Tag: kentucky

Prosecutor defends no prison time for trans daycare molester

The prosecutor who signed off on the plea deal in the case of a transgender daycare worker who sexually abused an infant says he believes the “sentence that the defendant served was appropriate for what could be proven in court.” 

“The defendant pled guilty to sexual misconduct and received a sentence of twelve months,” McCracken County Commonwealth’s attorney Dan Boaz told The Spectator in an exclusive statement. “The defendant served over 300 days in jail, primarily in solitary confinement, prior to entering the guilty plea. As the case developed, there were contradictions as sometimes happens and a plea bargain was entered. As stated, the defendant served over 300 days in jail.

“Ultimately, any plea bargain that is reached is my responsibility and I believe the sentence that the defendant served was appropriate for what could be proven in court.” 

Reduxx first reported on the case involving Maria Childers, a female-identifying male who works at a daycare in Paducah, Kentucky. Childers was accused of molesting a baby while changing her diaper. Childers was arrested in February 2023 based on an anonymous tip to the police claiming that Childers had touched the little girl’s clitoris inappropriately and police interviews with employees at the daycare corroborating the report. A female coworker told police that Childers rubbed the baby’s private area in a “circular motion,” and said, “She likes it. It just made her day.” 

Childers was charged with one count of first-degree sexual abuse of a victim under twelve and three counts of first-degree criminal abuse of a child under twelve. Childers was originally held in solitary confinement at McCracken County Jail on a $100,000 bond, which was reduced to $5,000 after his lawyer, transgender activist Madison Leach, complained that Childers couldn’t access his estrogen treatments. Childers was released in January 2024 and quickly struck a plea deal with prosecutors.

The deal saw the felony charges dropped down to a single misdemeanor count of class A sexual misconduct. Judge Joe Roark sentenced Childers to a twelve-month penalty, but with a conditional discharge for six months. If Childers abides by conditions set by the court, he will serve no time in prison.

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Kentucky GOP bill paves the way for ‘deadly physical force’ against the homeless

Republicans in Kentucky are cooking up new legislation that would pave the way for property owners to deploy “deadly physical force” against homeless people.

Vice reports that the bill, known as the “Safer Kentucky Act,” says that physical force against homeless people is “justifiable” if a property owner believes that criminal trespass, robbery or unlawful camping are occurring on their property.

Additionally, “deadly physical force” can be justified if the property owner believes a homeless person is trying to “dispossess” them of their property.

Lyndon Pryor, the CEO of the Louisville Urban League, tells Vice that the legislation will likely have deadly consequences for the homeless in his state.

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Kentucky Republican Pushes Bill to Make Sex With First Cousin Not Incest

A Kentucky Republican introduced legislation that would amend the state’s law so a person who had sex with their first cousin would no longer be criminally liable for incest, before withdrawing it and claiming an error was made during the drafting process.

House Bill 269, which state Representative Nick Wilson sponsored, was introduced on January 16 to the House Committee on Committees. According to the Kentucky General Assembly website, it would have struck “first cousin from the list of familial relationships” defined as unlawful incest in the state. In a statement sent to Newsweek, Wilson described this as a “mistake” in a wider bill intended to extend legal protection against incest, which he’d withdrawn and refiled leaving the “first cousin” reference in place.

Wilson, then a 27-year-old public defender, first shot to prominence when he won the 37th season of the CBS reality TV show Survivor in 2018, called Survivor: David vs. Goliath, before returning for the 40th season, featuring the winners from previous shows in 2020. In November 2022, Wilson ran unopposed for the 82nd District of the Kentucky House after Republican incumbent Regina Huff retired.

Kentucky law states that a person is guilty of incest if they engage in sexual relations with a person they know to be “his or her parent, child, grandparent, grandchild, great-grandparent, great-grandchild, uncle, aunt, nephew, niece, brother, sister, first cousin, ancestor, or descendent.” The initial amendment introduced by Wilson, if passed, would have removed first cousin from this list.

Both the initial and updated version of Wilson’s bill would also amend Kentucky law on parole for violent offenders to include a person “who has been convicted of incest by sexual contact” within the definition.

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Kentucky Governor Pushes Lawmakers To Approve More Medical Marijuana Qualifying Conditions While Unveiling First Program Rules

The governor of Kentucky is urging lawmakers to significantly expand the state’s medical marijuana law by adding new qualifying conditions as the administration puts forward a series of initial proposed regulations to begin implementing the program.

