The top elected official in Loving County, Texas, charged with cattle theft 

Lawmen got here to distant Loving County, Texas, on Friday to arrest the county choose, a former sheriff’s deputy and two ranch arms on considered one of Texas’ oldest crimes — cattle theft. 

Judge Skeet Jones, 71, the highest elected official since 2007 in the least populated county within the continental United States, is going through three felony counts of livestock theft and one rely of participating in felony activity, accused of gathering up and promoting stray cattle, authorities said. 

Jones, the scion of a powerful ranching family that settled in Loving County within the Fifties, was booked into Winkler County Jail on Friday and launched on $20,000 bond, records present. He did not return cellphone calls searching for remark. 

Authorities also arrested former Loving County deputy Leroy Medlin Jr., 35, on one count of engaging in felony activity — a second-degree felony that carries a maximum sentence of 20 years. Medlin did not return cellphone calls, but his spouse despatched an e mail that questioned the motives behind the arrests. “We're being focused,” she wrote, “at full pressure.” 

Officials with the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association, the lead company on the case, provided few specifics in regards to the alleged crime. Commissioned through the Texas Division of Public Safety, the affiliation has “special rangers” —  licensed peace officers — who investigate livestock theft and other agriculture crimes. 

Jeremy Fuchs, a spokesman for the affiliation, mentioned the yearlong investigation is ongoing and extra costs are possible.

The concept the judge — who's paid $133,294 yearly — would get picked up for cattle rustling was simply an excessive amount of for Susan Hays, a Texas election lawyer who’s wrangled with the Joneses up to now.

“You'll be able to’t make this shit up,” she said. “It’s a ache in the ass to spherical up cattle and take them to market. And then to threat actual hassle for it? It’s just asinine to me.”

Word of the arrests spread quicker than a prairie fire with a tailwind by this West Texas county, inhabitants 57 as of the last U.S. Census Bureau estimate. Unfold over 671 square miles of mesquite-studded desert, Loving County has no faculty, no church, no grocery store and no financial institution. The few youngsters who reside there board the bus in the one town, Mentone (population 22), and travel about 35 miles every morning and afternoon to attend faculty.

For many years, a handful of outstanding households in Loving County have feuded bitterly for control of the local government, with the Joneses finally largely popping out forward. Skeet Jones has served as the decide for more than 15 years. His sister is the county clerk. His cousin’s husband is the county attorney. His nephew is the constable. 

However some recently elected county officers have been butting heads with the Joneses and their allies, making for colourful commissioner’s court conferences and a much-anticipated November election. 

And blood is no longer holding the Jones household together. 

“He’s had free reign for all the time since he’s been the decide,” said Skeet Jones’ nephew, Constable Brandon Jones, who was elected in 2016. “That’s given him a sense of energy and impunity that he can do no matter he needs every time he desires.  Even the sensation of self-righteousness. That he can do no wrong.” 

When Skeet Jones was sworn in as judge in 2007, most of the caliche roads were rutted like washboards and residents nonetheless had to line up to get potable water disbursed from a neighborhood tank. 

However he presided over a interval of unprecedented development, as fracking boomed within the Permian Basin, feeding money into the county’s coffers. The parched panorama is dotted with massive gas vegetation, water plants and salt water disposal techniques. Many of the surviving working ranches have “frac pads” for horizontally drilled wells that lower through the caliche and bedrock to release the lifeblood for Loving County’s financial system: oil and gas. 

The tax base hovers around $7 billion to $9 billion. And the county’s finances has grown from about $2 million in 2008 to greater than $28 million. 

The salaries for most of the top officials on the town — the decide, auditor, treasurer, clerk, justice of the peace, county attorney, constable and sheriff — are $100,000 or higher. 

Jones’ father, Elgin “Punk” Jones, and mother, Mary Belle Jones, began the P&M Jones Ranch in 1953, settling into a wood-frame house with no operating water. “When I first got here to Mentone in 1953, it was quite a shock,” Mary Belle Jones advised the Texas Month-to-month in 1997. “I mentioned to my husband, ‘Punk, how long are we going to reside on this godforsaken place?’” 

But she came to love Loving County’s huge, open skyline. She served because the county’s chief appraiser for years. Punk Jones, the sheriff for 28 years, is credited with discovering the freshwater well discipline that feeds Mentone. 

Skeet Jones has gotten into trouble earlier than, but nothing like this. In 2016, the state Commission on Judicial Conduct decided Jones did not observe the regulation by charging steep charges — about $600 to $750 — for reducing tickets together with speeding and marijuana possession right down to parking tickets.

The decide denied any involvement in negotiations over tickets and instructed the fee he just authorized the plea deals offered to him. He was issued a public warning and ordered to take 10 hours of additional schooling.

Medlin previously worked as a detective for the San Antonio Police Department, where records present he was issued indefinite suspensions — the department’s equal of being fired — 3 times. 

In 2015, he was placed on indefinite suspension for a 100-plus mph pursuit of a driver who had a toddler in the back seat, records present. Medlin was reinstated after an attraction. 

Then in 2018, Medlin engaged in one other high-speed pursuit after telling dispatchers the driver “nearly ran me over,” information show. But body and dash digital camera footage contradicted Medlin’s account, in response to internal affairs reviews. He appealed again, telling supervisors he felt threatened, even when it wasn’t evident from the movies.

He was later issued one other indefinite suspension after supervisors determined he issued tickets for violations he didn’t witness, records show. 

Medlin joined the Loving County Sheriff’s Workplace in January 2019 and “separated” from the agency lower than two years later, information present. (Sheriff Chris Busse declined to say why.) 

Medlin additionally labored on Jones’ ranch earlier than being employed by Loving County as a janitor and groundskeeper. 

Two ranch hands also had been arrested on Friday. Cody Williams, 31, was charged with three counts of livestock theft and fascinating in organized criminal activity, records present. He didn't return a reporter’s telephone name.

Jonathon Alvarado, 23, faces one count of theft of livestock, which carries a sentence of as much as 10 years in jail. He hung up on a reporter in search of comment.

Along with the judge, Medlin, Williams and Alvarado posted bond and were released from jail.