The Eureka Springs Police Department closed its investigation into alleged computer trespassing involving the Eureka Springs City Advertising and Promotion commission after consulting with the attorney representing several current and former city officials named as defendants in a lawsuit connected to the CAPC.
Police chief Brian Young said in an email to the Lovely County Citizen on Oct. 14 that no evidence of a crime was found during the investigation, writing that: “The criminal case is now closed.”
In a report included in the case file, ESPD Detective Josh Jackson writes that he and Young contacted Arkansas Municipal League attorney Amanda LaFever on Sept. 27, after reading a report in the Carroll County News — sister newspaper to the Lovely County Citizen — headlined: “Computer resets draw attention of Eureka Springs council.”
The report described council members’ reaction to an earlier story regarding computers and other electronic devices connected to the CAPC being examined by an Oklahoma-based forensic auditing company. Several of the devices had been “factory reset,” according to the auditing company, and no user-created data could be recovered.
Jackson’s report says LaFever “confirmed the legitimacy of the article.” “After a thorough review of all the material gathered within the entrie [sic] case, investigators concluded there is not sufficient evidence to progress a criminal investigation at this time,” Jackson writes. “If new leads are developed at a later time, the case will be re-examined. Until then, the case will be marked as unfounded and closed at this time.”
BEGINNING OF INVESTIGATION
The ESPD investigation began on Feb. 22, 2021, when then-CAPC commissioner Melissa Greene went to the police department to file a report “for a theft of business,” according to an incident report included in the case file.
“Melissa stated there were emails given at the City Advertising and Permits Committee [sic] (CAPC) meeting stating there was a theft of business by diverting a government website to private businesses for a period of three years,” an incident report included in the case file says. “Melissa informed [ESPD officer Steven Dossett] this diversion takes inquiries made on the website away from the tax collectors resulting in a possible loss of business and revenue.” Greene apparently was referring to an email presented to CAPC commissioners by chairman Jeff Carter during an executive session on Feb. 19, 2021. The email, written to Carter by former CAPC executive director Lacey Ekberg, refers to sales leads from the CAPC website being diverted to three local business people — Jack Moyer, Damon Henke and Jackie Wolven.
“I discovered these in December, and could trace back 3 years,” Ekberg’s email says. “No one took responsibility for doing it. So couldn’t get a reason why. … I’m sure this was a cooperative effort by several people. I just couldn’t nail any of them with it.”
According to Ekberg’s email, group sales leads from the CAPC website “went directly to Jack Moyer,” general manager for the Crescent and Basin Park hotels.
Wedding leads went to Henke, Ekberg’s email says, while attractions leads went to Wolven.
“I didn’t say much about it since 1) it’s illegal 2) Didn’t know who did it 3) assuming Mike had Rick do it and Mike wasn’t there anymore,” Ekberg’s email says, apparently referring to former CAPC director Mike Maloney and Rick Bright, longtime finance director for the CAPC who retired late last year.
After the executive session at the Feb. 19 meeting, the commission voted to strip interim director Gina Rambo of that title. Five days later, on Nov. 24, the commission voted to terminate Rambo.
POLICE TALK TO EKBERG
Young spoke with Ekberg on Feb. 23, 2021, according to an incident report.
“Lacey advised she was advised by Karen of the issue with the links,” the report says, apparently referring to CAPC group sales Karen Pryor, who left her position late last year as well. “Lacey advised Gina (Rambo) allowed Damon access to the CAPC website in which Damon changed the addresses on the links,” the report says. “Chief Young asked who had access to the website. Lacey advised she believed only Gina and Rick (Bright) had access.
“Lacey advised all of those people at CAPC were afraid of the consequences of betraying Jack,” the report says. “Chief Young asked why they were afraid of Jack. She advised she had no idea. She advised she was told when she hired on, just to keep her mouth shut and head down. Lacey said she could not do that. She advised that place was so corrupt, and when she did bring it to light, she is now out of a job.”
Ekberg became the CAPC’s executive director in August 2019. In January 2020, Carroll County Newspapers reported that the resume Ekberg submitted to the CAPC listed several previous jobs as “short-term contracts” despite public records and published accounts indicating they were intended to be long-term positions. Ekberg’s resume also did not mention a position she held for a little more than two months in Alachua County, Fla. — while on partially paid leave from a similar job in Switzerland County, Ind. — before being fired. In February 2020, the commission voted to shift Ekberg to a contractor position on a 90-day contract and later appointed Rambo as interim director.
Ekberg is currently working in Folly Beach, S.C. under the name “Lacey Deeds.” She used the same name while working for less than a year in Shelbyville, Tenn.
On March 3, 2021, ESPD assistant chief Brian Jones spoke with Ekberg and asked “if there was any kind of paper trail to prove what took place,” according to a supplemental report included in the case file. Ekberg responded that she was not aware of a paper trail.
