Corrupt judge or not, why shoot him in cold blood, in front of cameras? Then walk out and surrender? If Stines was trying to stop corruption, there are better, LEGAL ways, of which he should be fully aware, that don't involve him throwing two lives away. Makes no sense IMO.
I'm not convinced the sheriff knew there were cameras. I'd bet a paycheck they were installed after the antius of Ben Fields. Given the sensitivity of cameras in a judge's chambers, it was probably the bailiff who was in charge of them and they would probably have been paid for out of the sheriff's budget. But that does not mean he was aware of them.
But yeah, the sheriff could have simply arrested the judge if he were corrupt. To me, and my opinion only, it suggests that if the judge was corrupt, the sheriff was in on it
My theory, without any real evidence is that the judge was getting kickbacks and the sheriff was involved but then got cold feet. Then they made threats against his family to keep him in line.
Please review
https://www.chfs.ky.gov/agencies/dbhdid/Documents/SB 90 Annual Report Final 2023.pdf
It is the annual report for 2023 for the program established un SB 90, the Behavior Health Conditional Discharge Program (BHCDP) in which offenders could have their charges dismissed if they agreed to enter treatment, usually for addiction. Treatment was paid for by insurance or Medicare. There was also hundreds of millions of dollars in funding from the opioid settlement entered into between pharmaceutical companies and several states attorneys-general. The state has awarded $42.9 million in funds from the settlement. Letcher County alone got $21 million in funding for the BHCDP (almost HALF of the statewide total!):
www.ag.ky.gov
Judge Mullins was the district judge that put everyone in that program. (No direct link for this fact but any basic research into the Kentucky judicial system will verify this.) Only District judges have this role. Circuit judges may take over later in the process. Mullins is the only district judge in Letcher county. But even if circuit judges were involved it only potentially includes one other person.
Letcher County was the first to implement the program and put by far the most people into the program. They put 142 through in 2023 according to the annual report linked.
$21,000,000/142 = $147,887 per person in the program from grant funds alone. That does not include anything collected from Medicaid or private insurance! I don't know how much treatment costs but I am sure that amount leaves a lot of room for graft!
I am convinced this is where we need to look! To quote Deep Throat - "Follow the money."
ETA: The US Supreme Court overturned a big part of the opioid settlement on June 28, 2024.
and the FBI began investigation ARC, one of the biggest treatment center operators in Kentucky on 7/30/2024
The KY attorney-general and his deputy had to recuse themselves from any matters rerlated to ARC 5 days before because the owner of ARC made large campaign contributions to them and the governor:
Addiction Recovery Care, or ARC, runs over 30 treatment centers in Kentucky. Now it’s under federal scrutiny.
www.lpm.org
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