Gerber, who is seen alone in the footage, seated on a couch. It is unclear when or where the video was taken, or whether it was a direct recording or screen recording of a video call.

The video's disseminator told the paper Gerber allegedly created the video to entice some other unidentified individual. "We don't hesitate to expose people involved in these dubious and un-Catholic practices," the email sender's response read.

Gerber, who'd previously served as city manager for Goodland and Beloit, Kansas, could not be reached for comment Friday.