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Mayor Will Sessoms addresses recent allegations against him: “Clearly, I have done nothing wrong”

Posted at 11:50 AM, Jan 22, 2015
and last updated 2015-01-22 17:30:21-05

Virginia Beach, Va. - Virginia Beach Mayor Will Sessoms made time for NewsChannel 3 on Thursday morning after making an announcement about a summer concert at the amphitheater.

Though he did say he was caught off-guard, he was willing to answer a few questions about the recent allegations against him regarding whether he used his role as mayor to cast votes to benefit his clients at TowneBank.

"The truth is, there's an investigation going on, but nothing has been found to this date that I've done wrong. I'm just moving forward and doing the job as mayor and loving every minute of it," he said.

A Commonwealth's Attorney from Lynchburg has been appointed to investigate the mayor and his voting practices. That investigation was launched after a Virginian Pilot articleexposed Sessoms for using his political role to case dozens of votes in favor of his TowneBank customers, including projects where Sessoms himself had a professional interest.

Sessoms told NewsChannel 3 he launched an independent investigation of his own, which he says cleared his name.

"Clearly I have done nothing wrong. The independent investigation shows clearly. So the bottom line is we just wait to see if anything comes from their investigation. If there is, we will respond accordingly," he said. "We had a lot of people do a lot of research and homework, the bottom line is I love the city of Virginia Beach and I would never ever do anything to the betterment for me or the TowneBank customers. Period. No way in the world."

Mayor Sessoms says, at this point, he is just waiting to find out the results of the official investigation. He says until then, he will continue to serve as mayor of Virginia Beach and has no plans of stepping down anytime soon.

"Bottom line is my attorney is going to shoot me for doing this, but it's being truthful," Sessoms said. "I'm just looking forward to getting everything behind us and being the best mayor I can be for the best city of the world, the city of Virginia Beach."

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