BREAKING NEWS
UPDATED AFTER PRINT DEADLINE
Two weeks after police searched the
Both confirmed that documents Marion police supposedly were looking for in the raid came from them, not from any attempt at identity theft.
Marion Police Chief Gideon Cody, who led the illegal raid Aug. 11 on the
“He thinks he’s above everyone,” the former detective said. “I’ve known him since he was brand spanking new. I worked with and for him.”
Although Marion police and the sheriff’s office were ordered Aug. 16 to return items seized during illegal raids Aug. 11 at the
Pam Maag has, for a while now, expected Kansas Bureau of Investigation agents or Marion County sheriff’s deputies to show up at her door on Upland Rd.
No one from law enforcement has arrived to search her home at Marion County Park and Lake for computers or cell phones.
Before City Administrator Brogan Jones emailed Mayor David Mayfield on Aug. 4 to tell him police wouldn’t follow up, Chief Gideon Cody met with Mayfield to say he would investigate the source of allegations that a Marion restaurateur who sells liquor did not have a driver’s license because of a past drunken driving conviction.
“He wanted to inform me that he was doing a criminal investigation, and it was going to involve a council person,” Mayfield told a Record reporter in Jones’s office.
“Cody has a shiny exterior, but when you dig deeper, it’s not very pretty.”
That’s what a Kansas City police officer said when asked by a Record reporter in April what he would tell Marion City Council members about Gideon Cody, then a candidate for top cop.
Marion Vice Mayor Ruth Herbel pushed to amend Monday’s city council agenda to include for the first time discussion about planned expenditures in next year’s budget.
Herbel led the meeting because Mayor David Mayfield was out of town.
A Butler County jailer who resigned as Burns police chief eight days earlier was charged Aug. 16 in Butler County District Court with 13 counts of sexual exploitation of a child.
According to the complaint filed against Joel Justice Womochil, 38, El Dorado, he had 13 brief videos on his computer that showed children who appeared to be younger than 10 years old engaged in sexually explicit conduct.
Florence resident Joe Box made his unhappiness over being outbid by Mayor Bob Gayle at an Aug. 10 tax sale clear when he showed up Monday to speak to city council members.
Gayle purchased five Florence properties at the sale. Only one might be rehabilitated. The others will be demolished, council member Matt Williams said.
Kansas House minority leader Vic Miller and District 102 Rep. Jason Probst introduced legislation Tuesday stemming directly from an illegal Aug. 11 raid on the Marion County Record.
They have asked for legislation to be written that would prevent magistrates from signing search warrants.
When Record reporter Phyllis Zorn dropped by the Marion Police Department on a recent Monday, Chief Gideon Cody invited her back to his office.
He told Zorn she should start a newspaper to compete with her current employer, Zorn said.
County Attorney Joel Ensey would not answer questions this week regarding his role in Aug. 11 raids on the Marion County Record, the home of its owners, and the home of Marion Vice Mayor Ruth Herbel.
Ensey claimed that answering questions would violate attorney rules because of “ongoing investigation and pending litigation.”
Video released Monday shows how incensed 98-year-old Marion County Record co-owner Joan Meyer became during a nearly two-hour search of her home Aug. 11 by Marion police and Marion County sheriff’s deputies.
“Don’t you touch any of that stuff! This is my house! You a**hole,” she scolded police. “Get out of my house! I don’t want you in my house! Stand outside that door. I don’t want you in my house!”
Two days before his mother’s funeral, Marion County Record editor and publisher Eric Meyer asked whether full-time employees — all women — could gather ’round.
“I need some womanly advice,” he said.
Services for Jessica Ann Pawloski Alexander, 43, Hillsboro, who died Wednesday as Ascenscion Via Christi St. Francis Hospital in Wichita, will be 10 a.m. Friday at First Mennonite Church, Hillsboro.
Pastor Norma Duerksen will officiate. Relatives will receive friends an hour before the service at the church.
Services for Beverly Jean Morgan, 76, who died Aug. 13 at St. Luke Living Center in Marion, will be 10 a.m. Sept. 2 at Burns Cornerstone Bible Church, Burns.
Pastor Jim Helzer will officiate.
Services for former Marion resident Jimmie Dean Parrack, 88, who died July 11 in Richardson, Texas, were Monday.
He was born July 24, 1934. to Marion Ellsworth and Ethel Lucille (Little) Parrack in Covington, Oklahoma.
No services are planned for Darryl William Rhodes, 72, Wichita, who died Saturday.
Born Nov. 15, 1950, in Denver to WilliamM. and Darlene (Davis) Rhodes, he grew up on a farm in Colorado and in 1972 graduated from Colorado State University with a bachelor’s degree in agri-business.
IN MEMORIAM:
Ruth Heinrichs
Broadcasts about these fire and ambulance calls were monitored this past week by the newspaper:
AUG. 15
The whole world quite literally was watching Monday night. Even the Voice of America was there to tell its global audience how, if citizens aren’t on their guard, rights can be trampled not just in developing countries but in the great bastion of democracy itself.
When video cameras came on, however, Marion’s city council blinked. The mayor was absent — not, as he claimed, for the first time, either. The police chief , who rarely ventures out of his office except to exercise and raid newspaper offices, didn’t show. The city attorney scooted out before citizens could speak. And everyone in attendance was warned — not just orally but in bold, red, all capital letters, followed by 47 exclamation points — that if they wanted to ask why police thought it necessary to lead a coordinated raid on two homes and a newspaper office much as if they were attacking a jaywalker with a tank, the council wasn’t going to answer.
ANOTHER DAY IN THE COUNTRY:
The week that wasLETTERS:
First Amendment,
Genius by design?,
Debating all sides,
Hiding
Spring Valley Mennonite Church, which claims the title of oldest Mennonite church in Kansas, is celebrating its 150th anniversary this year.
The church, three miles south and two miles east of Canton at 29th and Frontier Rds. in McPherson County, was founded in 1873 when Bishop Daniel Brundage organized a congregation of Mennonite homesteaders who had migrated from eastern states.
A concert Sept. 5 will raise money to support Hillsboro Senior Center.
Featured will be baritone Michael Nansel, who is married to Hillsboro High School graduate Tonja Seibel.
MEMORIES:
15,
30,
45,
60,
75,
110,
145 years ago
Are you having trouble coping with the death of a loved one? Do you need support as a caregiver? Are you feeling lonely or isolated?
These are some of the issues St. Luke Hospital seeks to address with a program called Senior Life Solutions.