Northwest board won’t appoint successor to arrested former trustee

At a special training meeting last week, Northwest trustees decided to leave a vacancy in Place 7, a seat that has been vacant since former board member Mel Fuller was arrested on suspicion of possession of child pornography.

“This decision was a mutual desire of the school board. We are preparing for some very important initiatives when we return from the holidays and felt our attention needed to be directed toward that,” school board President Mark Schluter said. “Our board wants the voters to decide who will sit in Place 7 in the May election.”

By Texas law, board members could either appoint a successor or leave the seat vacant. Because of the timing of the resignation, holding a special election before the May general election was not an option, district officials said.

There are two years remaining on the term for Place 7.

The seat has been vacant since Oct. 31, when Fuller submitted his resignation and was arrested. The 51-year-old educational account executive from Trophy Club had served on the board since 2008. He ran unopposed in the March 2017 election.

He is the second Northwest school board member to be under a criminal investigation for a youth-related crime since 2012. Former Trustee Kerry D. Jones was indicted in 2013 by a Denton County grand jury on four counts of improper relationship between an educator and a student. His trial is pending.

Fuller was board president when Jones was indicted.

Information for this report was provided by the Star-Telegram archives.

This story was originally published December 12, 2017 at 12:22 PM with the headline "Northwest board won’t appoint successor to arrested former trustee."