A computer server failure at Zebulon City Hall caused around three weeks worth of records to be lost last May. A Lamar County teacher says she was arrested due to the city's loss of citation payment records.
Lost records lead to arrest
A Lamar County school teacher says computer failure at Zebulon city hall caused her unlawful arrest and loss of a school day. Zebulon’s main server crashed in May 2013 and about three weeks worth of documents were lost – including ticket, utility and tax payment information.
Brandee Murrah, a Lamar high school math teacher, said she paid for the speeding ticket she received in Zebulon but the record was lost and as a result, a warrant for her arrest was issued.
“I was traveling home from Parent Night at the school in Barnesville on Feb. 28 when I was pulled over by a Lamar County sheriff’s deputy. He came to my car and told me my license had been suspended for a failure to appear charge and I had a ticket I hadn’t paid,” said Murrah. “He proceeded to arrest me. I was devastated. I was dressed for work when I got to the jail. I was so embarrassed and I’m still mad because I feel like someone should be held accountable.”
Zebulon’s server was so damaged it had to be completely replaced. Many records were lost and city employees had to input data from paper receipts and statements.
“Our server was down three weeks,” said city clerk Teresa Watson. “We lost everything in the system; utility statements along with any income that came in. We worked hard to restore the system and thought we’d caught everything until this came up.”
City attorney Rob Morton said the case is still pending but employees took all diligent and reasonable efforts to address the issues that occurred as a result of the server crash. Zebulon officials say three notices of the suspension were mailed to the address on her driver’s license.
Murrah said she never received any notice that her license had been suspended since October 2013.
The day after she was released from jail, her license was reinstated and all charges were dropped. She missed a day of work to handle the issue.
Murrah spoke to city council during its Tuesday, March 11 meeting about what happened to her and what could be done.
“I needed to share my story with council and let people know this is unacceptable,” she said. “I’m a professional and something like this is very damaging to my career. I’m thinking about elderly people who are on fixed incomes who may have paid their property taxes and their payments were lost like mine. They may get another bill and end up paying twice. Someone should be held accountable and should have gone back and checked the accounts when system went down. There should be checks and balances.”
“I was traveling home from Parent Night at the school in Barnesville on Feb. 28 when I was pulled over by a Lamar County sheriff’s deputy. He came to my car and told me my license had been suspended for a failure to appear charge and I had a ticket I hadn’t paid,” said Murrah. “He proceeded to arrest me. I was devastated. I was dressed for work when I got to the jail. I was so embarrassed and I’m still mad because I feel like someone should be held accountable.”
Zebulon’s server was so damaged it had to be completely replaced. Many records were lost and city employees had to input data from paper receipts and statements.
“Our server was down three weeks,” said city clerk Teresa Watson. “We lost everything in the system; utility statements along with any income that came in. We worked hard to restore the system and thought we’d caught everything until this came up.”
City attorney Rob Morton said the case is still pending but employees took all diligent and reasonable efforts to address the issues that occurred as a result of the server crash. Zebulon officials say three notices of the suspension were mailed to the address on her driver’s license.
Murrah said she never received any notice that her license had been suspended since October 2013.
The day after she was released from jail, her license was reinstated and all charges were dropped. She missed a day of work to handle the issue.
Murrah spoke to city council during its Tuesday, March 11 meeting about what happened to her and what could be done.
“I needed to share my story with council and let people know this is unacceptable,” she said. “I’m a professional and something like this is very damaging to my career. I’m thinking about elderly people who are on fixed incomes who may have paid their property taxes and their payments were lost like mine. They may get another bill and end up paying twice. Someone should be held accountable and should have gone back and checked the accounts when system went down. There should be checks and balances.”
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