Huntington official in hot water

HUNTINGTON, Ind., (WANE) - A Huntington County employee has been suspended, accused of hacking into the private e-mails of more than a dozen co-workers, and he says a Huntington County commissioner made him do it.

"I was disgusted. It's not something you expect your fellow co-worker to even consider doing," says county treasurer Cindy Yeiter.

In all, it's believed 15 workers were victimized by having their emails allegedly tapped into by county employee Mike Snelling.

Huntington County Coroner Leon Hurlburt is one of the victims. He says, "I'm just appalled. With my office, so much sensitive information comes through my office, I'm just appalled that this was allowed to happen."

Exactly how or why it happened isn't clear, but officials believe for from November 18th to the 26th dozens of private emails were compromised.

"The way I found out was, our IT department director called me and told me we had a problem," explained Richard Brubaker, President of the County Commissioners.

Brubaker and his fellow commissioners made the decision to suspend Snelling for ten days without pay.

But there's a twist: Snelling says County Commissioner Jerry Helvie made him do it.

"[Helvie] was asked point blank if he had requested Mike to do the emails and he said yes, he had," recalled Brubaker.

Even with his own admission, Helvie hasn't faced any punishment since commissioners say they don't have the jursidiction.

But at a special meeting Thursday morning, a number of county employees called for his resignation.

Yeiter says, "This was done by one commissioner and one employee and I just feel that they both should be punished exactly the same . Whether it's through legal prosecution, or firing or whether it's resignation."

Snelling also faces a 90 day probationary period.
His coworkers say trust has been broken and it likely won't been regained anytime soon.

Officials tell Newschannel 15 the incident is also under investigation by State police and the county prosecutor.

Mike Snelling and Commissioner Jerry Helvie were not available for comment on this story.