Judy Nicastro volunteer campaing officer Stephen Spoonamore (who Nicastro used to date) sparked a dramatic confrontation over the Fourth of July weekend when Seattle Districts Now campaign volunteers claim to have caught him tearing signature sheets off at least one districts campaign kiosk--a possible violation of Seattle election law.

According to districts campaign manager Jay Sauceda, the incident started when he and a campaign volunteer, Zander Batchelder, saw Spoonamore ripping signature sheets off a districts signature kiosk near the Burke-Gilman trail. Sauceda says that when the pair confronted Spoonamore, he responded by lobbing accusations at them. "He said, 'Somebody's been knocking down all of Judy's signs, and your kiosks are still standing, so it must be you,'" Batchelder says. "I told him it had nothing to do with us." Several other candidates' signs had also been vandalized, Batchelder adds. "But for some reason this Stephen character decided it was us."

The standoff escalated into "a real screaming match," Sauceda says--until Nicastro herself (who'd been riding her bicycle up the trail) came along and defused the battle. "Stephen just wouldn't calm down," Batchelder says. "I can't believe this guy's an officer for her campaign." Nicastro chalks the incident up to "an overly enthusiastic volunteer" and says she apologized to Batchelder and Sauceda.

Attempts to reach Spoonamore by e-mail and through the Nicastro campaign office were unsuccessful; campaign manager Jenn Forbes would say only that the campaign's "understanding was that... Districts Now had been placing their material over our yard signs," and "[Spoonamore] was in the process of rolling up their materials" when he was confronted. Districts Now requested a written apology from Spoonamore; in exchange, Sauceda says, the group agreed not to take legal action against him for interfering with their signature gathering. More than a week later, Spoonamore complied, apologizing via e-mail for "assum[ing] it was SDN" that removed Nicastro's signs. The irony, Batchelder notes, is that Nicastro has been largely supportive of districts, and vice versa. All the same, Batchelder says, "if you catch someone messing with your stuff, you've got to confront them. "

barnett@thestranger.com