Julia Pierce | April 28, 2026 | Updated April 28, 2026 7:12PM | Updated July 25, 2026

Several weeks ago, I started receiving calls from citizens who indicated that they knew that several road employees were stealing time. They indicated that there was one person in particular that would clock many of them in at the same time and when that guy was out, his buddy would do it for all of them. They indicated that the commissioners had been made aware of this and so had the county manager, Connie Harris.

I performed an Open Records Request, and indeed I found that one employee Roy Deal was clocking many of them in. When Roy wasn’t at work, one of the other guys in the group comprised of Jeremiah Johnson, Marion County Road Department’s lead man, Eric O’Neal, Johnny Allen, and Anthony Allen, who are related, would do the honors. Upon pulling their time cards for several random pay periods, I was able to verify that this has been, in fact, taking place.

These are the time punch cards for pay dates 3/19, which cover March 1 – March 14; 4/2, which cover March 15 – March 28; and 4/16, which cover March 29 – April 11. You will notice that they have the same times and on some days they are within a minute of each other. You will also notice that there are multiple entries that were punched and then later scratched out and marked as sick, which validates the allegation that one is clocking the others in. Notice Eric and Roy are both sick on the same date and Johnny clocks in Jeremiah and Anthony Allen on the time punch card marked 4/2. Notice on the time punch cards marked 3/19, Roy is out sick and either Eric or Anthony punched Jeremiah and Johnny in.

So, I performed an Open Records Request for video to prove that the vehicles that each individual drives was found on that video. It was almost immediately that an employee in the office of the Board of Commissioners notified me and indicated that Connie had instructed these men that they needed to change their behavior because someone was watching them. They indicated that Connie sent information about this to Jeremiah Johnson. Why was she giving the lead man a head’s up?

When I performed an Open Records Request to see if any complaint had been made about employees clocking others in and out and for any notice from Connie to any of them, I was told that no complaints had been made and no notice had been given.

So, if this is a problem that has been before the commissioners and Connie, AND I have at least 8 weeks worth of evidence, why would Heather have felt the need to copy the county attorney and Connie on the email?

When I received the response to my Open Records Request for the video surveillance, I noticed that the county attorney, Wayne Jernigan, was copied on my emails and that Connie was included on those emails which stated that there were no surveillance cameras facing that gate. I informed Heather that I knew that there were in fact many cameras that would have identified those vehicles and her second response was that there are no surveillance cameras. Her response is below.

Here are the still shots I took yesterday to prove that there are in fact multiple cameras.

So, why would they tell me that there were no cameras? Why would they need to include the county attorney if this was just a simple Open Records Request that they said they had no surveillance to produce? And why were there 44 views on our emails, when I only originally sent this to Heather and then she sent it to Connie and Wayne Jernigan.

People don’t feel the need to bring in an attorney unless they feel that they may need to cover themselves from a lawsuit. If you’re innocent, why do you need the attorney?

But, ultimately, I believe that Connie knows that she’s caught. However, as it stands, according to their response, there’s no surveillance at the sheriff’s office, the jail, or any other building that surrounds that Road Department, so I hope the Marion County Jail population doesn’t get wind of that! And I hope that the DOJ doesn’t get wind of that either!

In sum, this is just another reason why our roads aren’t being done. We have employees stealing time, getting paid for work they didn’t do, getting a $50.00 per day stipend for on-call time that we can’t prove they did, and gas for the new truck Connie just used taxpayer money to purchase for Jeremiah Johnson to drive to his home in Buena Vista, Georgia.

We have three years’ worth of financial audits that haven’t been filed, and since they’re not filed, we cannot apply for the grants that we need through the Department of Transportation to fix any of them.

So, my answer thus far, as to why we aren’t getting our roads fixed is Connie Harris.

This is a developing story and I will update as I receive information.

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