Stone Mountain council fires lawyer, votes to investigate mayor accused of ‘fraud’ by DDA chair

beverly jones stone mountain
Stone Mountain Mayor Beverly Jones stands on Main Street in the city’s central business district. (Dean Hesse/Decaturish)

STONE MOUNTAIN, Ga. — The Stone Mountain City Council met May 12, fired its attorney and authorized an investigation into how Mayor Beverly Jones took control of numerous accounts connected to the city.

Before that meeting, the Downtown Development Authority adopted a resolution affirming authorized signatories and representatives for DDA accounts. The vote occurred after DDA Chair Carl Wright repeatedly accused the mayor of “fraud” for her role in taking control of the DDA’s accounts. The city council does not manage those accounts.

“We have voted tonight on a reinstated resolution establishing the signatories on our accounts and removing the mayor from our accounts that she fraudulently attempted to hijack,” he said. “And we wonder why. We’re lucky that this fraud was discovered before the DA funds were stolen, as best we know.”

The mayor has controlled the city’s accounts since April 2, and the changes went undetected by city officials for nearly a month. DDA Attorney Kyle Williams and City Manager Shawn Edmondson have both said that, as far as they know, there have been no suspicious transactions.



Jones said she changed the names on the accounts to protect the city from fraudulent activities, offering a new explanation for her actions. She said she was contacted by a “cyber manager in three states” working for Truist, the company that holds the city’s bank accounts.

“[He] said that we were in distress,” Jones said. “He said that we have over four people, about five, maybe  … that is no longer an employee of the city of Stone Mountain. Some had been gone for two years, and some up to five years. They still had a signature card, and at any point in time they could walk into the bank without being questioned and withdraw money from our accounts.”

She said that prompted her to act, but she ran that by City Attorney Jeff Strickland, who she implied told her it was OK for her to act. The council had fired Strickland in a closed-door meeting minutes before Jones began talking about the alleged cybersecurity risk, and he had left the building before reporters knew what was happening and could speak to him.

Some council members skeptical

Strickland declined to comment when contacted by email. Mayor Pro Tem Ryan Smith and Mark Marianos said they knew nothing about a cybersecurity breach before the mayor spoke about it at the May 12 meeting. Councilmember Gil Freeman, Jones’ ally on the council, declined comment and walked away from a reporter asking him questions.

The council hired city solicitor Angela Couch to replace Strickland.

Jones could not offer specifics about the conversation with Truist, including providing documentation about a cybersecurity brief and the name of the person she spoke to. This was not mentioned at a previous council meeting on May 6, when the issue of Jones taking over the accounts first came to light. Strickland sent a letter to Truist on May 9 demanding that the bank remove Jones and reinstate Councilmembers Teresa Crowe and Mayor Pro Tem Smith to the accounts and Edmondson.

At no point in the letter did Strickland mention a conversation with Jones about the security of the city’s accounts.

“Let me be clear, Mayor Jones does not have any unilateral authority to withdraw or transfer any city funds or to order the withdrawal or payment of any city funds, whether such funds are maintained at Truist Bank or anywhere else,” Strickland wrote.

Councilmembers, particularly Councilmember Anita Bass — who also serves on the DDA — were skeptical of her claims.

“My question with that is do we have any documentation from Truist, indicating there was a cyber breach?” Bass said. “Do we have anything, madame mayor?”

“Um, you can get it, I’m sure,” Jones replied.

“Did you receive anything?” Bass asked.

“I received one document,” Jones said. “But this guy was the cybersecurity for three states, Georgia, South Carolina and Alabama. He showed his credentials. Before I went, I talked with our counsel … so he was OK.”

“I wasn’t part of that conversation,” Smith said.

The investigator, whom the council hasn’t officially hired, will be asked to determine how Jones gained control of the city accounts. The investigation will also likely touch on how she gained control of the DDA accounts that were not managed by the city council.

City plans to switch banks

The issue became public on May 6 when City Manager Edmondson told the council he had contacted Truist about a wire transfer. Truist told him the mayor showed the bank a resolution that removed everyone but herself as a signer for the account. Mayor Pro Tem Smith and Councilmember Crowe were previously listed as signatories.

Initially, it was believed Jones presented the bank with a resolution asking to remove everyone but herself from the accounts. However, the records Truist gave the city show the “resolution” was a “resolution for deposit account” form created by Truist.

“The bank created the resolution based off what she told them,” Edmondson said.

At the May 6 meeting, Stone Mountain City Council voted 4-2 to remove Jones’s authority to make financial decisions on behalf of the city while the city investigates how she obtained control of all city accounts.

