FRANKLIN, Tenn. (WTVF) — It was another dramatic twist in the ongoing Gabrielle Hanson saga Friday as the Franklin candidate for mayor found herself under oath in a Williamson County courtroom.
Now the question is: did Hanson potentially commit perjury when asked about her past.
Hanson is challenging the constitutionality of Franklin's ethics laws — laws that she's now accused of breaking in her position as a city alderman. Her own attorney put her on the stand to argue that the laws are so vague that she is now afraid to send any letters soliciting help for constituents.
"Do you swear or affirm the testimony you give will be the truth and nothing but the truth?" the clerk asked.
"I do," Hanson replied, with her right hand raised.
But Hanson may have been tripped up on what is normally the easiest of questions.
"Ma'am, will you please state and spell your name for the record?" her attorney Daniel Horowitz began.
"Gabrielle Hanson," she answered.
As our NewsChannel 5 investigation first revealed, a Texas Department of Public Safety hit shows that Laraine Gabrielle Bush — her maiden name — had a 1995 arrest for aggravated promotion of prostitution.
The agency report also lists an alias of Julie Newhouse.
And we found a separate business listing for J. Neuhaus and Associates — it was a different spelling — taken out by L. Gabrielle Bush.
Attorney Gail Ashworth, representing the Franklin Ethics Commission, cross-examined Hanson, beginning with her name.
"Do you have any explanation for why the Texas Department of Safety indicates that you do have an alias of Julie Newhouse?" Ashworth wanted to know.
"No," Hanson answered.
She denied ever having used an alias.
Ashworth continued: "And Julie Neuhaus, with n-e-u-h-a-u-s, corporate entity, that's not you?"
"No," Hanson insisted.
But NewsChannel 5 Investigates has now obtained a corporate filing showing a 1994 "application for registration of [a] fictitious name" for J. Neuhaus and Associates.
It was taken out by Gabrielle Bush with Hanson's social security number.
Then, we compared the signature to the signature on Hanson's 2004 marriage certificate, and it appears to match.
Hanson and her husband snuck out a back door, trying to avoid our questions.
Still, we caught up with her at an elevator.
We asked, "Ms. Hanson, you testified that you knew nothing about J. Neuhaus and Associates. I have your corporate filing here. Did you perjure yourself?"
"I need to go," she replied.
"Did you perjure yourself?"
"Excuse us," Tommy Hanson interjected.
Still, during Hanson's testimony, even the judge didn't seem to be buying some of her answers.
"I find answers to my questions ... to be non-responsive and evasive," Chancellor Joseph Woodruff told her. "And it undermines the credibility determination that I might otherwise have to make your testimony and how much weight to give your testimony."
Much of the questions surrounded Hanson's targeting of a group sponsoring a Juneteenth celebration in Franklin.
She sent an email to Metro Nashville Airport Authority president Doug Kreulen, threatening that airport board members and their personal businesses could be publicly targeted if the airport didn't withdraw funding from the group or provide funding to a competing group.
"So you were telling Mr. Kreulen and the board that you and these citizens are going to post on social media links and include business interests to out them, basically, about their support, correct?" Ashworth pressed.
"No," Hanson claimed. "I did not say that I would. My constituents told me that they would."
Over and over, the Franklin alderman tried to distance herself from the threats in her email, again seeming to frustrate the judge.
"You composed your own message, right?" Chancellor Woodruff asked Hanson.
"On their behalf," she replied.
"Well, whatever. You composed it. You own it, right?"
"Yes, on their behalf."
"You own it?"
"As an advocate for my constituents."
"OK, but you own it."
"I did write the letter."
The question now is: could Hanson's sworn testimony about her past — and the identity she now seems intent on denying — land her in another courtroom on another day?
Woodruff did not rule on Hanson's effort to strike down Franklin's ethics laws.
Her attorney objected numerous times to the questions she was being asked by an attorney for the city's ethics commission, but the judge overruled him every time.
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