Residents of a small Appalachian town rallied Friday to confront shootings involving two of their most prominent citizens: a judge who was shot dead in his courtroom and a local sheriff charged with murder.
“It’s very sad. I just hate it,” said Mike Watts, Letcher County Clerk of Court. “They’re both my friends. I’ve worked with both of them for years.”
According to Kentucky State Police, a preliminary investigation indicates that Letcher County Sheriff Sean “Mickey” Stines shot District Judge Kevin Mullins multiple times after an altercation inside the courthouse.
Mullins, 54, who had been a judge for 15 years, died at the scene and Steens, 43, turned himself in without incident. He was charged with first-degree murder.
The fatal shooting shocked the incorporated town of Whitesburg, the county seat of about 1,700 people, 145 miles southeast of Lexington.
Watts said he saw Mullins and Stines shortly before noon Thursday, about three hours before the shooting, when he walked into the judge’s office and asked her to sign some paperwork. Mullins and Stines were willing to go to lunch together, Watts said.
It seemed like a normal interaction, except Steens seemed calmer than usual. Watt said he thought the pair had a good working relationship and knew nothing that would lead to the violent confrontation. Watts said Steens was a bailiff in Mullins’ courtroom for years before becoming sheriff.
Watts, who was on the next floor of the courthouse, never heard the shots and only found out when his son called to say there was an “active shooter” in the courthouse.
The main question is what can provoke a shooting.
Stines was fired Monday following a lawsuit filed by two women, one of whom alleged the deputy forced her to have sex in Mullins’ cell for six months to remain incarcerated. The suit accuses the sheriff of “willful neglect in failing to train and supervise the deputy.”
Former sheriff’s deputy Ben Fields pleaded guilty to raping an inmate while he was under house arrest. Fields was sentenced earlier this year to six months in prison, followed by 6.5 years of probation, for rape, indecency, perjury and tampering with the Mountain Eagle inmate monitoring device. reportedThree charges against the second woman, now dead, were dismissed.
Steens fired Fields, who replaced Mullins as sheriff, for “misconduct” after the case in 2022, the Courier Journal reports. reported on time.
Kentucky attorney General Russell Coleman said his office will work with a federal prosecutor from the region as special prosecutors on the criminal case. “We will investigate thoroughly and seek justice,” Coleman said on social media.
Kentucky Supreme Court Chief Justice Lawrence B. VanMeter said he was “shocked by this act of violence” and that the judicial system was “shocked by the news.”
Jessica Sloan, a distant relative of Steens and a lifelong Letcher County resident, said she was shocked when she heard the news. She was at the dollar store with her cousin when he told her Mullins had been shot.
“Did I really say, ‘Is he okay?’ And he said, ‘No, he’s dead,’” she said, and I got really emotional and started praying.”
He described Stines as a family man who was close to his children and who worked to get fentanyl and methamphetamine off the streets of the community and help people dealing with substance use disorders.
The Letcher County Executive Court closed the county courthouse on Friday.
It is not known whether Steens has an attorney. State police referred requests to a spokesman, who did not immediately respond to an email.
Mullins served as a district judge in Letcher County because he was appointed by then-Gov. Steve Beshear, who was elected in 2009 and the following year.
Schreiner and Lowan write for The Associated Press.
