The Knox County assistant district attorney accused of lying under oath resigned the day Knox News reported about his suspension by the prosecutor’s office.
Assistant DA Sean McDermott confirmed Robert DeBusk resigned Oct. 14.
DeBusk testified Oct. 10 that he had not asked a supervisor to sign off on using a recorded phone call from a jail inmate to his attorney. His testimony was proven to be false after an attorney testified DeBusk told her that same day, outside the courtroom, that he had sought and received permission from his supervisor to use the recorded call.
DeBusk was recalled to the stand and initially denied the attorney’s account before agreeing it was true. He subsequently invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination, according to defense attorney Mike Whalen.
Whalen had called DeBusk to testify during a hearing on whether the prosecutor’s office should be removed from a criminal case because DeBusk had accessed an email that one of Whalen’s clients had sent him from jail.
Whalen asked Knox County Criminal Court Judge Hector Sanchez to consider a criminal charge of aggravated perjury against DeBusk. Whalen told Knox News on Oct. 15 he thinks the DA’s office isn’t taking the potential perjury charge as seriously as it would for someone who worked outside the office.
“I don’t want to see anyone in trouble, but if it was one on my clients, you can bet your ass they would be arrested.
“That’s not normally how the DA’s office works on crime,” he continued. “If they can’t uphold the law against their own, I don’t know how they’re going to uphold it against anybody else.”
How a Knox County prosecutor ended up testifying about attorney-client privilege
DeBusk was initially suspended after he was called to the stand to answer question about using communication between a client and an attorney. Whalen was seeking to remove the district attorney’s office from a criminal case he was handling because DeBusk improperly accessed communications in separate cases between at least two inmates to their lawyers.
Attorney-client privilege allows defendants to talk freely with their attorneys without fear the discussion will be used against them in court. It is key concept in the American legal system with roots firmly established in the English law that preceded America’s legal system. The protection extends to members of the defense attorney’s staff who help on the case, such as paralegals.
During the hearing, Whalen questioned DeBusk about whether a supervisor in the DA’s office told him in a different case that he could use a recorded phone call from an inmate to a paralegal because the call wouldn’t be protected by attorney-client privilege.
DeBusk testified he couldn’t recall whether he spoke with his supervisor about the inmate’s recorded phone call or whether he told the defense attorney in the case, Holly Nehls, he planned to introduce the recorded phone call into evidence, Whalen and Nehls told Knox News.
However, when DeBusk finished testifying, defense attorney Brooke Spivey alerted Whalen that DeBusk had told her that he discussed using the recorded phone call as evidence and that his supervisor signed off on it.
DeBusk was called again to the stand, where he initially denied Spivey’s story before agreeing it was true. He then declined to answer multiple questions by invoking his Fifth Amendment right, Whalen said.
The testimony caught the attention of McDermott, who was the prosecutor in the case.
“Then Sean McDermott, the deputy DA, asked (DeBusk) if he told the other lawyer something other than what he testified,” Whalen said in a text message to Knox News. “First, he said no, then said, ‘Well, now that I think of it, I did.'”
DeBusk was suspended later that day.
Why was a defense attorney trying to have the DA’s office removed from a criminal case?
Whalen requested the Oct. 10 hearing because he wanted to remove the DA’s office from prosecuting a criminal case he was handling.
What made DeBusk’s intention to use protected communication even worse, Whalen wrote in his request for a hearing, is DeBusk had accessed protected attorney-client communication before.
McDermott, representing the DA’s office, argued the jail communication system warns users all communication can be reviewed by jail staff and attorney-client privilege is protected when attorneys register with the jail. Whalen and Nehls have communicated with jail inmates in the past without breaches of attorney-client privilege.
In her case, Nehls testified, her client specifically alerted jail staff the call was to an attorney, yet it was recorded.
McDermott argued the recording of the phone call was never entered into evidence. Nehls testified this was because she asked for a delay in her client’s case after she learned DeBusk had acquired a recording of the inmate’s phone call with her paralegal.
Sheriff’s Office Capt. Aaron Turner, administrator of jail communications, testified law enforcement also has access to the communication system, though he did not know about protected attorney-client communications being shared when they shouldn’t be.
Before the Oct. 10 hearing, the DA’s office had removed DeBusk from the case and asked the judge to not allow Whalen to question prosecutors under oath during the hearing.
DeBusk, who graduated in 2016 from the Duncan School of Law at Lincoln Memorial University, joined the DA’s office in 2021.
Tyler Whetstone is an investigative reporter focused on accountability journalism. Connect with Tyler by emailing him at tyler.whetstone@knoxnews.com. Follow him on X, formerly known as Twitter, @tyler_whetstone.
This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: Knox County assistant DA resigns after allegation he lied under oath
