A Marion County grand jury returned a 10-count indictment Tuesday afternoon of Robert “Gene” Hargis, chief detective of the Marion County Sheriff's Office since 1996.
12th Judicial District Attorney General Courtney Lynch requested that the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation examine possibly forged signatures on sex offender registry forms. According to a TBI news release, as the county’s sex offender registry compliance officer, Hargis was “responsible for obtaining the required signatures from registered offenders to confirm legal compliance. Through the course of the investigation agents determined several of the signatures on sex offender documents were falsified.”
The felony indictment includes eight counts of tampering with government records and two misdemeanor counts of official misconduct. Hargis turned himself in to the Marion County Jail, where he was released after posting a $25,000 bond.
Part 2 of our update on East Tennessee development River Gorge Ranch
As reported by the Scene two weeks ago, Hargis also sits on the Marion County Commission and the Planning Commission, where he has an unblemished history of approving plats, variations and requests related to River Gorge Ranch, a luxury housing development built by John “Thunder” Thornton above a honeycomb of abandoned coal mines on Aetna Mountain.
At a contentious 2024 commission meeting where the potential danger of mine fires was discussed, Hargis volunteered, perhaps inadvertently, “When I first started working the sheriff’s department, we’d be up there, and you could warm your hands by [the rocks] in the wintertime.” At the time, county Mayor David Jackson, who also sits on the commission and chairs the planning commission, put a hand to his forehead and shook his head as the detective’s comment sparked stories of fires on “Et-knee” around the room.
The mayor was probably rubbing that forehead again Tuesday afternoon, although he refused comment regarding the ongoing case against Hargis. A commissioner who requested anonymity speculates that Hargis would likely retain his seats on both commissions, at least until his case plays out in court.
At the last commission meeting, held on May 27, local resident and longtime sheriff’s department critic Thomas Morgan spoke against a proposed agreement for a multicounty drug task force, saying that because a portion of funds from drug seizures is returned to Marion County, “You are profiting from a system that routinely violates people’s constitutional rights.” He also cited Hargis and other commissioners with law enforcement connections as having a conflict of interest in voting on the task force agreement.
In April, Cody Smith, a former director of the force, pleaded guilty to two counts of meth possession and was found to have misappropriated $7,000 in seized funds. Despite past problems and Morgan’s comments, Hargis and all but two commissioners voted to renew the task force agreement.
Meanwhile, unconfirmed rumors of further TBI and FBI investigations and pending arrests have spread like a mine fire among residents of Jasper, the county seat. Neither agency, however, has responded to requests for information regarding investigations in Marion County as of this writing.
