Former Fairhope IT employee disputes mayor’s claims

Receives letter asking him to be silent on city matters

Posted

Former City of Fairhope IT Technician Tanner Bonner received a letter from one of Fairhope’s attorneys July 18 after Bonner made comments critical of the city and Mayor Karin Wilson on social media posts.
Bonner’s comments on his own Facebook page, as well as his comments regarding stories posted on Gulf Coast Media’s Facebook page, involved stories reported in The Courier, including key logger software placed on seven city employees’ computers at the direction of Wilson and hard drive and phone searches performed on the city-owned equipment of former city employees Sherry Sullivan and Jennifer Fidler at the request of Wilson.

Bonner’s Facebook comments
On a story posted earlier this week on Gulf Coast Media’s Facebook page and on his own Facebook page, Bonner posted comments about some of his work with the city and how it applied to a story involving invoices sent to the city by Elias Technologies.

Two invoices from Elias Technologies to the City of Fairhope were recently given to The Courier appearing to show work equipment used by former city employees Sherry Sullivan and Jennifer Fidler was sent to be examined and searched by Elias, an IT forensics company, at the request of Mayor Wilson.
The invoices from the company both have the same invoice number, billing date and case title, but the details and amounts charged for the work differ between the two.
In a statement from Mayor Wilson in that story, Wilson wrote:
“To clear up any confusion, Elias was not hired for purposes of processing the computers or devices used by former employees,” Wilson wrote. “That job is handled by in-house IT professionals working for the City.”
Bonner wrote in a comment on his Facebook page:
“This is a lie,” Bonner wrote. “The only person who had the ability and tools to do this was me, and I certainly did not do it. These kind (sic) of things was (sic) why I quit.”
On a comment on Gulf Coast Media’s Facebook page, Bonner elaborated:
“I have nothing to gain (or lose any more) and I will tell you 100% this entire thing was an attack on these employees,” Bonner wrote. “Every single time someone has disagreed with her on legal or ethical backgrounds has had these unethical and immoral badgering methods applied. It has caused good people, who are also your neighbors, to quit. She ain’t good for your city guys.”
Bonner also commented on key logger software that was placed on some city employees’ computers.
The Courier has previously reported the software was placed on the computers of Human Resources Director Pandora Heathcoe, City Clerk Lisa Hanks, City Treasurer Deborah Smith, Purchasing Department Buyer Randy Weaver, Water and Sewer Superintendent Dan McCrory, Gas Superintendent Robert Rohm and recently retired Electrical Superintendent Jimmy Cluster.
According to confidential sources, the spyware was placed on the PCs by a member of Fairhope’s Information Technology Department at the instruction of Wilson and without notification to the seven employees.
In his Facebook comment, Bonner wrote he was the one who found the software installation.
“I found the software,” Bonner wrote. “I found it reprehensible. It’s a noose around peoples’ neck. It’s a HIPPA violation on HR’s PCs. They went to FEMA sites while being tracked. They ran the electrical grid while being keylogged. It harmed my professional pride and reputation. The lack of thought involved worried me everyday (sic) I went in.”

