The Tennessee Department of Safety announced Wednesday that it had begun termination proceedings against a Tennessee Highway Patrol lieutenant.

"[On Wednesday,] the Tennessee Department of Safety served Lieutenant Ronnie Shirley with a 'minimum due process letter for termination' surrounding the ongoing investigation into Shirley's alleged unauthorized access to the Integrated Criminal Justice Web Portal (ICJWP), a Department of Safety news release said.

"I recommended to Commissioner Dave Mitchell that Lieutenant Shirley be terminated for gross misconduct and violating the public's trust as a Tennessee State Trooper," said Col. Mike Walker. "The recommendation to terminate was based upon evidence developed during an investigation conducted by the Department of Safety's Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) and the Criminal Investigation Division (CID). Lt. Shirley's conduct and actions relative to this investigation are unacceptable for a Tennessee State Trooper," Walker said.

On July 2, 2008, Commissioner Mitchell referred the investigation to the THP Criminal Investigation Division (CID) as the lead agency, after information of Lt. Shirley's possible violation of the ICJWP access agreement was first discovered in the OPR investigation.

Expert assistance was also requested of the TBI to conduct forensic searches of all state computers available to Lt. Shirley and for the FBI to conduct a complete and thorough search of the FBI's National Crime Information Center database located in West Virginia. In addition, Commissioner Mitchell contacted the Davidson County District Attorney's Office and the United States Attorney's Office to present the initial facts surrounding Lt. Shirley's investigation to ensure that this investigation was appropriately reviewed for all potential criminal violations.

"The investigation determined there was no political motive behind the actions of Lt. Shirley nor was he acting at the direction of any other individual," stressed Department of Safety Commissioner Dave Mitchell. "No politicians or known elected public officials were among the individuals checked. There is no evidence whatsoever of any political motivation behind the unauthorized checks conducted by Lieutenant Shirley."

The CID investigation has determined that 182 individual names were accessed through the ICJWP portal from October 19, 2006, when Lt. Shirley first accessed the portal, to July 3, 2008, when his access was terminated.

These inquiries included access of the Tennessee Department of Safety's Driver License records, the Tennessee Department of Revenue's Title and Registration records, the Tennessee Department of Correction's Tennessee Offender Management Information System (TOMIS) and the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation's Sexual Offender Register.

To date, 139 individuals have been interviewed. 132 of these individuals stated they did not authorize, request, or consent to Lt. Shirley accessing their records, and only seven of these individuals requested Lt. Shirley access their information.

"The investigation has determined that Lt. Shirley engaged in criminal activity in violation of T.C.A. 39-14-602, Unlawful Access of a Computer, by his unauthorized access of these records," the news release said. "The majority of Lt. Shirley's queries were to view photos and driver license records of citizens that are protected by the Federal Driver Privacy Protection Act (DPPA).

"Certain data queried is federally protected. All queries of this nature must be for legitimate law enforcement purposes. Lt. Shirley did not have a legitimate law enforcement purpose to check the records of these 132 individuals."