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 judge, 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 within the least populated county in the continental United States, is going through three felony counts of livestock theft and one count of engaging in criminal activity, accused of gathering up and promoting stray cattle, authorities stated. 

Jones, the scion of a robust 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, data present. He didn't return telephone calls seeking remark. 

Authorities also arrested former Loving County deputy Leroy Medlin Jr., 35, on one count of participating in criminal activity — a second-degree felony that carries a most sentence of 20 years. Medlin didn't return telephone 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, offered few specifics concerning the alleged crime. Commissioned via the Texas Department of Public Security, the affiliation has “special rangers” —  licensed peace officers — who investigate livestock theft and different agriculture crimes. 

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

The idea that the decide — who's paid $133,294 yearly — would get picked up for cattle rustling was just an excessive amount of 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. And then to threat actual bother for it? It’s just asinine to me.”

Word of the arrests unfold faster than a prairie hearth with a tailwind by means of this West Texas county, inhabitants 57 as of the last 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 reside there board the bus in the only city, Mentone (population 22), and travel about 35 miles each morning and afternoon to attend college.

For many years, a handful of prominent households in Loving County have feuded bitterly for management of the local authorities, with the Joneses lastly largely popping out forward. Skeet Jones has served because the judge for greater than 15 years. His sister is the county clerk. His cousin’s husband is the county attorney. His nephew is the constable. 

But some not too long ago elected county officials have been butting heads with the Joneses and their allies, making for colorful commissioner’s courtroom meetings and a much-anticipated November election. 

And blood is no longer holding the Jones family 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 whatever he wants every time he wants.  Even the feeling of self-righteousness. That he can do no unsuitable.” 

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

However he presided over a period of unprecedented growth, as fracking boomed within the Permian Basin, feeding money into the county’s coffers. The parched landscape is dotted with massive fuel plants, water plants and salt water disposal programs. Most of the surviving working ranches have “frac pads” for horizontally drilled wells that lower by the caliche and bedrock to free up the lifeblood for Loving County’s economic system: oil and fuel. 

The tax base hovers around $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 many of the high officers on the town — the decide, auditor, treasurer, clerk, justice of the peace, county attorney, constable and sheriff — are $100,000 or larger. 

Jones’ father, Elgin “Punk” Jones, and mom, Mary Belle Jones, began the P&M Jones Ranch in 1953, settling right into a wood-frame home with no working water. “When I first came to Mentone in 1953, it was quite a shock,” Mary Belle Jones told the Texas Month-to-month in 1997. “I mentioned to my husband, ‘Punk, how lengthy are we going to dwell 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 well field that feeds Mentone. 

Skeet Jones has gotten into trouble earlier than, but nothing like this. In 2016, the state Fee on Judicial Conduct decided Jones failed to follow the legislation by charging steep charges — about $600 to $750 — for lowering tickets together with rushing and marijuana possession right down to parking tickets.

The judge denied any involvement in negotiations over tickets and advised the commission he simply approved 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 Division, the place data present he was issued indefinite suspensions — the division’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 within 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. However physique and dash digicam footage contradicted Medlin’s account, in accordance with inner affairs experiences. He appealed again, telling supervisors he felt threatened, even if 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, data present. 

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 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 engaging in organized criminal exercise, information show. He did not return a reporter’s cellphone name.

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 seeking remark.

In addition to the choose, Medlin, Williams and Alvarado posted bond and had been released from jail.