Letter from the City
In a letter from Matt McDonald, an attorney who was hired by the city in Nov. 2016 to review pending litigation against the city, wrote Bonner a letter dated July 18 addressing his social media comments and expressing the City of Fairhope’s concerns.
“Since leaving the City as an employee of its IT Department, it has come to our attention that you are posting on social media sites information about the City’s IT Department, including your observations and opinions about software and its use constituting an alleged ‘HIPPA violation’ as well as information concerning the software’s impact on the ‘electrical grid’ and ‘FEMA sites’ visited by City employees,” McDonald wrote. “It is unclear why you are revealing this information about the City’s IT Department on social media sites but the City is clearly concerned with protecting its confidential information and insuring that employees and ex-employees do not divulge confidential information.”
McDonald wrote that Bonner’s confidential information agreement with the city included not divulging information regarding: personnel and medical records of City employees, information marked or designated by the City as confidential, information known to Bonner as being treated by the City as confidential and information provided to the City by third parties which the City is obligated to keep confidential.
“Your social media posts to date are a cause for concern that you may intentionally or even unintentionally reveal confidential information and therefore you are hereby put on notice that the City intends to enforce the Confidential Information Agreement you executed,” McDonald wrote.
McDonald also questioned Bonner’s deletion of the data from his laptop upon his departure from employment with Fairhope.
“We understand that prior to your departure from the City, you wiped all data from your laptop without saving any of the City’s data or information,” McDonald wrote. “This data information was City property and belonged to the City following your departure. If you have saved any of the data from your laptop and took that data with you, demand is made hereby for you to return such saved data and information to the City at your earliest opportunity. Please not that the City will hold you accountable if there are any consequences from your deletion of data.”
The Courier contacted Wilson’s office for further comment, but was told “The letter speaks for itself.”

Bonner’s response
In an email to The Courier in which Bonner sent a copy of the letter from McDonald, Bonner responded to many of the claims made in the city’s letter.
Bonner wrote his comments online could be easily verified and alluded that he was told to hold onto some information by other “governing bodies.”
“Everything I said can be proved with either eye witness testimony or documentation I have available upon request of authority,” Bonner wrote. “Any confidential information that is still in my possession I was told to hold on to by governing bodies i recognize as greater authority to her's and her lawyers.”
Bonner wrote he was troubled by the work performed by Elias Technologies at the mayor’s request, which caused him to wipe his personal information off of his city computer.
“I wiped my personal information and accounts after the Elias company came to my attention, which in my opinion is a blatant act of misappropriation of funds,” Bonner wrote.
Bonner said he had recommended several companies to try to recover the data from Sullivan’s damaged hard drive before he became aware of Elias’ involvement with the equipment.
“In my regards I was the only technician who had the tools and software to recover a broken hard drive,” Bonner wrote. “I found Sherry's drive to be unrecoverable, so I sent Jeff multiple companies and attempted to get quotes from reputable drive recovery systems.  She also had a full synced backup on the file server due to her unique situation in the city. I felt like this recovery was not needed due to the cost and completeness of the data we already have. Jennifer Fidler's PC and phone was never given to me for processing. There was zero need to involve a third party who's primary job, in our situation, was to  find out a way to handle police investigations data. Any and all information is dumped to the file server on an employee's exit, then synced to cold storage on an Amazon Server aka a secure server.”
Bonner also addressed the issue of security involving the key logger software installed on several employees’ computers, specifically the security of the data being collected by that software.
“In regards to the spyware, all data starting on May 3 was dropping in plain text on the users computer in a folder,” Bonner wrote. “The data is littered with what looks to be Mandarin, which are the earmarks of a reverse engineered Chinese virus, and then dumped to a server I can not verify to 100 percent accuracy of security. This information has people social security numbers, date of birth, and in some cases, ailments they were on with FMLA. This data seems to never have been encrypted or secured in any fashion I can determine.”
Bonner wrote that, in his opinion, using such spyware was a poor decision.
“If not illegal, it is incredibly stupid and shows poor judgement on her part,” Bonner wrote. “It is at least a breach of the civility and ethics of the employee/employer relationship. Employees are not owned, they are not dogs.”
Bonner wrote he felt Wilson was trying to punish him for leaking information to The Courier.
“She is trying to attempt to punish me for leaks, but I never leaked any information to you prior to this email,” Bonner said. “I never asked for this, but if she continues to push me I will continue to bite back. I am not a person who likes to sneak and plot, and I do not respect any person who sneaks and plots. I am not a person who enjoys staying silent when people are treated poorly. It broke my heart to have Pandora Heathcoe come to my office almost every day and sob about her predicament, as there is no doubt she was  and continues to be violated.  I pride myself on ethics and integrity, even if I fail. Karin Wilson shows none of these traits.”
The Courier can verify there had been no prior contact with Bonner until this matter arose.