The Florida Department of Health’s former dashboard manager, Rebekah Jones, has had her scheduled prosecution delayed under certain conditions listed in a “deferred prosecution agreement.”
Authorities charged Jones in 2021 with illegally accessing the Florida Department of Health’s computer system to contact 1,750 people and downloading confidential data, which she allegedly saved it to her private devices. Jones, who created Florida’s official coronavirus database, was fired from the department in May 2020 for “insubordination” after being repeatedly reprimanded, Florida Today reported.
Jones claimed the department fired her for refusing to forge COVID-19 numbers, which an investigation later concluded was false.
In December 2020, Florida police raided Jones’ home and seized her computer and data equipment to investigate these allegations.
Jones had been scheduled to stand trial for these charges in January 2023 in Leon County. She accepted a plea deal Wednesday on the conditions that sh pays $20,000 in investigative fees to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement at a rate of $200 per month, performs 150 hours of community service at the minimum rate of 13 hours per month, sees a mental health professional, pleads guilty and pays a $100 fee to the State Attorney’s Office upon filing the agreement, according to the agreement.
In order to have a felony charge against her dismissed, Rebekah Jones agreed to pay a $20,000 fine, complete 150 hours of community service, see a licensed therapist and – a big one –admit guilt. On Substack, Jones is taking a victory lap claiming complete and total vindication. pic.twitter.com/xHUSjdJCf5
— Brandon Meyer (@meyer0656) December 9, 2022
She must also abide by pre-trial intervention conditions that include refraining from breaking the law, “working regularly,” and reporting to a pre-trial intervention officer each month, the document said.
In a statement to Facebook, Jones criticized the raid on her home, accusing the police of “pointing” firearms at her children.
“In order to have the case dropped, I had to agree to pay the police a large sum of money for the time they spent raiding my home without a warrant and pointing guns at my small children,” she said.
Jones had previously accused the administration of Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis of forging COVID-19 numbers. She claimed that she was fired for her refusal to forge these numbers in order to lift COVID measures. She made various appearances on media networks to make her accusations against the governor, including MSNBC’s “The ReidOut” and CNN’s “Cuomo Prime Time.” (RELATED: Yet Another Conspiracy Theory Left Wing Media Loved Comes Crashing Down)
Inspector General Michael J. Bennett declared Jones’ allegations to be false in an internal report after conducting interviews with dozens of people who collected state COVID data, including supervisors for Jones.
“The OIG found no evidence that the DOH misrepresented or otherwise misled the public regarding how positivity rates were calculated,” the report said. “The definitions for overall and new case positivity were provided on the Data Definition sheet and Health Metrics Overview, which were both linked to the dashboard, and were consistent with testimonial evidence obtained by the OIG.”
