Antioch Council candidate’s father, with same name, arrested for parole violation, Wednesday

Kenneth Ray Turnage

Kenneth Ray Turnage, Sr. Photo from the Megan’s Law website

By Allen Payton

Kenneth Ray Turnage, Sr. the father of Kenneth Ray “Kenny” Turnage, II, a candidate for the Antioch City Council in the November election, was arrested on Wednesday for violating his parole, according to Antioch Police. Turnage, Sr., age 66, was attending a memorial service at Most Holy Rosary Catholic church on A Street in Antioch. Because it was too close to the Holy Rosary Catholic School, located next door, he was arrested.

According to Antioch Police Sergeant Tom Fuhrmann, county parole agents responded to an alert they had received from an ankle monitor of a parolee at a location he was not supposed to be.

“Turnage, Sr. is on parole from prison for sexual assault,” Furhmann stated. He was not allowed to be on or near any school campus.

“He was removed from the church and arrested,” Furhmann added. “The school was informed and was placed on lock down.”

Turnage, Sr., was arrested in July, 2009 for “lewd or lascivious acts with a child under 14 years of age,” according to the Megan’s Law website. He was released from prison, earlier this year.

When reached for comment, Turnage II, the candidate, who is 44-years-old, made the following statement:

“Yes, my father, who is a parolee was arrested for being too close to a school, which was in violation of his parole. I do not have any further information at this time, because I do not keep in contact with my father. We have been estranged since he was released from incarceration on May 16, 2016.”

Fuhrmann said Turnage, Sr. would most likely “get a slap on the wrist for this and be released.”

No further details were provided, and no press release is expected from the Antioch Police Department about the incident. To view the Megan’s Law website, click here. To see locations of registered sex offenders in Antioch on the CrimeReports.com website, click here.


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18 Comments to “Antioch Council candidate’s father, with same name, arrested for parole violation, Wednesday”

  1. Nancy Fernandez says:

    I don’t think I would have printed that no matter who’s father it was. I know it is public record and all of that but you have to draw a line somewhere. Just plain cruel Mr. Publisher. How far does the need to know rule go?

  2. Nancy Fernandez says:

    Marty has asked me to send this to Mr. Turnage! You have both our votes. You are a quality individual and have done many things for this city. You are a very productive individual and we are proud to know you.

  3. Manny Soliz says:

    Must be slow news day? How about a story on the overall concentration of sex offenders in very specific neighborhoods, right here in Antioch. I think this would be of greater interest to the people of Antioch, instead of a blurb with definite political undertones. Let’s all work to keep this campaign clean, in fact let’s start with our various news services!

  4. Peggy Court says:

    Rather obvious what this was about…..but we are not our parents, nor do we deserve to be punished for them.

  5. Jim Lanter says:

    I know there are parole violators arrested every day in Contra Costa County and I’m sure there’s a fair share right here in our town. Why make this a big thing. To try and sensalize the election. Do me a favor Antioxh Harold. Start posting EVERY payrolls violation arrest in Antioxh and be sure and put it in the same location .
    This is as low as you can go. Or maybe not there’s quite a few mirw days left before the election.

  6. Publisher says:

    Readers,

    Below is why I wrote and published this article, and in large part, it’s related to the fact that they have the same name.

    I was asked by a reader and resident why a helicopter was flying around toward downtown, this morning. I said I didn’t know because the Antioch police radios were turned off to both the public and media, earlier this year, but I would check into it. I called the APD media line and left a message asking what if anything was happening or had happened. Later, I was at the Wells Fargo Bank branch at 18th & A Streets and asked their security guard if he knew of anything and he told me he had seen a helicopter flying over the area earlier, today.

    When I later spoke to Sgt. Fuhrmann I asked him about the helicopter and he informed me of the arrest at Holy Rosary and the details, which I provided in the article. When I learned of the name of the person arrested, I told Fuhrmann I wished I hadn’t asked about this incident.

    As a friend of Kenny’s I was faced with a dilemma – do I write the story about it or sit on it and protect my friend from this potential embarrassment in his campaign for city council? I knew I had a journalistic responsibility to write the story but at the same time give Kenny the opportunity to make a comment on it, if he wished to do so.

    This is not the kind of article that gives me or hopefully anyone else in the news media any pleasure writing.

    Anyone who wanted to could do an internet search on any of the candidates and had they done so on Ken Turnage, this and the father’s previous arrest would have most likely come up. So to be clear that it’s not the candidate who was arrested, I specifically wrote the differences in names and ages, and provided a photo of Ken Turnage, Sr. who I’ve known and was friends with, but haven’t seen for years, and learned in the past year, why.

    Both Kenny and I knew that most likely he would have to eventually deal with this issue as a candidate for office, and as the publisher of the local newspaper, I would have to deal with it, as well. Today, we both had to.

    It’s unfortunate. But it’s news and I felt obligated to provide the news to our readers. That’s part of the challenge of being both the owner of a local media source and living and interacting with those who are, at times the subject of the news articles I publish.

    Hopefully, now that this matter is out there Kenny can put it behind him and it will not be an issue during the campaign, as it shouldn’t be.

    I specifically wrote the headline so that there would be no confusion as to which of them was arrested. If people had heard that a Ken Turnage was arrested today, there would have been confusion.

    In addition, when people who subscribe to our website receive an email with this article link it will not show the photo of the father. So, that had to be taken into consideration, as well.

    Furthermore, it would not be right to pick and choose which story to publish that might have negative implications for one candidate and not another.

