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 hands on one in every of Texas’ oldest crimes — cattle theft. 

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

Jones, the scion of a powerful ranching household that settled in Loving County within the Nineteen Fifties, was booked into Winkler County Jail on Friday and released on $20,000 bond, information present. He did not return phone calls seeking comment. 

Authorities additionally arrested former Loving County deputy Leroy Medlin Jr., 35, on one rely of engaging in legal activity — a second-degree felony that carries a most sentence of 20 years. Medlin did not return phone calls, but his spouse sent an email that questioned the motives behind the arrests. “We're being targeted,” she wrote, “at full power.” 

Officials with the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Affiliation, the lead company on the case, offered few specifics concerning the alleged crime. Commissioned by way of the Texas Department of Public Security, the association has “particular rangers” —  licensed peace officers — who investigate livestock theft and other agriculture crimes. 

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

The concept the decide — who's paid $133,294 yearly — would get picked up for cattle rustling was just too much for Susan Hays, a Texas election lawyer who’s wrangled with the Joneses up to now.

“You may’t make this shit up,” she mentioned. “It’s a ache in the ass to spherical up cattle and take them to market. After which to risk real trouble for it? It’s just asinine to me.”

Word of the arrests spread faster than a prairie hearth with a tailwind via this West Texas county, population 57 as of the final U.S. Census Bureau estimate. Unfold over 671 sq. miles of mesquite-studded desert, Loving County has no school, no church, no grocery store and no bank. The few children who live there board the bus in the only city, Mentone (population 22), and travel about 35 miles every morning and afternoon to attend school.

For many years, a handful of outstanding families in Loving County have feuded bitterly for control of the local authorities, with the Joneses lastly largely popping out ahead. 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 legal professional. His nephew is the constable. 

However some lately elected county officials 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 your entire time since he’s been the decide,” stated Skeet Jones’ nephew, Constable Brandon Jones, who was elected in 2016. “That’s given him a sense of power and impunity that he can do no matter he needs each time he wants.  Even the sensation of self-righteousness. That he can do no flawed.” 

When Skeet Jones was sworn in as decide in 2007, many of the caliche roads had been rutted like washboards and residents nonetheless needed to line as much as get potable water disbursed from a group 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 panorama is dotted with huge gas crops, water plants and salt water disposal techniques. Most of the surviving working ranches have “frac pads” for horizontally drilled wells that minimize through the caliche and bedrock to unencumber the lifeblood for Loving County’s economy: oil and gas. 

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

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

Jones’ father, Elgin “Punk” Jones, and mother, Mary Belle Jones, started the P&M Jones Ranch in 1953, settling right into a wood-frame house with no running water. “After I first came to Mentone in 1953, it was quite a shock,” Mary Belle Jones instructed the Texas Monthly in 1997. “I mentioned to my husband, ‘Punk, how lengthy are we going to live in this godforsaken place?’” 

But she got here to love Loving County’s vast, 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 nicely subject that feeds Mentone. 

Skeet Jones has gotten into trouble earlier than, however nothing like this. In 2016, the state Commission on Judicial Conduct determined Jones didn't follow the law by charging steep charges — about $600 to $750 — for reducing tickets including dashing and marijuana possession all the way down to parking tickets.

The decide denied any involvement in negotiations over tickets and advised the commission he simply accredited the plea deals introduced to him. He was issued a public warning and ordered to take 10 hours of further schooling.

Medlin beforehand labored 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, information show. Medlin was reinstated after an attraction. 

Then in 2018, Medlin engaged in another high-speed pursuit after telling dispatchers the driver “virtually ran me over,” data show. But physique and dash camera footage contradicted Medlin’s account, in keeping with internal affairs experiences. He appealed again, telling supervisors he felt threatened, even when it wasn’t evident from the videos.

He was later issued another indefinite suspension after supervisors determined he issued tickets for violations he didn’t witness, information present. 

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

Medlin also worked on Jones’ ranch earlier than being hired by Loving County as a janitor and groundskeeper. 

Two ranch fingers also have been arrested on Friday. Cody Williams, 31, was charged with three counts of livestock theft and fascinating in organized criminal activity, data present. He did not return a reporter’s phone call.

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

Along with the decide, Medlin, Williams and Alvarado posted bond and were launched from jail.