After the council voted to remove her authority, Edmondson visited the local Truist branch.

“When the city manager hand-delivered the city resolution to the local bank branch to initiate getting the city’s bank accounts appropriately straightened out, he was turned away and told he would not be helped,” former City Attorney Jeff Strickland wrote in a May 9 letter sent to Truist. “That is unacceptable.”

Strickland and Stone Mountain Downtown Development Authority Attorney Kyle Williams, who wrote a similar letter to Truist on May 9, asked Truist to preserve any records that might be considered “evidence” as the city tries to figure out what happened.

In addition, Eileen Smith, the wife of Mayor Pro Tem Smith, has filed a police report regarding the allegations against the mayor.

Jones repeatedly said she did not remove Mayor Pro Tem Smith and Councilmember Crowe. Edmondson said the resolution Truist provided Jones “is very clear.”

“It’s a statement right before you sign,” Edmondson says. “It says the authorized representative, or designated representative, by signing it, you have the right to add to or delete anybody on that resolution. In fact, the moment you sign that resolution, [it] becomes the new resolution and the previous resolution is void.”

To view the resolution and all the accounts Jones now controls, click here.

Truist, which hasn’t responded to messages from Decaturish, sent a letter written by its in-house counsel Jenna Bost in response to the May 9 letters from Stone Mountain’s city and DDA attorney.

Bost wrote that Truist followed its procedures in transferring control of the accounts to Jones. Bost said it was Stone Mountain’s responsibility, not Truist’s, to ensure that all of the city’s accounting procedures were followed.

The letter also suggests the bank has documentation for the city’s accounts that differs from the city’s documentation.

Bost said the three DDA accounts were opened under a “Resolution for the city of Stone Mountain” which is “why a designated representative on the city’s current resolution was allowed to update signers on those accounts.”

“The authority of the new designated representatives and/or authorized signers will be recognized after all individuals have signed the documents and changes have been made in the Truist deposit system,” Bost wrote. “Until that time, accounts will continue to operate as they have been.”

Bost said the only other alternative is to block accounts, which would end all account charges until the changes are made. The letter mentions nothing about the cybersecurity risk Jones said prompted her to make changes to the city’s accounts.

To see Truist’s response to the city’s letters, click here.

Edmondson told the council in an email that he is “actively exploring” a new bank to house the city’s accounts.

A confusing meeting

During the May 12 meeting, the council voted to request drafting of “a resolution regarding elected officials’ direct communication and interaction with city’s banking institution without authorization from city administration.” The resolution was required to change access to the accounts. Jones asked the council to delay voting on it until meeting with Truist to discuss the issue.

“We need to get with the bank,” Jones said. “I don’t know why you guys are afraid to have a conversation with the bank president.”

“It’s already been over a month,” Mayor Pro Tem Smith said.

Councilmembers Freeman and Shawnette Bryant, Jones’ allies on the council, voted against nearly everything the council discussed at the May 12 meeting, resulting in repeated 4-2 votes.

Freeman wanted the investigation into the mayor to be expanded to include other alleged instances of fraud in the city that did not involve the mayor. The council rejected his suggestion.

Freeman said Jones was protecting the city’s interests.

“I think the thing that keeps getting lost is that the bank cybersecurity said that there was a security risk,” Freeman said.

Freeman said the mayor was preventing fraud, not committing it.

“So if the mayor had not gone down there at their request and addressed those breaches. — and it’s my understanding, she also brought that attention to the previous city attorney, and the previous city attorney did not advise her otherwise — So if there was a security risk, and millions of dollars had got transferred out of the account, removed by an account that should have been deactivated, then we would all be saying, ‘Why didn’t somebody do something? Why didn’t somebody stop that from happening?’” Freeman said. “Well, the mayor stopped that from happening out of concern raised by the bank security.”

Freeman pulled Jones away while reporters were interviewing her after the meeting. Jones stayed after the meeting and answered reporters’ questions while standing outside City Hall. She reiterated that she had informed the city attorney about the potential security breach, but did not say whether they discussed the attorney telling the city council.

“I contacted the attorney,” Jones said. “I got directives from him, and unfortunately, he’s not here today.”

Many audience members were disgusted by what they saw during the May 12 meeting. Stone Mountain resident Qunee Haile stayed after the meeting to voice her dissatisfaction to the media who were present. Numerous television stations showed up, but only Decaturish remained to interview her. She expressed frustration with the bickering among council members, the lack of documentation for claims being made and the repeated 4-2 votes. She said residents do not understand what is happening.

“Right now, I’m more confused than I was last week,” she said.

This story was provided by WABE content partner Decaturish.