At a briefing on Thursday, Gov. Andy Beshear (D) announced that two independent advisory groups he appointed have unanimously voted to recommend that the legislature add more than a dozen new conditions to qualify patients for medical cannabis under a law he signed last year.

“This is a crucial step. While the legislation referenced several qualifying conditions, it left others out,” he said, adding that the expanded list includes “very serious conditions that we believe—but more importantly that these medical groups and advisory groups all unanimously agree—should become a part of the program.”

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New Kentucky Bill Would Legalize Marijuana Use, Possession And Home Cultivation—But Not Sales

As Kentucky works to implement a recently passed medical cannabis policy, a lawmaker filed legislation this week that would end all penalties, including arrest, for simple possession and use of recreational marijuana by adults 21 and older. It would also allow adults to grow a small number of cannabis plants at home for personal use. Commercial sales, however, would remain prohibited.

The limited legalization measure, HB 72, was introduced Tuesday by Rep. Nima Kulkarni (D), who this time last year introduced a measure that would have let voters decide whether to legalize use, possession and home cultivation. The lawmaker previously introduced a similar noncommercial legalization proposal for the 2022 legislative session.

“For decades, the failed and irrational War on Drugs has ensured that we have arrested, prosecuted and jailed millions of Americans for low level nonviolent drug offenses,” Kulkarni said a year ago.

Under the new proposal, adults could possess up to an ounce of marijuana in plant form, five grams of cannabinoids derived from hemp or marijuana, products containing 1,000 milligrams or less of delta-8 and delta-9 THC or five or fewer cannabis plants.

Possession above the personal use limit would be considered a Class B misdemeanor, carrying up to 45 days of jail time plus monetary penalties.

In addition to ending penalties for noncommercial possession and cultivation, the newly filed legislation would also prevent marijuana use from being used as grounds to revoke probation, parole or conditional release.

Trafficking penalties, meanwhile—which state law says someone is guilty of “when he knowingly and unlawfully traffics in marijuana”—would apply to people with more than the personal use quantity and less than eight ounces of cannabis. That would be a Class A misdemeanor on the first offense and a Class D felony on second and subsequent offenses. Higher penalties would apply for greater amounts.

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40 human skulls, other bones used as decorations found in Kentucky man’s home, authorities say

Human remains — including dozens of skulls — were found inside a man’s house in Kentucky, according to authorities.

In an affidavit, an agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation noted approximately 40 skulls, as well as femurs, hip bones, and a Harvard Medical School bag, were discovered during a raid at 39-year-old James Nott’s home in Bullitt County Tuesday morning.

The skulls were decorated around the furniture. One skull had a head scarf around it. One skull was located on the mattress where Nott slept. A Harvard Medical School bag was found inside the Residence,” Special Agent Sara J. Cunning noted in the affidavit.

Cunning wrote that authorities also found a slew of weapons, such as an AK-47 rifle, a .38 special, Charter Arms, a revolver, ammunition, grenades, and plates for body armor.

The FBI, along with the Mt. Washington Police Department, executed a warrant in connection with a search for guns and trafficked human remains, which led to Nott’s arrest.

During the search, “an FBI agent asked Nott asked if anyone else was inside the residence,” the document noted. “Nott responded, ‘only my dead friends.'”

Nott, who is a convicted felon, as he was arrested on gun charges in 2011, was also linked to a nationwide trafficking ring in which several suspects were accused of purchasing and selling stolen human remains, some of which were tied back to the Harvard Medical School and a mortuary in Arkansas.

The FBI began looking into Nott after he had chatted with Jeremy Pauley, a man from Pennsylvania — who was also being investigated for his role in the trafficking ring.

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Police Let Their K-9 Maul on the Wrong Guy. They Arrested Him Anyway.

Last year, a police officer sicced his K-9 on Sean Davis as he slept in a wooded area in Covington, Kentucky, mauling his arm and causing severe injuries. Officers had mistaken Davis for a different individual who had allegedly violated a protection order and detained him even after he provided police with his ID. Last month, Davis filed a lawsuit against the officer responsible for Davis’ mauling, claiming that he was subject to unreasonable force, negligence, and battery.

According to the Covington police incident report, on June 8, 2022, police received a call from a woman who said she believed that her violent ex-boyfriend, whom she had a protection order against, was sleeping in a wooded area near a campsite at which she was staying. When police arrived, they found Sean Davis—not the woman’s ex-boyfriend—sleeping in a hammock in the woods. Without warning, a police officer released a K-9 on Davis, which bit his arm and brought him to the ground. While the dog continued to maul Davis’ arm, police got on top of Davis.

