A municipal elected official from Camden County skipped his first public meeting with constituents Tuesday after being charged last month with leaving the scene of a car accident and driving with an expired license.

Paul Dougherty, a commissioner in Haddon Township -- one of three elected officials responsible for administering the municipality -- was scheduled to appear at the township's regular action meeting at 7 p.m. in the municipal building.

Paul Dougherty

Mayor Randall Teague, who along with James Mulroy are the other two elected commissioners, said he received an email from Dougherty on Monday informing him that Dougherty "was on vacation" and did not plan to attend the only scheduled meeting this month. Teague said Tuesday he was "concerned" about the accident but Dougherty "deserved his day in court" to explain.

Dougherty, 49, who is also an attorney and municipal prosecutor for at least three other nearby towns, was issued two citations for the accident in Haddon Township on the evening of July 19, shortly before 9:30 p.m.

He reported his involvement 20 minutes after the crash, according to a police report obtained by NJ.com. He apparently was already home when he reported it.

A Barrington woman who said she was rear-ended by Dougherty near the intersection of Haddon Avenue and Cuthbert Boulevard while waiting for a traffic signal was still in her car at the scene when the officer arrived, the police report said.

New questions about the incident have arisen in the past week.

Information from public documents related to the case was posted last week on a Haddon Township Facebook page. The documents were requested by a former township police officer who settled a $175,000 lawsuit with the municipality after he was terminated in 2015.

The documents, which include an email from Captain Scott Bishop, the department's second ranking officer, to Chief Mark Cavallo, indicates Dougherty gave conflicting accounts of the incident immediately afterward.

Dougherty left the scene of the accident after claiming the other driver did not follow him into the parking lot of a nearby drug store after the crash, according to the police report. Dougherty later called Cavallo on the chief's mobile phone and told him his wife had been involved in the accident and became "nervous" and drove home, according to an email Bishop wrote to Cavallo the four days later.

Teague and another township official verified the information in the email Tuesday.

Cavallo then called the ranking officer that evening, who was Officer Wendy Schwartz, to report that Dougherty's wife had been involved in the accident.

Dougherty told Schwartz he was the driver after she responded to his home to take an accident report. Dougherty was not tested for alcohol or drug use after the incident.

Dougherty had attended a concert at the township swimming pool complex prior to the accident, according to Teague and a report in the Retrospect, a weekly newspaper. The report said several people there had observed Dougherty drinking alcohol. Teague, who was not there, said he did not know if Dougherty was drinking at the event.

Dougherty said he did not call police dispatch after the accident because he did not trust Sergeant Thomas Whalen who was scheduled to be on duty that night, according to the email Bishop sent to Cavallo. Whalen is one of four senior officers suing the chief and the township over alleged sexually harassment by Cavallo.

Bishop, Lieutenant Sean Gooley and Detective Sergeant Joseph D. Johnston are also plaintiffs in the lawsuit. All of the officers, including Cavallo, are males. Whalen was off duty that night.

Bishop sent the email on July 23, the Monday following the incident on Thursday. He said it "appears the circumstances reported to you are different than those reported to the two officers who responded to Commissioner Dougherty's residence."

Cavallo's response to the email the following day was: "Received. Thank you Captain."

The information released in the OPRA filing last week was requested by Jason DeMent, a former officer who settled a lawsuit for $175,000 with the township earlier this year after he was terminated in 2015. The lawsuit said Cavallo had sexually harassed him. DeMent agreed to his terms of settlement which stated he had no evidence of harassment from Cavallo.

DeMent was the only person in a crowd of about a dozen Tuesday to speak during the public comment portion of the meeting. He called for Dougherty's resignation. He stood a few feet away from Cavallo, who sat at a dais in the front of the room as he does at all commissioner's meetings. Cavallo said nothing and did not look at DeMent.

The harassment allegations against Cavallo in the suit by the four ranking officers were dismissed in June because of statues of limitations. Part of the suit alleging retaliation from the township after the allegations are still being litigated.

Bill Duhart may be reached at bduhart@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @bduhart. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

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