Michigan judge issues new arrest warrant for WFAA8 anchor Shon Gables, with bond now set at $100,000

Shon Gables in wfaa.com bio photo

By ED BARK
@unclebarkycom on Twitter
The price on her head keeps getting higher for WFAA8 anchor-reporter and fugitive Shon Gables.

The honorable Shalina D. Kumar on Wednesday became the latest Michigan judge to cite Gables for contempt of court for failure to appear in connection with a successful judgement against her by Gables’ former husband, Peter Klamka. Another bench warrant has been issued for her arrest, with the “bond necessary to release this warrant” now at $100,000, according to the official court document signed by judge Kumar.

It’s the third bench warrant issued against Gables, and the bond now is more than triple the last amount. As previously reported, Gables was first cited for contempt of court on March 4, 2011 by Michigan district judge Jeanne Stempien.

WFAA8 news director Carolyn Mungo declined to comment on the record in an email reply Thursday night. The Dallas-based station’s only public comment on the ongoing Gables situation came in March of 2011, when Mungo’s predecessor, Michael Valentine, said, “I am in constant communication with Shon and she has kept me up to date on the issue.”

Valentine, currently vice president of content for Gannett-owned TV stations (including WFAA8), hired Gables in January 2010. WFAA8 since has renewed her contract, and she continues to anchor the station’s weekend morning newscasts while also reporting several days a week.

Peter Klamka, the second of Gables’ three husbands, is represented in court by his brother, Richard Klamka. They have won numerous legal judgments against Gables, who now lives in Frisco, TX. Some of them, of a more private nature, have not been reported here.

The latest contempt of court document in the case says that on October 23, 2013, “this Court found that Defendant, Shondella Morton, also known as ‘Shon Gables,’ maliciously contacted the police about Plaintiff, Peter Klamka, and provided them with false information which led to his arrest.”

A $250,000 judgement against the defendant was rendered and the case was closed, the document says. “However, Defendant has not paid Plaintiff anything towards the $250,000 judgment, nor has she sought an Order to pay Plaintiff in Installments. Therefore, on March 13, 2014, this Court signed an Order ordering Defendant to appear and testify as to her assets and financial ability to pay the judgment.” But Gables failed to appear, as ordered, on April 20th of this year, the document said.

Gables has failed to appear on numerous occasions in connection to various judgments against her. The court has denied three motions by her attorneys that she be allowed to testify via telephone or Skype. In a June 2011 “Motion to Permit Telephone Testimony,” Gables’ attorneys argued that should she appear in Michigan at an evidentiary hearing, “It is almost a certainty that either Plaintiff or his brother, or both of them, will take all steps to assure that Defendant is arrested and incarcerated.”

Attorneys representing Gables also said that “significant custody proceedings” in both Texas and New York also have caused her to incur “substantial additional attorney fees with attorneys in both cases. This makes it important for her to conserve her financial resources as much as possible to be able to pay the fees and costs incurred in those proceedings and, accordingly, she does not want to incur the airfare and hotel charges that would be incurred to testify at this Evidentiary Hearing.”

Judge Stempien rejected those arguments, citing an earlier ruling by a Washtenaw County, Mich. circuit court judge who said Gables and her lawyers were asking that court to “undermine one of the major tools of enforcement of judicial authority in this state.”

One of Gables’ first stories for WFAA8, headlined “Warrant Roundup under way in Dallas County,” was reported in August 2010 and remains on the station’s website as of this writing.

Gables told viewers that arrests can be avoided if “offenders simply pay their fines or obey the law.”

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