According to WCPO, a local news station, body camera footage of the incident shows that officers handcuffed Davis and demanded he identify himself. In the footage, Davis repeatedly gives officers his name, social security number, as well as his photo ID, proving that he was not the person in the protection order. Nonetheless, police kept Davis handcuffed for 37 minutes. 

“Try to scoot your butt straight over so you don’t get blood all over the car,” one officer told Davis as he directed him to get inside the police vehicle. “Try to keep that arm off the seat.”

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Kentucky’s Risky Million-Dollar Bet to Fight the Opioid Crisis With Psychedelics

On the steps of the state capitol building in Frankfort on May 31, the Kentucky Opioid Abatement Advisory Commission (KYOAAC) announced the launch of a new state-funded program that would aim to help stem the damage and destruction wrought by the ongoing opioid crisis that has devastated the lives of millions and led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands. But the new initiative wasn’t simply to throw more money and resources into tried-and-true public health programs.

Instead, the commission announced it was going to explore allocating tens of millions of dollars toward studying and promoting the use of the controversial, plant-based hallucinogen ibogaine in psychedelic-assisted therapy to combat the opioid crisis, as well as treat a host of other mental health issues. The goal is to make Kentucky the first state in the nation to pursue a clinical program around ibogaine—currently legal only in Mexico and New Zealand.

“This administration recognizes that the opioid epidemic is one of the most tragic and visible symptoms of spiritual affliction which pervades our society,” Bryan Hubbard, chairman and executive director of KYOCC, told The Daily Beast. “We must do better. We must explore every possible avenue which holds the potential for improvement.”

The news was lauded by advocates of psychedelic-assisted therapy, an increasingly popular form of mental health treatment.

“With yesterday’s announcement, Kentucky is taking a bold leadership role to addressing the opioid epidemic,” Jesse MacLachalan, state policy and advocacy coordinator for Reason For Hope, a psychedelic therapy advocacy nonprofit, told The Daily Beast. “This is a prudent and measured approach to explore innovative solutions to the greatest addiction crisis our country has experienced in its history. We applaud the Bluegrass State for the example they are setting for states across the country.”

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Director’s Cut: ‘The Kentucky Derby Is Decadent and Depraved,’ by Hunter S. Thompson

The telephone rang at Warren Hinckle’s San Francisco home at about 3:30 in the morning on Wednesday, April 29, 1970. When Hinckle picked up the receiver, he heard the unmistakable voice of Hunter S. Thompson, calling from Aspen, proclaiming, “Goddammit, Scanlan’s has to cover the Derby. It’s important.”

The pitch, even at the late hour and the late date (barely 72 hours before the race itself), was fairly irresistible.1 Send Thompson, still finding his distinctive voice in countercultural journalism, to his hometown of Louisville to cover the drunken, debauched scene at Churchill Downs for Scanlan‘s, the anti-establishment (some would say subversive) monthly magazine for which Hinckle was co-editor.

Hinckle agreed on the spot, booked Thompson a ticket, wired him expense money, and then set about finding an artist to provide illustrations for the story. Originally, he had hoped to send a photographer to shoot the event, but after haggling with Thompson, he instead hired the English illustrator Ralph Steadman.2

It would prove to be a memorable, historic weekend. And it began, as so many of Thompson’s adventures would, with drinks at a bar.

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Louisville Bank Shooter Left Behind Manifesto Detailing 3 Reasons for Rampage: Report

It is now reported that Louisville bank shooter Connor Sturgeon left a disturbing manifesto outlining three key reasons for his killing spree that left five coworkers dead.

The 25-year-old wrote a 13-page screed describing his motives for gunning down his colleagues during their morning conference at the Old National Bank, “a massacre he captured on a deranged Instagram live stream,” the New York Post reported.

The murderer’s treatise reportedly lists three principle goals that served as motivation for the murder spree, addressed here in no particular order.

One was suicide. Sturgeon could easily have achieved this goal without killing anyone else, but he did reportedly list suicide as one of his three motives.

A second goal was to raise awareness regarding mental health issues in America. Sturgeon dealt with depression and anxiety and was taking medication.

A third goal communicated by Sturgeon was to demonstrate how easy it is to purchase a gun in Kentucky.

Observers have noted that Sturgeon was aware that he was about to be fired from the bank, but the veracity of that report is now disputed.

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