Former Kansas police chief who led Marion County Record raid charged with felony

TOPEKA, Kan. – A former Kansas police chief who led a raid last year on a weekly newspaper has been charged with obstruction of justice and accused of persuading a potential witness to withhold information from authorities as they investigated. late his behavior.

The single charge against former Marion Police Chief Gideon Cody alleges that he knowingly or intentionally influenced a witness to withhold information on the day of the raid on the Marion County Register and its publisher’s home or sometime within six days of the following.

The charge was filed Monday in state district court in Marion County and is no longer specific to Cody’s alleged conduct.

The raid sparked a national debate about press freedom focused on Marion, a town of about 1,900 people nestled among prairie hills about 150 miles southwest of Kansas City, Missouri.

Also, newspaper publisher Eric Meyer’s mother, who co-owned the paper and lived with him, died the next day of a heart attack, which he blames on the stress of the raid.

Meyer said last week that authorities appear to be making Cody the “fall guy” for the raid when multiple officials were involved.

He said Tuesday that he doubts the criminal case will ultimately be resolved through a plea deal so Cody doesn’t have to face a trial that would more fully reveal details about the raid.

“We’re just basic journalists here,” he said. “We want the whole story. We don’t want any part of it.”

A report by two special prosecutors last week referred to text messages between Cody and a local business owner after the raid.

The business owner has said Cody asked her to delete text messages between them, fearing people might get the wrong idea about their relationship, which she said was professional and platonic.

The Associated Press left a message seeking comment at a possible cellphone number for Cody, and it was not immediately returned Tuesday.

Attorneys representing Cody in a federal lawsuit over the raid are not representing him in the criminal case and did not immediately know who was representing him.

Cody justified the Aug. 11, 2023, raid by saying he had evidence that Meyer, the newspaper and one of its reporters, Phyllis Zorn, had committed identity theft or other computer crimes in verifying the authenticity of a copy of the business owner’s state ID. . minutes given to the newspaper by an acquaintance.

The business owner was seeking Marion City Council approval for a liquor license, and records showed she had been driving without a valid license for years. However, her license was later reinstated.

The prosecutors’ report concluded that no crime had been committed by Meyer, Zorn or the newspaper and that Cody reached the wrong conclusion about their conduct due to a poor investigation.

Zorn used the information he had to legally search an online state database using her name.

Prosecutors also said police search warrants signed by a judge contained inaccurate information due to “inadequate investigation” and were not legally justified. But prosecutors said they could not show Cody had deliberately misled the judge.

The obstruction of justice charge against Cody was brought by one of the special prosecutors, Barry Wilkerson, the chief prosecutor in Riley County in northeastern Kansas.

The other special prosecutor is Marc Bennett, the district attorney in Sedgwick County, home to the state’s largest city, Wichita.

A conviction for a first-time offender can be punishable by up to nine months in prison, although under state sentencing guidelines, the typical sentence is 18 months or less of probation.

The Record’s publishing company and current and former staff have filed four federal lawsuits against Cody and other former and current local officials.

The publishing company’s lawsuit includes a wrongful death claim and suggests total damages exceed $10 million. The city’s current annual budget is about $9.5 million.

The publishing company also filed an open records lawsuit last month in state district court, seeking to compel the city to hand over the texts to police and other local officials.

CCTV footage of the 2023 police raid on the publisher’s home shows the publisher’s 98-year-old mother, Joan Meyer, visibly upset and telling officers, “Get out of my house!”

Prosecutors said they could not charge Cody or other officers involved in the raid with her death because there was no evidence they believed the raid posed a risk to her life.

Prosecutors also said there was no “significant deviation” from how officers have served other search warrants in the past. However, Eric Meyer said seven officers came to the home to search.

“A few weeks ago, they raided the home of a suspected child rapist who was known to have guns in his home, and they only sent two police officers for that,” he said.