{"id":1422725,"date":"2025-06-28T08:33:54","date_gmt":"2025-06-28T13:33:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/?p=1422725"},"modified":"2025-07-01T03:22:05","modified_gmt":"2025-07-01T08:22:05","slug":"hawkins-council-hires-law-firm-for-officer-termination-appeal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/?p=1422725","title":{"rendered":"Hawkins council hires law firm for officer termination appeal"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/wp-content\/media\/2025\/06\/CityofHawkins-203x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"203\" height=\"200\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-1420137\" srcset=\"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/wp-content\/media\/2025\/06\/CityofHawkins-203x200.jpg 203w, https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/wp-content\/media\/2025\/06\/CityofHawkins-356x350.jpg 356w, https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/wp-content\/media\/2025\/06\/CityofHawkins-768x755.jpg 768w, https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/wp-content\/media\/2025\/06\/CityofHawkins.jpg 1290w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 203px) 100vw, 203px\" \/>HAWKINS &#8211;  Friday night, the Hawkins City Council met in a special session, with the agenda only holding one item to discuss and vote on hiring the law firm \u2018Flowers Davis\u2019 in Tyler to represent the city in a termination appeal.<\/p>\n<p>According to a report from our news partner KETK, former Hawkins officer, Eric Tuma, was removed from his position by the city council earlier this month. A highly debated move and amid ongoing department drama. Mayor Debbie Rushing said the special session decision will be helpful and could lead to hiring a city attorney. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cHaving that mediator will be nice,\u201d Rushing said. <\/p>\n<p>According to former councilwoman, Eleta Taylor, the council has tried to get legal representation for the city several times. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe did try when I was on the council several times to get one, and it didn\u2019t go right,\u201d Taylor said. \u201c\u2026Three, at least three or four times, I\u2019m thinking we tried to get it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>During the meeting, some residents said using this specific firm could be a conflict of interest, but Mayor Debbie Rushing said it would not.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe have someone that has filed a petition to remove me as mayor, and this same attorney is working on that case. In no way, shape, or form is him working on that petition, going to have any weight in the appeal process for a city employee who is, you know, has been fired,\u201d Rushing said. <\/p>\n<p>The Flowers Davis law firm was ultimately hired. Mayor Debbie Rushing said she\u2019s ready to move forward with the appeal process. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>HAWKINS &#8211; Friday night, the Hawkins City Council met in a special session, with the agenda only holding one item to discuss and vote on hiring the law firm \u2018Flowers Davis\u2019 in Tyler to represent the city in a termination appeal. According to a report from our news partner KETK, former Hawkins officer, Eric Tuma, &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/?p=1422725\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Hawkins council hires law firm for officer termination appeal<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1420137,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/wp-content\/media\/2025\/06\/CityofHawkins-203x200.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[177],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1422725","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news-archive-archives"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-08 19:30:22","action":"change-status","newStatus":"trash","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/wp-content\/media\/2025\/06\/CityofHawkins-203x200.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1422725","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1422725"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1422725\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1423189,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1422725\/revisions\/1423189"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1420137"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1422725"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1422725"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1422725"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}