Michael Nellums, the man hired by the Pine Bluff School Board as the new principal of Pine Bluff High School Tuesday night, was investigated by the Pulaski County Sheriff’s Office between 2010 and 2011.
The investigation stemmed from allegations that Nellums conspired with Pulaski County Special School District board president Tim Clark to frame PCSSD board member Gwen Williams.
Nellums was principal of Mills High School in the Pulaski County Special School District and a member of the Little Rock School District Board of Directors at the time of the investigation.
Pine Bluff district superintendent Jerry O. Payne defended his Tuesday night recommendation to the board to hire Nellums.
“I did due diligence and got feedback from board members and personnel directors,” Payne said of his vetting of Nellums. “He was deemed to be a top candidate and based on that I recommended him for leading the high school.”
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
In the Tuesday night vote, board president Herman Horace, and board members Ken Dickson, Chandra Griffin and Harold Jackson voted to hire Nellums while board secretary Freddie M. Johnson and board member Ellen Nichol voted against the hiring recommendation. Board vice president Donna Barnes abstained from voting.
Prosecuting Attorney’s report
In a May 20, 2011, report Larry Jegley, Prosecuting Attorney for Perry and Pulaski counties, reviewed the Pulaski County Sheriff’s Office investigation into the activities of Nellums and Clark and determined that even though no actual criminal violations had taken place, the entire event painted the two men in a much less than favorable light.
Nellums and Clark were determined by Jegley’s office to have participated in a scheme that produced a videotape and letter suggesting that Williams took a bribe.
“Clearly, it was an appearance of impropriety on the part of Ms. Williams that Nellums and Clark were attempting to capture rather than an actual crime,” Jegley wrote in the report. “The video coupled with the manufactured letter appears to capture an act of bribery, but in fact captures nothing more than an absurd and misguided ruse perpetrated by equally misguided persons, whose possible motives defy logical explanation.”
“Rather than delivering legitimate evidence to law enforcement along with credible, legitimate information that perhaps a crime had been committed, the subject individuals had the packages delivered, in the dead of night, to Ms. Williams’ fellow board members,” Jegley wrote. “Again, we will not speculate as to the motives of Nellums and Clark; however, regardless of their motives, to resort to such juvenile cloak and dagger means to discredit Ms. Williams would verge on the ridiculous if it weren’t for the sad fact that both of these men hold important positions in the education of the children of this community.”
“The entire affair is sad and has been a terrible distraction of law enforcement resources and of a beleaguered school district which has been struggling to improve,” Jegley wrote. “Put bluntly, what happened is shameful.”
PCSSD
In the wake of the Jegley report Nellums was suspended by PCCSD superintendent Charles Hopson until an investigation by the school district could be completed.
Early on June 13, 2011, the same day that the PCSSD completed its investigation into Nellums, he submitted a letter requesting early retirement.
The PCSSD said in a June 13 statement that because Nellums had resigned the results of its investigation into Nellums were not an open record under FOIA due to it only being applicable after the completion of an action ending in a suspension or termination.