Unemployment benefits questioned

Former Det. Donnie Anderson's unemployment benefits are being questioned.

HUNTSVILLE — Documents recently brought into public light indicate that a Scott County Sheriff’s Department detective who was indicted on felony charges connected to a false report received unemployment benefits after being fired from his position.

Donald Anderson applied for and apparently received unemployment benefits for an unclear period of time, according to documents obtained from Anderson’s personnel file. The file is publicly available as part of Tennessee’s open records statute.

It was not clear how long Anderson received unemployment benefits, or how much he received. In Tennessee, the maximum payout to unemployed workers prior to passage of the federal stimulus legislation earlier this year was $275 per week.

Scott County does not pay unemployment insurance premiums on employees paid through the general fund — which includes most employees except those employed by the school system and ambulance service. Instead, the county directly reimburses the state, according to Finance Director Keith Jeffers.

Records showed that Scott County had reimbursed the state around $195 per week for Anderson’s unemployment benefits.

Anderson served as the Sheriff’s Department’s chief of detectives from the beginning of Sheriff Anthony Lay’s administration on Sept. 1, 2006, until he was terminated by Sheriff Lay on Aug. 9, 2007, at the recommendation of District Attorney General Wm. Paul Phillips. Phillips’ recommendation followed the preliminary findings of a Tennessee Bureau of Investigation probe into an alleged false report.

On Aug. 20, 2007, a grand jury indicted Anderson and two others. Anderson was charged with two counts of official suppression, two counts of official misconduct and one count of filing a false report.

Days after Anderson’s employment claim, representatives of the State Dept. of Labor & Workforce Development’s (LWD) Unemployment Insurance Claims Center sent Scott County a request for separation information on Anderson.

The responding report, which was signed by Sheriff Lay, stated that Andrson was fired as a result of a TBI investigation. In a hand-written addendum to the report, Lay wrote that Anderson “was released from his duties due to an investigation conducted by the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation.”

On Oct. 4, 2007, a report from LWD to Scott County stated that “although [Anderson] stated that he was aware of the policy, he denies the allegation. Employer did not provide any evidence to substantiate the allegation.

“The employer has not provided sufficient evidence to prove [Anderson’s] actions constitute work-related misconduct. Therefore . . . benefits are approved.”

The report gave Scott County a 15-day window within which it could dispute the state’s findings. However, no appeal was fired.
On Monday, County Commission addressed the issue without Anderson being mentioned by name, voting unanimously to file a late-term appeal after County Attorney John Beaty brought the matter to the governing body’s attention.

Beaty cited “insufficient notice” by the state as a reason for filing the appeal, saying that the state’s forms were addressed to the Sheriff’s Department and were not received by his office or the County Mayor’s Office.

“I’ve never seen them be this lenient,” Beaty said of the state awarding benefits to Anderson despite notification that he had been fired due to the outcome of a TBI investigation. He added that the Dept. of Labor & Workforce Development “did not have all the information.”