A date for a bench trial has been set for the Mercer County School District superintendent.
During Tim Farquer’s appearance in Mercer County Circuit Court on Monday, the trial was scheduled for July 29-31. A final pre-trial conference has been set for July 6.
Farquer was arrested last September, along with Mercer County School District IT workers Amberly Norton and Andrea Long, following an Aledo Police Department investigation into a complaint accusing Mercer County School District employees of illegally accessing students’ medical records. He’s facing four Class 3 felony counts of official misconduct, two Class A misdemeanors of computer tampering, and two Class A misdemeanors of unauthorized access to medical records.
Last October, Aledo Police Department Detective Lindsey Kenney testified that she received a complaint from a Mercer County High School nurse, who reported Farquer had requested information regarding hand-foot-and-mouth disease cases in the district. Farquer is accused of creating a Google Drive spreadsheet and sharing it with the nurses in the school district, and another teacher who serves as a union representative for the teachers’ union.
During Farquer’s preliminary hearing, his defense cited the Illinois School Student Records Act, which includes medical records as part of a student’s permanent or temporary records. It allows schools to share student health records with staff who have “a legitimate educational interest,” without parental consent, but other disclosures require consent.
Farquer was originally accused of accessing the records on Sept. 1, 2025, but additional charges filed against him earlier this year allege he also accessed them in May 2025. Norton and Long are accused of accessing the unauthorized records beginning on July 19, 2019.
Farquer remains on paid administrative leave by the Mercer County School District. His annual salary is $171, 223.
Last month, the school district hired Stacey Day as its deputy superintendent, beginning on July 1. She told WRMJ the role will allow her to act as superintendent while Farquer’s legal proceedings are ongoing. The Mercer County School District is currently utilizing an interim superintendent, Scott Petrie.
Norton and Long’s next court date is May 11.