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 choose, a former sheriff’s deputy and two ranch fingers on considered one of Texas’ oldest crimes — cattle theft. 

Choose Skeet Jones, 71, the top 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 depend of partaking in prison exercise, accused of gathering up and promoting stray cattle, authorities stated. 

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 launched on $20,000 bond, data show. He did not return cellphone calls looking for comment. 

Authorities also arrested former Loving County deputy Leroy Medlin Jr., 35, on one rely of participating in criminal activity — 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're being targeted,” she wrote, “at full power.” 

Officers with the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association, the lead agency on the case, provided few specifics concerning the alleged crime. Commissioned by way of the Texas Division of Public Safety, the affiliation has “special rangers” —  licensed peace officers — who examine livestock theft and different agriculture crimes. 

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

The concept that the choose — who is 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 prior to now.

“You possibly can’t make this shit up,” she stated. “It’s a pain in the ass to spherical up cattle and take them to market. And then to threat actual trouble for it? It’s just asinine to me.”

Phrase of the arrests unfold sooner than a prairie fire with a tailwind by way of this West Texas county, population 57 as of the last U.S. Census Bureau estimate. Unfold over 671 square miles of mesquite-studded desert, Loving County has no faculty, no church, no grocery retailer and no financial institution. The few children who live there board the bus in the only town, Mentone (population 22), and travel about 35 miles each morning and afternoon to attend school.

For decades, a handful of prominent families in Loving County have feuded bitterly for management of the native authorities, with the Joneses lastly largely popping out ahead. Skeet Jones has served as the choose 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 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 no longer holding the Jones family together. 

“He’s had free reign for all the time since he’s been the choose,” said 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 whatever he needs each time he needs.  Even the feeling of self-righteousness. That he can do no unsuitable.” 

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

However he presided over a interval of unprecedented growth, as fracking boomed within the Permian Basin, feeding money into the county’s coffers. The parched landscape is dotted with huge fuel vegetation, water plants and salt water disposal methods. Lots of the surviving working ranches have “frac pads” for horizontally drilled wells that lower by the caliche and bedrock to liberate the lifeblood for Loving County’s economy: oil and gas. 

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

The salaries for most of the high officers on the town — the choose, auditor, treasurer, clerk, justice of the peace, county lawyer, constable and sheriff — are $100,000 or greater. 

Jones’ father, Elgin “Punk” Jones, and mom, Mary Belle Jones, started the P&M Jones Ranch in 1953, settling right into a wood-frame house with no working water. “After I first got here to Mentone in 1953, it was fairly a shock,” Mary Belle Jones told the Texas Month-to-month in 1997. “I mentioned to my husband, ‘Punk, how long are we going to dwell on this godforsaken place?’” 

But she got here to like 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 discipline that feeds Mentone. 

Skeet Jones has gotten into trouble before, but nothing like this. In 2016, the state Fee on Judicial Conduct determined Jones didn't comply with the regulation by charging steep fees — about $600 to $750 — for decreasing tickets including speeding and marijuana possession right down to parking tickets.

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

Medlin previously worked as a detective for the San Antonio Police Department, where records show he was issued indefinite suspensions — the division’s equivalent of being fired — 3 times. 

In 2015, he was positioned on indefinite suspension for a 100-plus mph pursuit of a driver who had a toddler in the again seat, records show. Medlin was reinstated after an enchantment. 

Then in 2018, Medlin engaged in another high-speed pursuit after telling dispatchers the driver “almost ran me over,” records show. But body and sprint digital camera footage contradicted Medlin’s account, in line with inside affairs reviews. 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 decided he issued tickets for violations he didn’t witness, information show. 

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

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

Two ranch palms also have been arrested on Friday. Cody Williams, 31, was charged with three counts of livestock theft and fascinating in organized criminal activity, records show. He did not return a reporter’s telephone name.

Jonathon Alvarado, 23, faces one count of theft of livestock, which carries a sentence of up to 10 years in prison. He hung up on a reporter searching for comment.

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