“Ekberg stated when she found out what was going on, she was told by her boss, Carol Wright (The Chair), to keep it quiet and fix it,” Jones’ report says.
WRIGHT WAS ‘FURIOUS’
Jones interviewed Wright by phone on March 5, 2021. Wright said she wasn’t aware of Ekberg’s allegations until Carter presented the email from Ekberg at the meeting two weeks earlier.
“I’m aware of a lot of things that are related to it that made sense to me when he presented that memo,” Wright said.
Wright said that Ekberg didn’t make her aware of the situation, contradicting Ekberg’s statement to Jones.
“I wasn’t aware of it at the time,” Wright said. “And, you know, she shared a lot with me. And I’m thinking she either didn’t tell me and/or share this widely because she was … probably trying to protect the CAPC and/ or Gina’s job, because if I had known about it, then, yeah, I would have done something about it actively.”
When Jones asked Wright directly about Ekberg’s statement that she brought the issue to her attention, Wright said she didn’t remember.
“But Lacey’s not a person that lies,” she said. “… I remember over time that as she would find things, she would fix them. We had and have a lot of staff problems. … So she may have said something to me and I’m sure I would have told her to fix it. I don’t know about being quiet about it because, you know, I was really furious when I realized what had happened.”
Wright said she was approached by several local business people with concerns about the CAPC website.
“I thought maybe we had been hacked,” Wright said. “… I certainly didn’t know that somebody had just opened our website up for someone to scrape information before it was shared equally with our collectors, which we are really required to do.”
According to Wright, her understanding was that Rambo was the only person with administrative rights to the website.
“My husband, by the way, is a computer security expert,” Wright said. “He worked for Symantec for many years and I’ve asked him some of these things and he’s just, basically, that administrator is responsible for whatever happens on that website, period.”
MOYER RESPONDS
Henke has previously denied being given access to the CAPC computers. Moyer described the allegations as part of efforts by Carter to manipulate the CAPC.
“There was never a question that the accusations were false and were being used by the chairman to manipulate commissioners and undermine the tourism structure in place for his own pursuits and control,” Moyer said by email.
Moyer pointed out that in 2015, the Eureka Springs Chamber of Commerce and the CAPC formed a group travel committee to facilitate wider and more timely distribution of sales leads. Moyer provided copies of emails regarding meetings of the committee, and also provided a copy of an email to Greene in which he shared that documentation. Moyer’s email to Greene was dated Feb. 23, 2021 — the day after Greene filed the police report and the day before the commission fired Rambo.
RAMBO: ‘JUST MALICIOUSNESS’
ESPD detective Josh Jackson interviewed Rambo on March 5, 2021. During the approximately half-hour conversation, Rambo denied the accusations made by Ekberg. She also told Jackson about a way to access an archive of internet pages so he could see the CAPC website as it existed during the time the sales leads were allegedly being directed improperly.
Rambo said the allegations are “just maliciousness, in my opinion.”
Both Rambo and Jackson questioned why Carter didn’t go to the police when he received the email from Ekberg in April 2020.
“If I received that email and really thought somebody was committing a crime, I would have run to the police station right then,” Rambo said.
“That’s what we were wondering, why it took so long, if it was so bad,” Jackson replied.
At the end of the conversation, Jackson said Eureka Springs police were reluctant to investigate the allegations.
“Being that it was a city deal, we were trying to see if we would even want to, because normally city things we don’t even mess with,” Jackson said. “But we talked to the prosecutor and they said, just start asking questions and if you think there’s something, then we can see if we want to hand it off to a different agency. We try not to investigate our own, I guess you could say.”
Later that day, according to a report included in the case file, Jackson spoke with Carter and informed him that investigators had not been able to “find truth” in the allegations and asked if Carter had any additional information. Carter replied that he did not.
According to the report, Jackson asked Carter what he wanted to achieve from the investigation.
“Carter stated he just wanted to make sure nothing bad happened again in the future and that he was not really concerned with anyone getting in trouble,” the report says.
On June 9, 2022, Jones spoke with Carter by phone and inquired about the forensic audit.
According to the report, Carter said he was “not involved with the case anymore” and advised Jones to contact LaFever.
Eureka Springs attorney Tim Parker filed a civil lawsuit in March 2021 on behalf of Rambo, Pryor, Bright, former CAPC events coordinator Tracy Johnson and former commissioner Greg Moon. LaFever represents the defendants: Mayor Butch Berry; his administrative assistant Kim Stryker, Ekberg, Carter, Wright, former CAPC commissioners and current city council members Greene and Harry Meyer, former commissioners James DeVito and Patrick Burnett, the city and an insurance company that provides a policy to the city.
