In the process Commissioner Hanning partnered with an ex girlfriend of Paulsen, Vanessa Edwards, with whom Paulsen had had a very troubled and rocky relationship. Edwards had filed a series of false felony charges against Paulsen and managed to coerce him into agreeing to a plea deal, one that would have not impacted his gun rights. Even the instructions given to Paulsen as part of the plea deal made zero mention of any gun rights being lost.
Wagoner County Corruption Case Defendant Wins Two Major Battles
OSBI Child Molestation Investigation into Wagoner County Commissioner Hanning Appears to Have Disappeared as
No Charges Filed One Year After Investigation Begins
Commissioner Hanning later leveraged this case, heading over to Mayes County to a small town to get the police to dismiss some misdemeanor criminal charges over a traffic stop, charges that Paulsen had already settled and paid the fines. Then the Mayes County D.A. refiled the charges after Commissioner Hanning's pressure and brought up felony charges including possession of a gun after a felony conviction.
This is about the same time that Wagoner County Sheriff Department employees arranged to have Paulsen arrested at a small Church with the idea of having Paulsen sitting in jail so he would miss the embezzlement lawsuit hearings Paulsen had filed against Commissioner Hanning. All the email chains and phone records proved that both Commissioner Hanning and the Wagoner County Sheriff Department were in-cahoots.
Well last week Paulsen made some major headway in beating back this corruption. A lawsuit filed against Vanessa Edwards, Commissioner Hanning, Hanning's brother Aaron Hanning, and Bridget O'Brien resulted in a default judgment against Edwards, with the court leaving the other co defendant's responsibility still to be determined. This is a major turn as with one defendant found responsible all it will take is proving that Commissioner Hanning and Edwards collaborated, something already proven by testimony from Edwards and Commissioner Hanning and their phone records.
And the original 2016 set of false felony charges against Paulsen were dismissed due to lack of jurisdiction, likely a face saving way to get rid of charges that even the original prosecutor said were filed by a crazy person, charges he then vowed to help get dismissed.
The dismissal of the original charges should in turn negate the Mayes County felony charges instigated by Commissioner Hanning, charges that had already been filed in Wagoner County and dismissed angrily by an honest Wagoner County District judge.
The corruption in Wagoner County is immense, driven by a very corrupt County Sheriff, Chris Elliot, and an indifferent or incompetent D.A. named Jack Thorpe who seems to be more concerned about shielding incompetent or corrupt assistant prosecutors than bringing justice.
You will remember the exposure of Commissioner Hanning's molestation of his young step daughter, exposed in court during sworn testimony, with a former Wagoner County District Attorney acting as Commissioner Hanning's attorney. And this attorney was still a working assistant D.A. in one of the other counties that Jack Thorpe covered as D.A.
Wagoner County District Attorney Jack Thorpe did ask the OSBI to investigate the child molestation charges, one day after our STP newsletter told the story, months after the crimes had been reported in open court with a sitting D.A. acting as counsel for Commissioner Hanning.
The OSBI has yet to complete the investigation or they have and Thorpe has refused to file charges against Commissioner Hanning. Remember, these charges came out only because the victim was under oath during court testimony; she didn't willingly come forward out of fear, she was forced to testify about the molestation starting when she was in grade school.
Public pressure is building against Wagoner County with one Tulsa area news reporter working hard to get a federal investigation started into corruption in Wagoner County. If that were to happen, we would expect to see both Commissioner Hanning and Sheriff Chris Elliot removed from office and charged with multiple felonies. There might well be many other small fry swept up including many in the Wagoner County Sheriff Office and the District Attorney Office in Mayes and Wagoner County might well face scrutiny as well.