    I did the best I could with what I was faced with and believe I made the right decision, and wrote an article that’s fair to all concerned.

    Allen Payton, Publisher

  7. Publisher says:

    Readers,

    Here’s another, very recent example. I know the mother of the young man who was arrested for the hate crime in Antioch, last week. I could not have left out his name from the article to protect her. That would be irresponsible as a journalist.

    One more example and I’ll leave it at that. A lady involved in a murder in Antioch, last year had been an advertising client of mine. It would have also been irresponsible to try and protect her by not including her name when she was arrested.

    Allen Payton, Publisher

  8. BOB says:

    This is so tacky and low. The publisher is biased and proven himself unprofessional on so many occasions. Time to move on Allen

    • Publisher says:

      BOB,
      I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt that you wrote your comment before you had the chance to read mine, above, which I encourage you to do, as well as Kenny Turnage’s, below.
      Allen Payton, Publisher

  9. Kenny Turnage II says:

    I want to thank everyone for the support. Allen D Payton was/is doing his job and reporting things in Antioch! Sometimes doing your job isnt fun or nice but you do it. As many of you have said this is not a reflection of me nor do i take the article to be. Hopefully tomorrow there is some great news story about Antioch and this is forgotten!

  10. Publisher says:

    Thank you, Kenny, for your words and understanding.
    Allen

  11. Terry Ramus says:

    Allen, I believe that your local paper can contribute greatly to Antioch as we no longer have the local papers of old. My argument regarding this article is NOT to hide information from anyone. My argument is about judgement and content. I do not agree with publishing this article in this manner. (1) so as you mentioned, a helicopter was flying around a part of town due to this, yet unfortunately, helicopters fly around town on many evenings. Therefore, based on your stated criteria and reasoning, I should expect many articles per week just to explain all the reasons for all of the helicopters flying around. This was NOT the reason for this article. (2) There was NOT a victim in this case as it was a parole violation. Now I take such things seriously, especially for these types of past crimes, but I do not recall articles about daily parole violations all over town. So this was also NOT the reason for the article. (3) You did not need to mention third parties in the article and that they might be running for office. Do articles typically layout the family tree of criminals in the city and do we then engage in group or family-wide punishment? Of course not. So I am very disappointed that this was published in this way. Kenny Turnage, the candidate, is a very hard working, accomplished, family-oriented, generous citizen of Antioch and I am sure that the family already struggles with this situation. We should each respond with a prayer to help the entire family and any past victims. This article was ONLY published because Kenny is a candidate for office and yet the subject of the article had nothing to do with him. It was just wrong for you to publish and I encourage an apology to correct the situation. In the future, I recommend that that you exercise more judgement prior to publishing articles that are intended to impact a third party. Again, your paper can be a very positive influence but you must be fair. Terry

  12. Nancy Fernandez says:

    Thank you Terry!

  13. Publisher says:

    Terry,
    While I always appreciate your perspective, and your words of encouragement in your comments, and agree with your second sentence, I have to disagree with your conclusion.

    I encourage you to re-read the article. Nowhere does it mention the helicopter. That’s in my comments, above, which I also encourage you to re-read. The helicopter is not the reason I wrote the story. The inquiry by an Antioch resident, who is a retired police officer, about why the helicopter was flying around, toward downtown is what led me to obtaining the unfortunate information, which I included in the article.

    Because the Antioch police radios are turned off, and because the APD puts out very few press releases, and we have to usually wait for the city manager’s Weekly Report to get the calls for service highlights, the media is forced to get information on possible police activities in Antioch, when and where we can, to provide as timely news to the public, as possible. If a helicopter is spotted flying around for a period of time, sometimes people ask me about what’s going on, or I spot one, sometimes I call into the APD media line to ask. Sometimes, it’s not a helicopter but a large police response with multiple cars heading in the same direction or showing up at the same location, that triggers someone to call, text, Facebook message me or if I see it, to stop and try to find out what’s happening.

    As it turns out, the helicopter circling around 18th & A Street, yesterday, I was informed, today was KGO-TV Channel 7’s helicopter.

    One thing I didn’t mention in my previous comments was that Sgt. Furhmann told me I wasn’t the first one from the media to inquire about what had happened, and that KGO had already called in about it.

    Another thing I didn’t mention in my previous comments was the fact that a school was locked down as a result of the proximity of a parolee in violation of his parole. That means hundreds of school children and their families – in the Antioch community – would be wondering what happened and why. If and when we ever learn about a school lock down, no matter which one it is in Antioch, that alone is newsworthy.

    As I wrote in my comments, above, I wrote and published the article in large part due to the fact the parolee arrested has the same name as a current candidate for public office in Antioch, and is also why I wrote the headline the way I did – to hopefully eliminate any confusion that might arise in the community.

    If another parolee or someone involved in a crime had the same name as any other local candidate or public office holder, even if they weren’t related, I would probably mention the candidate’s or officeholder’s name in the article in order to clear up any confusion, by stating that it’s not them and/or they’re not related.

    Please, also re-read Kenny’s comments, above. He understands what and why I wrote and published the article.

    Again, I disagree with your conclusion and I believe I did exercise good judgement, made a responsible decision and handled it the right way and for the right reasons.

    I do, however, agree with your comment about praying for the entire family and past victims.

    Allen Payton, Publisher

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  15. Joe Blow says:

    Just so all you morons know, this wonderful candidate condoned his father’s actions by saying, “it’s not his fault, he was simply in love.” In love with a child. Takes one to know one maybe… good thing he lost.

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