A 2020 TBI case against a Monroe County, Tennessee, couple that led to felony theft charges that were dismissed Monday should never have been prosecuted in the first place, according to an attorney defending two of the three people arrested in the investigation.
The couple, Timothy and Mary Ellen Sellin, 60 and 61, respectively, “had their reputations destroyed by this unjust prosecution,” Athens, Tennessee, attorney Stephen Hatchett said in an email. Hatchett strongly criticized the 10th Judicial District Attorney’s Office in its prosecution of the case.
Charges were dismissed on a state motion Monday that had been filed against the Sellins and their fellow defendant in the case, 72-year-old Anthony Aram Millsaps, Monroe County Criminal Circuit Court records show. Tennessee Bureau of Investigation officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the dismissal, and Millsaps’ attorney, Madisonville lawyer Steven B. Ward, could not be reached for comment.
The three were accused by the TBI of stealing about $30,000 from the Monroe County 4-H Scholastic Clay Target Program over several years. Mary Ellen Sellin handled funds for the organization, while Timothy Sellin and Millsaps served as coaches, the TBI said in a Feb. 5, 2020, news release on the arrests. Each was charged with theft over $10,000, a class C felony that, in a conviction, carries a potential sentence of three to 15 years in prison, depending on criminal history, and up to a $10,000 fine.
The case was faulty from the outset, Hatchett said. The TBI lists the victim as being the Monroe County 4-H Club, he said, but the club “had nothing to do with this case and was not a victim of a theft, a fact I confirmed personally with Greg Austin, the director of the Monroe County 4-H Club.”