Mayor of Monticello charged with felony

Police investigate city check, invoice

Monticello Mayor Zack Tucker fraudulently funneled funds from the city and solicited loans that he never repaid from the city and economic development agencies to a nonprofit he had ties with, according to a state police investigation.

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A Drew County sheriff's deputy went to the office of Tucker's personal attorney, Hani Hashem, on Monday and served the city's 27-year-old mayor a court summons indicating he was charged with one count of tampering with public records, a felony, and one count of abuse of power, a misdemeanor.

Conviction of any felony can disqualify a person from holding a mayorship, Hashem said.

Felony record tampering can result in a fine of up to $10,000 and up to six years in prison, Hashem said. Misdemeanor abuse of power can result in a fine of up to $1,000 and no more than 90 days in jail.

Tucker is scheduled to appear at 9 a.m. Oct. 17 in Drew County Circuit Court before Judge Bynum Gibson.

Hashem said Tucker would continue working as mayor.

"It's just that -- it's a charge," he said, adding that Tucker has not been accused of doing anything for personal gain.

The charges, filed Friday, relate to the 2015 Arkansas Forest Festival. The festivals, which started in 2015, are operated by the Arkansas Forest Festival Committee, of which Tucker is chairman. The festivals are not officially operated by the city.

The festivals featured a pageant, carnival and musical acts, including country musician John Michael Montgomery for this year's festival. According to police, the committee's vice chairman, Melissa Calson, had expressed concerns to Tucker about being able to afford everything, but Tucker had assured her that sponsors would cover the bills.

Tucker started moving money around to cover debts after the authorization of a check filled out by Tucker in February 2015 was disputed by the person whose signature was on it, according to an Arkansas State Police summary of its investigation. That dispute spawned an unauthorized disbursement from a city account by the mayor, according to the investigation.

The investigation further details financial troubles in 2016 for the festival, including solicitations for cash that were followed by unfulfilled promises of repayments and the closing of Arkansas Forest Festival's bank account for an outstanding negative balance.

Tucker opened an account at Union Bank for Arkansas Forest Festival on Feb. 27, 2015, and was the only signatory on the account, according to an Arkansas State Police summary of its investigation. But before that, on Feb. 18, Tucker had written a check to the festival from the account of another nonprofit he worked with -- Southeast Arkansas Cornerstone Coalition. Those funds, along with a $500 donation from Tucker himself, were used to open the bank account.

Southeast Arkansas Cornerstone Coalition President Scott Kuttenkuler told state police last month that he did not authorize the check and that Tucker had filled out a blank check with Kuttenkuler's signature already on it and written it out to the Arkansas Forest Festival.

Kuttenkuler said he discovered the issue in checking the nonprofit's monthly bank records, confronted Tucker and demanded that he pay the money back, he told investigators. He said Tucker paid it back within a few days, and he took away Tucker's keys to the nonprofit's office.

Police said the funds were paid back in two checks, but only one was from the Arkansas Forest Festival. Tucker wrote a $5,000 check from the city's One-Cent Sales Tax Fund and a $7,500 check from the Arkansas Forest Festival, both to the Southeast Arkansas Cornerstone Coalition, police said.

On April 3, 2015, Tucker wrote a $22,500 check from the city's Advertising and Promotion Commission to the Economic Development Fund of Monticello -- a longtime city contractor and the business that took Arkansas Forest Festival under its wing as a nonprofit in 2014. Tucker then created an invoice from the fund that stated the fees were for ETC Engineering work done on a proposed convention center that had failed by public vote in 2015, police said. Tucker did not have the authority to write checks from the fund, police said.

That check is what prompted Drew County Prosecuting Attorney Thomas Deen to send the case along to Arkansas State Police. Tucker is charged with having committed abuse of office April 2, 2015, and tampering with public records on April 3, 2015.

On that day -- April 3, 2015 -- Tucker deposited the $22,500 into the Arkansas Forest Festival's bank account instead of the Economic Development Fund's account, then withdrew the money from the bank and bought a cashier's check to pay Variety Attractions for entertainment provided for the 2015 festival, police said. That $22,500 fulfilled the remaining balance to Variety Attractions, police said.

The festival was held April 3 and 4, 2015.

In 2016, Tucker secured $16,500 in loans from the city and the Economic Development Fund of Monticello, with the promise of matching donations to pay back the loans from a local business, witnesses told police. That business, Interfor, only donated $5,000, and Tucker said it was spent by Arkansas Forest Festival and never paid back to the city or the fund. The city paid $6,500 of those loans.

In June, Union Bank closed Arkansas Forest Festival's bank account because of a negative balance, police said. McDaniel told police the account had a negative balance of $886 at one point.

The Arkansas Forest Festival was a major entertainment undertaking in a community that had in 2015 rejected a sales tax to fund a convention center that Tucker supported.

Tucker became the second-youngest person to ascend to the office of mayor in Monticello when he took office in January 2015. In 2014, he was named one of the 20 most influential Arkansans in their 20s by Arkansas Business.

But in recent months Tucker has faced opposition from Monticello Citizens for Better Government, a group that is attempting to collect enough signatures to hold a recall vote on the mayor. Tucker is in the second year of his four-year term.

Metro on 09/20/2016

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