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November 9, 2009

Residents stunned over judge’s arrest

By Art Lawler Staff Writer

SEVEN POINTS — When the FBI and County law enforcement officers arrested the city’s municipal judge, Monica Corker Thursday, cell phones around this small town began lighting up.

Rumors were flying that other city officials had also been arrested, but those rumors turned out to be false.

County Sheriff records show that Corker was arrested Thursday morning. She was confined at Henderson County Jail at 2:46 p.m., and had posted two bonds totaling $20,000 by 3:26 p.m. when she was released.

She is charged with Fraudulent Possession of Identifying Information, and for carrying in her purse, an item that led to a charge of Fraudulent Possession of Identifying Information.

Both are felony charges.

The Athens Review attempted to contact Mayor Gerald Taylor, but had been unsuccessful at press time Friday.

Since then, attempts to talk to city officials have been fruitless. Acting on the advice of City Attorney Blake Armstrong of Tyler, employees have been ordered not to discuss the arrest, or any part of recent FBI investigations with the public or press.

The Review was able to reach City Secretary Debbie Moseley, who said on the advice of the city’s attorneys that all city personnel had been instructed not to discuss the case.

“We want to give everybody a fair chance,” she said. “We don’t know all the facts yet.”

Moseley did confirm that Tool Municipal Judge Rhonda Peterson, who also fills in as Gun Barrel’s municipal judge, also is now interim judge at Seven Points, having been hired by Mayor Gerald Taylor.

Here’s how the FBI and officials from Henderson County Sheriff’s Office converged on Forbes’ driveway Thursday morning to make the arrest.

Corker had instructed a volunteer worker, Tasha Fink, to pick up a computer that had been dropped off at a Gun Barrel City computer company. That was on Tuesday.

Upon returning with the laptop, the woman, who is a friend of Forbes’ wife, Brandi, overheard Corker on the telephone in her office.

Fink said Corker closed the door, but that she could hear her anyway.

Fink said she was standing in the hallway while Corker talked to the police officers inside.

“She told them that the history on the laptop had been removed,” Fink said.

She later asked Fink to pick up the computer for her. Fink did as instructed, and brought it back to Corker.

But Fink worried about what she had overheard, and on Wednesday, talked to Forbes about it.

Forbes said he, in turn, called the information into the FBI. While Tasha waited with Forbes’ wife at their home, Forbes went to city hall to talk to City Secretary Debbie Moseley about what he had learned.

Seven Points resident and Moseley’s friend, Wanda Nichols listened to that information, which Fink had provided.

Then Forbes left to return home.

Nichols said she and Moseley went to the judge’s office to tell her about Forbes’ conversation with them.

At least two sources told the Review that Corker left a message on Fink’s telephone Wednesday, telling her to get up to the office, and show everybody her new baby, and that everyone wanted to see it.

But Fink, at Forbes suggestion, never replied to the message.

Corker didn’t try to contact Forbes Wednesday, but Thursday morning, Corker left City Hall and drove to Forbes’ residence.

Asked why the judge would want to visit him unannounced, Forbes replied that he wasn’t sure, but that he thought she may have wanted to tell him the information about the computer Fink had given him was untrue.

But before Corker could tell him, she was surrounded by the FBI, the Texas Rangers, an investigator from the Henderson County District Attorney’s office, and officials from the Henderson County Sheriff’s Department.

Forbes said law enforcement officers were in front of his house for “maybe a half hour” before he ever woke up.

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