Madison County officials fired for alleged dirt-digging

EDWARDSVILLE, Ill. (AP) - Top officials of Madison County in southern Illinois have been fired for allegedly improperly accessing emails and other data for political purposes.

The Madison County board in a 26-1 vote late Thursday fired county administrator Doug Hulme and information technology director Rob Dorman. The allegations against the men, both Republicans, came to light after the unsealing of court documents relating to a 2018 investigation into possible corruption within the county administration office.

The documents indicate county officials told a grand jury about their suspicions that Hulme and Dorman had untitled access to county workers' emails. That information had been revealed by Madison County State's Attorney Tom Gibbons to members of a special computer crimes task force.

The court documents show Madison County Treasurer Chris Slusser, a Republican, said Hulme bragged about having evidence of a judge using county resources for political fundraising. No judge has been publicly accused of such conduct.

The court documents states that when Slusser confronted Hulme on how he obtained this evidence, he alluded to his access to the emails of everyone in county government.

The task force asserted not all county emails should be available to every county official.