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 decide, a former sheriff’s deputy and two ranch palms on one in all Texas’ oldest crimes — cattle theft. 

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

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

Authorities additionally arrested former Loving County deputy Leroy Medlin Jr., 35, on one depend of participating in criminal exercise — a second-degree felony that carries a most sentence of 20 years. Medlin did not return telephone calls, but his spouse sent an e mail that questioned the motives behind the arrests. “We are being targeted,” she wrote, “at full power.” 

Officials with the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Affiliation, the lead company on the case, provided few specifics in regards to the alleged crime. Commissioned by the Texas Department of Public Security, the association has “special rangers” —  certified 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 costs are possible.

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

“You can’t make this shit up,” she said. “It’s a pain in the ass to spherical up cattle and take them to market. After which to threat actual hassle for it? It’s just asinine to me.”

Word of the arrests unfold quicker than a prairie fireplace with a tailwind by means of this West Texas county, population 57 as of the last U.S. Census Bureau estimate. Spread over 671 sq. miles of mesquite-studded desert, Loving County has no college, no church, no grocery retailer and no financial institution. The few youngsters who reside 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 control of the native authorities, with the Joneses lastly largely popping out ahead. Skeet Jones has served because the decide for greater 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 officers have been butting heads with the Joneses and their allies, making for colourful commissioner’s courtroom conferences and a much-anticipated November election. 

And blood is now not holding the Jones family together. 

“He’s had free reign for your complete time since he’s been the decide,” stated 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 at any time when he wants.  Even the feeling of self-righteousness. That he can do no mistaken.” 

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

However he presided over a period of unprecedented progress, as fracking boomed in the Permian Basin, feeding cash into the county’s coffers. The parched landscape is dotted with large gas crops, water plants and salt water disposal programs. Most of the surviving working ranches have “frac pads” for horizontally drilled wells that lower by means of the caliche and bedrock to liberate the lifeblood for Loving County’s economic system: oil and gasoline. 

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

The salaries for lots of the prime officers in town — the judge, auditor, treasurer, clerk, justice of the peace, county lawyer, 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 into a wood-frame home with no working water. “Once I first got here to Mentone in 1953, it was fairly a shock,” Mary Belle Jones informed the Texas Monthly in 1997. “I mentioned to my husband, ‘Punk, how lengthy are we going to stay on this godforsaken place?’” 

But she came 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 effectively area that feeds Mentone. 

Skeet Jones has gotten into bother earlier than, but nothing like this. In 2016, the state Commission on Judicial Conduct determined Jones didn't follow the regulation by charging steep fees — about $600 to $750 — for lowering tickets including rushing and marijuana possession all the way down to parking tickets.

The decide denied any involvement in negotiations over tickets and advised the fee he just accredited the plea offers presented to him. He was issued a public warning and ordered to take 10 hours of extra schooling.

Medlin previously worked as a detective for the San Antonio Police Department, where data present he was issued indefinite suspensions — the department’s equal of being fired — three times. 

In 2015, he was positioned on indefinite suspension for a 100-plus mph pursuit of a driver who had a toddler within the back seat, information present. Medlin was reinstated after an appeal. 

Then in 2018, Medlin engaged in another high-speed pursuit after telling dispatchers the driver “virtually ran me over,” information present. However body and dash digicam footage contradicted Medlin’s account, in line with inner affairs stories. He appealed once more, telling supervisors he felt threatened, even when it wasn’t evident from the videos.

He was later issued one other indefinite suspension after supervisors decided he issued tickets for violations he didn’t witness, records show. 

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

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

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

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

Along with the judge, Medlin, Williams and Alvarado posted bond and had been launched from jail.