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

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

Decide Skeet Jones, 71, the top elected official since 2007 within the least populated county within the continental United States, is facing three felony counts of livestock theft and one count of engaging in legal exercise, accused of gathering up and selling stray cattle, authorities mentioned. 

Jones, the scion of a robust ranching family that settled in Loving County in the Fifties, was booked into Winkler County Jail on Friday and released on $20,000 bond, data present. He did not return telephone calls searching for comment. 

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

Officials with the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association, the lead agency on the case, provided few specifics about the alleged crime. Commissioned by way of the Texas Division of Public Security, the affiliation 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 more charges are potential.

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

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

Word of the arrests unfold quicker than a prairie hearth with a tailwind by this West Texas county, inhabitants 57 as of the final U.S. Census Bureau estimate. Unfold over 671 sq. miles of mesquite-studded desert, Loving County has no faculty, no church, no grocery retailer and no bank. The few kids who dwell there board the bus in the one town, Mentone (inhabitants 22), and journey about 35 miles every morning and afternoon to attend college.

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 coming 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 lawyer. His nephew is the constable. 

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

And blood is no longer holding the Jones family collectively. 

“He’s had free reign for the whole time since he’s been the choose,” 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 desires every time he desires.  Even the feeling of self-righteousness. That he can do no incorrect.” 

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

However he presided over a period of unprecedented progress, as fracking boomed within the Permian Basin, feeding money into the county’s coffers. The parched panorama is dotted with large fuel crops, water crops and salt water disposal systems. Lots of the surviving working ranches have “frac pads” for horizontally drilled wells that minimize via the caliche and bedrock to unlock the lifeblood for Loving County’s economy: oil and fuel. 

The tax base hovers around $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 most of the prime officers in town — the choose, auditor, treasurer, clerk, justice of the peace, county attorney, constable and sheriff — are $100,000 or larger. 

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

However 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 bother before, however nothing like this. In 2016, the state Fee on Judicial Conduct decided Jones did not comply with the legislation by charging steep charges — about $600 to $750 — for lowering tickets together with dashing and marijuana possession all the way down to parking tickets.

The judge denied any involvement in negotiations over tickets and advised the commission he simply authorised the plea deals offered to him. He was issued a public warning and ordered to take 10 hours of additional education.

Medlin beforehand worked as a detective for the San Antonio Police Department, where data present he was issued indefinite suspensions — the division’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 within the again seat, information show. Medlin was reinstated after an appeal. 

Then in 2018, Medlin engaged in another high-speed pursuit after telling dispatchers the driving force “almost ran me over,” information present. However physique and dash digicam 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 videos.

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

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

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

Two ranch fingers also had been arrested on Friday. Cody Williams, 31, was charged with three counts of livestock theft and engaging in organized legal activity, information show. He didn't return a reporter’s phone call.

Jonathon Alvarado, 23, faces one count of theft of livestock, which carries a sentence of up to 10 years in jail. He hung up on a reporter seeking remark.

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