Local AG files petition against Hurley

Jeremy Nash news-herald.net

A petition against Loudon County Commissioner Julia Hurley was filed Thursday in Loudon County Chancery Court by 9th Judicial District Attorney General Russell Johnson in an effort to end a months-long dispute over her residency.

“District Attorney General Russell Johnson predicated an investigation by the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation upon learning of Hurley’s removal from the second commission district,” the petition reads. “Subsequent to this action, the Loudon County Commission led by chairman Henry Cullen ... passed a resolution to investigate this situation and to take any necessary action, such as a Quo Warranto suit to address or remedy Hurley’s removal from her elected district.”

Johnson declined additional comment, instead referring to the petition filed. He became involved in August after Loudon County Commission asked him to look into the matter.

Hurley moved into the county’s fifth district after being elected in the second district. Her attorney, T. Scott Jones, has remained adamant the move was temporary.

“The TBI investigation established that there was reasonable cause to believe that the respondent no longer resided within her elected district and that Hurley had committed acts or omissions, which constitute a forfeiture of her office pursuant to Tennessee Code Annotated 29-35-101 and 5-5-102,” the petition reads.

Johnson gave Hurley until March 6 to resolve the issue by moving back to the second district. As of Thursday, the day of the filing, Hurley still lived in the fifth district.

“I don’t think it came as any surprise because, obviously, it’s a matter that we have a disagreement about, one that I think actually falls in Ms. Hurley’s favor,” Jones said. “I had actually provided the general information concerning the work that she had done on the home that she had purchased with the intention of selling, including documentation and information pertaining to when her anticipated placement of the same was on the market, the steps that she had taken.”

Jones said the investigator involved simply worked under Johnson’s direction.

“They started out with a goal,” he said. “They don’t start out looking for fact when it’s a predicated investigation. ... What really concerns me is that same investigator never got the lease, never asked the woman that he supposedly goes and interviews for the lease, and I had to provide that to the general, and clearly the tenant had the lease. I just kind of question that, but I understand, that’s what lawsuits are for as far as disagreements.”

A copy of the lease provided to Johnson in February showed a one-year agreement with a tenant for Hurley’s property on West 5th Avenue in Lenoir City, which is located in the second district, Jones said.

“It had always been Ms. Hurley’s intention to return to her district, that she was only absent for a basically a temporary period of time. She was basically, if you will, turning a piece of real estate and I think all the information — and I do appreciate the fact that he attached the lease (to the filing),” Jones said.

In the petition, the tenant said the agreement included a purchase option for the West 5th Avenue property at the end of the lease.

“Hurley participated in a real estate closing on June 4, 2019, and is believed to have paid $330,000 for the house and lot at ... Yellowstone Drive,” the petition reads. “... Hurley obtained a purchase money mortgage in the amount of $313,500 on the ... Yellowstone Drive property through Mortgage Investors Group as evidence by a deed of trust recorded in Trust Book T410 at Page 29-46 in the Loudon County Register of Deeds Office.”

Since moving to the new property, the petition said Hurley has received $16,000 in compensation and benefits as a commissioner.

The petition requests Hurley answer the petition “within the time prescribed by law,” that the court find Hurley “unlawfully” holding office due to her move and that Hurley be notified a trial will be conducted.

Jones hopes to soon file a motion to dismiss.

An order entered March 25 by Loudon County Clerk and Master Lisa Niles canceled the Loudon County Chancery Court April term.

“We’ll probably be filing that in the near future,” he said. “I’m not in a position to just instantaneously file that, but I’m working under the same constraints the general is with the order of the state’s supreme court that there are to be no in-person hearings at least through the 24th of April, so we’ll move with all due haste. It’s going to take us some time as far as to actually file the formal motion and certainly that will be of record with the file to clerk of the court.”