Sent Information To The FAA Because She Didn't Like Him

A former employee of a cardiology clinic in Grapevine, TX has pleaded guilty to a charge of sending a pilot's medical records to the FAA without his consent, and now faces up to a year in prison and a $50,000 fine.

The former employee is Ebony Shonte Echols. The Dallas Morning News reports that in February of last year, she got into an argument with a commercial airline pilot who was not named in court documents after he apparently complained about the clinic. He was there for an FAA-mandated fitness exam.

As the argument escalated, she told the pilot he was "terminated as a patient of the clinic," and she was going to send his medical records to the FAA. He told her not to do so, but she did "with the intent to cause malicious harm," according to an indictment.

It is not Echols' first brush with the legal system. The Dallas Morning News reports that Dallas County records show she received deferred adjudication in 2014 for fraud committed while she was working as a podiatrist in Irving, TX. The court records show she used a patient's banking and personal information to pay her rent. She has also convicted of insurance fraud last year.

But it doesn't end there. She had also been convicted of failing to identify a fugitive in 2003, and has multiple theft-by-check cases on her record.

A Federal Judge must approve the plea agreement before it is official.

FMI: http://www.dallascounty.org/department/courts/courts_index.php