WHITESBURG, KY – A sheriff from a county in rural eastern Kentucky walked into the courthouse and “shot and killed a district judge in his chambers after an argument,” according to the police, reported Emmett Linder and Orlando Mayorquin from The New York Times last week.
On Thursday evening at a news conference, Trooper Matt Gayheart of the Kentucky State Police stated 43-year-old Mickey Stines, sheriff of Letcher County, was charged with first-degree murder after turning himself in following the shooting, reported Linder and Mayorquin.
“The shooting happened at about 2:55 p.m. inside the Letcher County Courthouse in Whitesburg, a city in southeastern Kentucky,” the Times wrote, adding Trooper Gayheart noted the sheriff had been cooperative with investigators after being taken to a local jail.
“This community is small in nature, and we’re all shook,’ the trooper said,” Linder and Mayorquin from the NY Times wrote, adding Trooper Gayheart revealed Judge Mullins, 54, was pronounced dead at the scene and had suffered various gunshot wounds.
“Investigators were interviewing witnesses who were in the building at the time of the shooting. The police were still trying to determine what had led up to the argument,” the Times reported.
Gov. Andy Beshear of Kentucky took to social media to say that he was aware of the shooting that occurred, writing, “There is far too much violence in this world, and I pray there is a path to a better tomorrow.”
Linder and Mayorqui reported this shooting created concerns for the community about an active shooter and led to lockdowns in surrounding schools. Later, the police informed the public there was no threat and the shooting had been an isolated incident.
Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman said his office would work alongside local officials to investigate and also prosecute this case—Chief Justice Laurence B. VanMeter of the Kentucky Supreme Court said on Thursday night that he was ‘shocked by this act of violence, and the court system is shaken by this news.’ The courthouse where the shooting took place is closed until further notice.”
The residents of Letcher County were stunned by the news. Letcher County is approximately 110 miles southeast of Lexington with about 12,500 reside there, the Times said.
According to Ballotpedia, Judge Mullins had been elected in 2010 by the county residents and had been as of recently been “appointed to a state judicial commission on mental health.”
Stines, also known as Shawn M. Stines, was first elected sheriff in 2018 and was then re-elected in 2022. He was a named defendant in two federal cases, the Times noted.
Linder and Mayorqui explained, “In 2020, a judge dismissed a lawsuit brought by a former sheriff’s office employee who claimed Mr. Stines eliminated her job upon taking office in 2019 because she had expressed support for another candidate for sheriff.”
Earlier this month, Stines had participated in a deposition for an ongoing case that pertained to a former sheriff deputy who was accused of sexually abusing an inmate. Stines fired the deputy, Ben Fields, not long after the lawsuit was filed in 2022,” said the Times’ Linder and Mayorqui.
Fields, the suit alleged, coerced the inmate late at night in the Letcher County Courthouse to perform sexual acts. Fields is now serving a five-year sentence in state prison after being convicted on charges, said the Times.
The Times’ Linder and Mayorqui noted Sheriff Stines was “named as a defendant in the lawsuit because he was accused of ‘deliberate indifference in failing to adequately train and supervise’ Mr. Fields.”
