‘You tried to ruin my life’: Accused Durham City Council member confronts colleagues.

Monique Holsey-Hyman stepped to the podium, wearing a yellow striped jacket over a green dress that matched her trademark sparkling headband.

Thursday was the first Durham City Council meeting since the district attorney announced this week that a six-month investigation into an extortion allegation against Holsey-Hyman had turned up “no evidence.”

First, Holsey-Hyman addressed the two City Council members who had stood by her, women she’d brought bouquets of roses.

“Mayor Elaine O’Neal, from day one, had my back and knew that these allegations were false,” Holsey-Hyman said. “DeDreana Freeman … went into protective mode to make sure that I was treated fairly, and I truly from the bottom of my heart am so upset about the level of scrutiny she had to endure.”

Then she turned to the other six people seated at the front of the City Council chambers, pointing to each as she said their names: Mayor Pro Tem Mark-Anthony Middleton; council members Javiera Caballero, Leonardo Williams and Jillian Johnson; City Manager Wanda Page; and City Attorney Kimberly Rehberg.

“I have endured so much you don’t know. There are no words to tell you the amount of pain that I’ve suffered. I’ve had death threats. I’ve been blasted through public media by some of my own colleagues on this dais,” she said.

“You tried to ruin my life,” Holsey-Hyman eventually concluded. “I hope nobody else ever goes through what I went through.”

Only Middleton responded publicly, saying Jarrod Edens, the developer who made the accusation, is the one who should answer for himself. Edens didn’t cooperate with the investigation, the District Attorney Satana Deberry said.

“Unfortunately this has morphed into attacking everybody except the person who actually did it,” he said. “We didn’t wake up one morning and convince some wealthy white man to make up things about one of our colleagues.”

He highlighted one of the final sentences in the DA’s letter: “Additionally, there is also no evidence that there was a coordinated effort led by any other Council Member to initiate allegations against Holsey-Hyman,” Deberry wrote.

‘I will not be called a liar’

After an exchange later in the meeting about proposed bonuses for city employees, Holsey-Hyman said she “can’t stay quiet anymore” about the digs she feels she gets from Middleton.

“I’ve just watched the way that you’ll say something good, then you’ve got to come back for me,” Holsey-Hyman said.

“Somebody higher than you, a FBI and an SBI, have said that I have integrity,” she said. “I’m going to ask you to stop saying every time I say something that it’s a lie, because for months I’ve had to deal with the lies that you all were saying.”

Middleton asked for permission to speak, but the mayor said no.

“I was directly called out,” he protested several times.

“I’m sorry,” O’Neal said. “I am presiding. … We’re not going to have a back and forth.”

“I’m not going to be called a liar at the dais,” Middleton said.

“Just chill right there for a second,” O’Neal said before moving on.

‘Baby girl, check your email’

Holsey-Hyman, a social work professor at N.C. Central University, was appointed to the City Council in 2022 and is currently running for election.

She recalled on Thursday her excitement at making it to the final four for the appointment and her nervousness during the interviews. She said she framed the first group photo the City Council took and sent thank you cards and Christmas gifts.

Then, the allegations started. Holsey-Hyman said she was blindsided.

“I was at work teaching my students and the mayor called me and said, ‘Baby girl, check your email,’” she recalled.

Holsey-Hyman read out text messages exchanged between council members the week the allegations were made public, as well as a snippet from a memo Rehberg wrote that said it was “unlikely that a developer would report conduct that has no factual basis or to maliciously cause harm, particularly a developer who regularly brings matters before the city.”

She said she’s missed career opportunities and had to spend money meant for her daughter’s law school tuition to get an attorney.

“I don’t think you understand the things that I’ve lost,” she said. “I want you to understand what you put my family through. I want you to understand that every time I came in here, I didn’t know if I could hold my head up.”

Early voting in the primary got underway this week. Durham is electing a new mayor and filling the three at-large City Council seats occupied by Holsey-Hyman and Caballero, who are bth runnibg for re-election, and Johnson, who is not.

The field narrows after Primary Day, Oct. 10.