Why did Sheriff Mickey Stines shoot Judge Kevin D. Mullins? That’s the question dominating Letcher County, Kentucky, since September of 2024, when the shocking incident occurred.
Almost immediately rumors began swirling speculating exactly what was behind the crime. We know that Mullins and Stines ate lunch together the day of Mullins’s death. And several other people were in attendance at the business lunch, and one overheard Mullins ask Stines if they needed to meet privately in his chambers. Surveillance video shows Stines, moments before the shooting, using his phone to call someone, then using Mullins’s phone. Both calls were made to Stines’s daughter, and the daughter’s phone number was saved on the judge’s phone.
According to Stines’s attorney Jeremy Bartley, misconduct allegations against former deputy Ben Fields and Mullins are “going to be crucial” in Stines’s defense — he has pleaded not guilty to murder of a public official. Three days before Mullins’s death Stines gave a deposition in a civil case brought by Sabrina Adkins alleging women under house arrest were extorted for sexual favors in exchange for more lenient treatment. According to the complaint in that case, it all happened in Mullins’s chambers. Adkins’s attorney said “It’s like they were running a brothel out of that courtroom.”
Now more people are coming forward with eye-popping stories of what happened behind the scenes in Letcher County. Sarah Davis, a former deputy jailer at Letcher County Jail, told NewsNation’s Banfield the stories she heard about officials using their positions to have sex with inmates were “nasty and sickening.” Davis said she was aware of Mullins having sex with inmate, “That’s kind of the thing that everybody in the county knows, but it was confirmed to me after working in the jail, especially after being invited to a party myself.” It was Mullins himself tht Davis says invited her to a sex party, though she declined the invitation.
My ex coworkers, they come out and even ask me now not to mention it, they’ve, even them participating in the parties themselves. I had had another one ask me to go to another one of Mullins’ get-togethers, and I declined it again because it’s one of those things. I was raised better than that. You know what I mean? If you know, you know in the county, everybody knows. They might not speak on it, they might not want to be involved in it because of the fear of retaliation because there’s so many people that has come out and spoke out about what Judge Mullins has done, even if we’re afraid to speak up on it, we need to, because, is this what we want for our next generation? Is that what we want for our kids, what we’re going through, what our past people have gone through? Do we want that for them? And no, I don’t want that for my daughter. I don’t want that for my son. I want better for them. I want an actual community that’s not based on if you got money and know people, and if you’re willing to get on your knees or on your back. It’s sickening. And I want better for them.
Tya Adams is also talking about her experience at these sex parties. As detailed by NewsNation, Adams said Mullins “started introducing me to his friends, the other lawyers, and we would do sex parties and perform shows and have sex with them for money, things like that.” Asked if she felt she could say no to these encounters, Adams said, “No, no, and he, they would make sure to make you feel as small and degraded and belittled as possible to take your power away, you know?”
Adams continued, “It was consensual. But it was the thing that we were so young, and then they used it against us and to destroy our lives later.” And keeping party about the sex parties was expected, “That was just a given,” she said. “And, who would believe it anyway? Because the whole town was doing it. Nobody cares. They’re all swingers. It’s all a big party to them. It was just so normal.”
Davis believes the death of Mullins will lead to many revelations about the abuses of power in the town. Asked what she thought when he heard of the shooting, “A lot of corruption was going to come out. I knew that this was going to be, that was going to be the beginning to set everything aside to make people come in and people’s voices finally be heard. Because even I believe that the sheriff, he either knew something or something was going on that he knew about that we all might not know about, but he was something to protect us.”
Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter @Kathryn1 or Mastodon @Kathryn1@mastodon.social.
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