Tom Gear
[5] Gear was up for re-election in a three way race with Independent Gordon C. Helsel, Jr. the then-current Mayor of the City of Poquoson, Virginia.[9][10] Tom Gear sponsored and fought for legislation giving Teddy P. Thompson $270,000 for spending seven years in prison for a robbery he did not commit.Because the tentative deal included the appointment of his sister, Gear's fellow Senate Republicans walked off the floor in protest when the selections came up for a vote.[13] In December 2019, Gear's elderly mother was indicted for embezzlement of more than $180,000 over a three-year stretch from an American Legion Women’s Auxiliary in Hampton, where she had been treasurer for more than four decades.Donald Gear further said that his brother had convinced his mother to take a reverse mortgage on her $540,000 home, eventually leaving her destitute.