The scandal surrounding Nashville Mayor Megan Barry and her admission of a two-year-long extramarital affair with her bodyguard, now-retired Metro Nashville Police Sgt. Rob Forrest, intensified on Thursday when the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation (TBI) released an affidavit presented to a judge in support of a search warrant for the city-issued cell phone of Forrest and the personal cell phone of Barry.
“Authorities believe that Forrest took two photos of a nude woman who is believed to be Barry on his police department-issued cell phone. He allegedly sent the pictures to himself to his MNPD email,” WSMV reported on Thursday.
As if those details were not bizarre enough, a defiant Mayor Barry told WSMV later on Thursday in an on-camera interview, “I am furious as you might imagine today when I learned there might be photos of me. If they exist, they were taken without my knowledge and without my consent. It didn’t show that I have done anything wrong or criminal and, in fact, if anything was wrongly done, it was done to me personally.”
Barry then attacked the TBI for the manner in which they were conducting their investigation of her, barely three weeks after the January 31 press conference in which she promised complete transparency and cooperation with any and all investigations into her extramarital affair:
We went to [the TBI] and said they can have my personal phone and could have anything off of it that was related to this investigation and they declined. Instead, they wanted all emails, text message correspondence between me and my mom and my husband and my son and my attorney and that just didn’t feel right.
It is clear today with this affidavit that was released to the media that this should have been sealed and it should have been sealed until the end of this investigation. It was completely designed to humiliate me and politically embarrass me. Therefore, it’s clear I have to make sure I am protecting my personal rights as we move through this.
When WSMV reporter Liz Lohuis asked Barry, “So when the TBI said that you refused to hand over your phone, that’s not true?,” the embattled mayor disputed the TBI’s claim:
Not at all. My attorney was working with them and said all along that we would be happy to turn over the phone. We said they could have any information that they wanted that was related to this investigation and we would give it to them. They declined. They said they wanted every piece of data on there that included every piece of information between me and my attorney, between me and my mom and that just didn’t feel right.
“Forrest’s police-issued cell phone was taken into possession by the TBI earlier this month. It has since been sent to a third party for a more thorough search,” WKRN reported, adding:
Mayor Barry and her attorney have refused to give the passcode to her personal phone to TBI agents. Her phone will be sent to a third party that will try to extract information.
Mayor Barry said late Thursday that the TBI called her attorney on Feb. 15 and asked if they would agree to a search of her personal cell phone. Since it was her personal phone, her attorney asked that they agree to a protocol to limit the search so as not to encroach on items irrelevant to the investigation, such as communication with personal friends and family.
The next day, without notice, Barry said her attorney was served to retrieve the phone. On Feb. 20, the TBI called Barry’s attorney and asked for her personal passcode to the phone.
He requested to see the affidavit upon which the search warrant was based in order to better understand the basis for it. Her attorney was informed this wasn’t something they would usually do but the decision was up to District Attorney General Glenn Funk. On the advice of counsel, Mayor Barry declined to provide the code to the TBI.
Neither Mayor Barry nor her attorney specifically stated whether the city or she personally paid for the phone bill on her personal cell phone, or if she was reimbursed by the city for payments she made for her phone service on her personal phone.
You can watch Mayor Barry’s full interview with WSMV here.
Has anyone considered the horror the TBI officers must endure having to look at nude meg pictures? Try erasing that mental image from your mind. Yikes!
Any reporter following a particular story would be continually checking for warrants and anything else normally available, and that sounds like what The Tennessean did, according to their first, I think, story about the photos. I don’t know about the TV reporters or who got it first. I rarely watch local TV news. I believe the TBI has indicated such affidavits are normally available, meaning no special release in this case, but I don’t know all the details.
It’s over for Barry.
Ole Meg, the 1st to throw many a stone…here she is squirming, saying “you got it all wrong!” When not so long ago she was building her own local police Mafia; allowing certain locals to be harassed, followed, intimidated by uniforms, concerned citizens to be ignored, lives disrupted while she looked the other way from the FOP- not knowing for sure if political enemies were telling truths or just aiming for revenge or to disable folks with fear tactics. That’s a dirty kind of person who engages in such…one could say to her, “what goes around comes around.” She should look to her old ethics SOPs. Oh! Right! Those are suggested rules for other people, not her! Her narcissism rages on.
Reporter Alto:
Please ask the mayor why she states that “no laws were broken” when she made trips with her paramour alone to Utah and New York, both of which are states that make adultery a misdemeanor that carries jail time? From all news reports I have read, this question has never been asked.
Thanks.
“Release of Affidavit by TBI ‘Designed to Humiliate Me and Politically Embarrass Me'”. I’d say she does not need any help in that score. Guilty liberals always like to portray themselves as victims.
She did this to herself. Another liberal blaming someone else for their own actions. Resign, already.
You’ll have to pry her ceremonial ribbon cutting scissors and groundbreaking shovel out of her cold, dead cloven hooves.
Quick. Someone ask Bredesen if she should resign. He endorsed her when he didn’t endorse Dean or Purcell.
“they were taken without my knowledge and without my consent.”
So the Mayor is throwing the Sargeant under the bus! Maybe someone should offer him immunity for his testimony against the Mayor? But a picture is worth a thousand words!
Oh my, taking it personally now, are we, Moonbeam? Saw you made Drudge Report but guess that’s not the kind of national attention you wanted.
Keep it up, Megan. Flame out and take your horrible transit plan and socialist dreams with you.
“In your face Nashville”. Have you ever seen some one this guilty refuse to do the right thing? Barry didn’t need help to humiliate and embarrass herself. Apparently she can’t be humiliated or embarrassed. Any normal person would now be out of the public eye, not giving interviews. I feel for the residents of Nashville. And where is the Metro Council on this? Why have they not asked for Barry’s resignation AND Anderson and Barry’s Chief of Staff? If Metro Board of Ethical Conduct, “lacks jurisdiction to examine alleged violations of Metropolitan Government executive orders,” sounds to me like the fox is in charge of the hen house.
Did any one else see this? In this interview with WSMV, watch Barry’s eyes. Twice I’ve seen her with this bug eyed expression. I believe she’s taking some kind of drug.
In her narcissistic and delusional mind TBI stands for The Barry Investigators whose sole purpose is to destroy her as part of a vast right wing conspiracy. This woman is now a crazed lunatic and needs to resign immediately.
So if there are nude pictures of her isn’t one way to find out if she knew they were taken is to see if she smiled for the camera? Her blaming the TBI for being mean is great. I’m sure she has made jokes at President Trumps expense about the FBI investigations. The difference is Trump doesn’t have a history of lying to authorities.
If she let Forrest into her room when she was partially or completely
nude then she was giving him the opportunity to photo her. This
bitch is either totally nuts or a bigger liar than Bill & Hillary.