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

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

Decide Skeet Jones, 71, the top elected official since 2007 in the least populated county in the continental United States, is facing three felony counts of livestock theft and one depend of participating in prison activity, accused of gathering up and promoting stray cattle, authorities said. 

Jones, the scion of a strong ranching household that settled in Loving County in the Nineteen Fifties, was booked into Winkler County Jail on Friday and launched on $20,000 bond, records present. He didn't return telephone calls looking for remark. 

Authorities additionally arrested former Loving County deputy Leroy Medlin Jr., 35, on one depend of engaging in prison exercise — a second-degree felony that carries a maximum sentence of 20 years. Medlin did not return phone calls, but his wife sent an email that questioned the motives behind the arrests. “We are being targeted,” she wrote, “at full drive.” 

Officials with the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association, the lead agency on the case, supplied few specifics concerning the alleged crime. Commissioned through the Texas Division of Public Safety, the association has “special rangers” —  licensed peace officers — who investigate livestock theft and different agriculture crimes. 

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

The concept the choose — who is paid $133,294 annually — 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 previously.

“You may’t make this shit up,” she stated. “It’s a pain in the ass to round up cattle and take them to market. And then to threat real bother for it? It’s simply asinine to me.”

Phrase of the arrests spread quicker than a prairie fireplace with a tailwind via 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 retailer and no financial institution. The few children who live there board the bus in the only town, Mentone (population 22), and travel about 35 miles every morning and afternoon to attend school.

For decades, a handful of prominent families in Loving County have feuded bitterly for management of the native government, with the Joneses lastly largely popping out ahead. Skeet Jones has served as the judge for more than 15 years. His sister is the county clerk. His cousin’s husband is the county legal professional. His nephew is the constable. 

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

And blood is no longer holding the Jones family together. 

“He’s had free reign for the whole time since he’s been the judge,” mentioned Skeet Jones’ nephew, Constable Brandon Jones, who was elected in 2016. “That’s given him a way of energy and impunity that he can do no matter he desires each time he desires.  Even the sensation of self-righteousness. That he can do no unsuitable.” 

When Skeet Jones was sworn in as decide in 2007, most of the caliche roads had been rutted like washboards and residents nonetheless needed to line as much as get potable water distributed from a neighborhood tank. 

But he presided over a interval of unprecedented progress, as fracking boomed within the Permian Basin, feeding cash into the county’s coffers. The parched landscape is dotted with large fuel plants, water vegetation and salt water disposal programs. Lots of the surviving working ranches have “frac pads” for horizontally drilled wells that lower via the caliche and bedrock to liberate the lifeblood for Loving County’s economy: oil and gasoline. 

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

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

Jones’ father, Elgin “Punk” Jones, and mother, Mary Belle Jones, began the P&M Jones Ranch in 1953, settling right into a wood-frame home with no running water. “When I first came to Mentone in 1953, it was fairly a shock,” Mary Belle Jones informed the Texas Monthly in 1997. “I said to my husband, ‘Punk, how long are we going to live in this godforsaken place?’” 

But she got here to love Loving County’s vast, open skyline. She served as the county’s chief appraiser for years. Punk Jones, the sheriff for 28 years, is credited with discovering the freshwater nicely field that feeds Mentone. 

Skeet Jones has gotten into hassle before, but nothing like this. In 2016, the state Fee on Judicial Conduct decided Jones didn't comply with the law by charging steep fees — about $600 to $750 — for reducing tickets together with speeding and marijuana possession all the way down to parking tickets.

The judge denied any involvement in negotiations over tickets and advised the fee he just authorised the plea deals offered to him. He was issued a public warning and ordered to take 10 hours of extra schooling.

Medlin previously labored as a detective for the San Antonio Police Division, where information present he was issued indefinite suspensions — the department’s equivalent of being fired — three 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, data show. Medlin was reinstated after an appeal. 

Then in 2018, Medlin engaged in one other high-speed pursuit after telling dispatchers the motive force “virtually ran me over,” data present. But body and sprint digital camera footage contradicted Medlin’s account, in response to inner affairs experiences. 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, data present. 

Medlin joined the Loving County Sheriff’s Office in January 2019 and “separated” from the company less than two years later, data present. (Sheriff Chris Busse declined to say why.) 

Medlin also worked on Jones’ ranch before being employed by Loving County as a janitor and groundskeeper. 

Two ranch fingers additionally were arrested on Friday. Cody Williams, 31, was charged with three counts of livestock theft and fascinating in organized legal activity, data present. He did not return a reporter’s cellphone name.

Jonathon Alvarado, 23, faces one rely of theft of livestock, which carries a sentence of up to 10 years in prison. He hung up on a reporter looking for comment.

In addition to the decide, Medlin, Williams and Alvarado posted bond and have been launched from jail.