A memorial in the parking lot of the Hardin County Justice Center, where Erica Riley and her mother Janet Rylee were killed on their way to a domestic violence hearing. Erica Riley was seeking protection from the man who shot them and later killed himself. The photo was taken Sept. 22, 2024 in Elizabethtown. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Austin Anthony)

If you or someone you know has experienced domestic violence, call the National Sexual Assault Telephone Hotline at 1-800-656-4673. Call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233. You can also contact any of Kentucky’s 15 domestic violence programs.?

This story also discusses suicide. The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is 988.?

Georgia Hensley feels like she’s been “screaming in a padded room” for too long about gaps in the way Kentucky protects survivors of domestic and intimate partner violence.?

Now that two women are dead in her town, “suddenly there’s two or three people at the tiny window on the door” listening to those concerns, said Hensley, the CEO of SpringHaven, which helps survivors of intimate partner violence in Kentucky’s Lincoln Trail District.?

“It truly has been like begging for help and no one was listening … and that’s abhorrent,” Hensley said. “It should not take the death of a woman and her mother and the severe injury of her father for all of us to begin talking about the issues that we needed to be discussing anyway.”?

A month after a woman and her mother were gunned down in the parking lot of the courthouse in Elizabethtown on the day of her emergency protective order (EPO) hearing, advocates who work to end intimate partner violence told the Lantern the state can and should do more to protect survivors.?

That includes, they say, passing a Crisis Aversion and Rights Retention Orders (CARR) bill, which would establish a process for temporarily removing guns from people at risk of hurting themselves or others. In other words, a “red flag” law.?

In 1994, Congress barred anyone who is subject to a domestic violence protective order — or who has been convicted of the crime of domestic violence — from possessing or buying a gun or ammunition. The United States Supreme Court upheld that law this year, saying it is constitutional to disarm a person in those circumstances.?

Kentucky is not among the 32 states that have enacted their own laws and protocols to separate domestic abusers from guns, even temporarily. As a result, protection for victims varies across the state, said Darlene Thomas, the executive director of GreenHouse17, a Fayette County-based nonprofit working to end intimate partner violence.?

The violent deaths in Elizabethtown, Hensley says, should spur action.?

“The community is enraged,” she said. “Citizens are enraged. And our officials need to be listening.”??

What happened in Elizabethtown???

In early August, Erica Riley asked the court system to protect her from a man with whom, police say, she’d had a relationship.?

A judge granted her request, issuing an emergency protective order (EPO) on Aug. 8 and scheduling a hearing to consider extending the order.?

On the morning of the hearing, Aug. 19, Riley arrived at the Elizabethtown courthouse, family by her side.?

The man in question, Christopher Elder, 46, was there too.?

Jeremy Thompson, the Elizabethtown police chief, said that Elder shot Riley and two others in an “ambush type style” in the parking lot right before 9 a.m., when the hearing was scheduled.?

Riley died there, police say, the day before she was to turn 38.?

Her mother, Janet, later died at the hospital, police say. Erica Riley’s father was also injured and hospitalized, but has since been released, according to a police spokesman.??

Within hours of the shooting, police publicly named Elder as their suspect. He led police on a multi-county, 100-mile car chase. After a standoff in a parking lot in Christian County with at least nine first responder agencies, he shot himself at 11:15 CST, according to Kentucky State Police.?

Elder was airlifted to Vanderbilt Hospital and died that day.?

Domestic violence, guns a lethal combination

While the Elizabethtown shooting got widespread attention, the key details aren’t uncommon.?

The majority of murder-suicides (62%) in the United States have an intimate partner component, the nonprofit Violence Policy Center said in a 2023 report.?

Almost all of those — 95% — were a man killing a woman and 93% of those involved a gun.?

Most female homicide victims were killed by a current or former male partner, according to research published in the National Library of Medicine last year.?

That same research showed victims of intimate partner violence are five times more likely to die if their abuser has access to a gun — and 1 in 8 convicted perpetrators of intimate partner violence admit they used a gun to threaten someone.??

In 2022, about half of Kentucky women — 45.3% — and around 35.5% of men had experienced intimate partner violence — or threat of it — in their lifetimes, the Lantern has reported. ?In 2023, that number decreased to 44.5% of women and 32.9% of men.?

When police respond to a domestic violence or adjacent situation, they are required to file a form called a JC-3. Of the roughly 41,000 Kentucky JC-3s filed in 2023, 97 involved a gun.?

Hundreds more — 399 — involved terroristic threatening.

Research shows when abusive partners have access to guns, they’re more likely to kill. A 2023 paper published in the National Library of Medicine found victims were five times more likely to die when a firearm is involved.?

Advocates who work to end intimate partner violence told the Lantern that Kentucky needs a way to remove weapons from the hands of domestic violence? perpetrators.?

Unfunded mandate

Even though the Supreme Court says it’s constitutional to disarm people who are the subject of domestic violence protective orders, that’s basically an “unfunded mandate” in Kentucky, said Thomas with GreenHouse17.?

“Our systems throughout the commonwealth are having to figure out who gets them, who collects them, who stores them, who marks them for storage,” she explained. “How do people get them back? When do they get them back? What’s the process for people to get their weapons back when they’ve been removed?”?

There’s no funding in Kentucky to carry out the federal law, Thomas said, which results in an uneven application across the state.

“Some courts will sometimes ask the sheriffs to go confiscate the weapons. Sometimes they’ll tell a person, ‘you have to turn those weapons over to your attorney or to the sheriff’s department,’” she said. “All the systems are a little different by how they do it, but the federal law says they have authority to help see that weapons are not in the hands of abusers, right? How they go about doing that can look very different county to county, judge to judge, situation to situation.”?

Based on existing laws, any firearm Elder had “should have been removed from his possession at the time he was served,” said Hensley, who is also an attorney.

It’s unclear if the gun used in the August shooting was registered to the suspect. No official information about the gun and how it was obtained is available, a police spokesman told the Lantern.?

“The way that most sheriff’s departments serve those petitions and request for firearms is simply … they’ll knock on the door, (say), ‘Here you go, sir. Do you have any firearms in the house?’ And if the perpetrator says, ‘No,’ that’s it,” Hensley explained.?

Whether or not a police officer has the legal ability to enter the home and search for those weapons is a complicated question, Hensley said. “I would probably argue, as an attorney: no,” she said.?

One exception could be if the petitioner told authorities that the alleged perpetrator did have access to weapons.?

Still, she said: “truthfully, that’s an uphill legal battle. They would really need to obtain a warrant or see something.”?

Leaving is dangerous. It doesn’t need to happen alone.?

Leaving an abusive situation — when it’s often most dangerous for survivors — is difficult, but doesn’t have to happen alone.?

In Elizabethtown, Hensley organized a court escort volunteer service after Riley’s death.?

“I don’t have any faith in the legislature or in our leadership to get that done, so I’ve done it,” she said. “And is that something that a nonprofit should be forced to do? Probably not. But is it something that we’re going to do? Yeah, it is. It is because safety is the most important thing.”?

Still, survivors sometimes must enter a courthouse or go through a door at the same time as an abuser or sit together in a waiting area, advocates say.?

But there are simple — and inexpensive — solutions to those physical barriers, said Angela Yannelli, the CEO of ZeroV (formerly known as the Kentucky Coalition Against Domestic Violence), such as bringing in the parties at different times and through different entrances and having a designated space for petitioners to wait separate from respondents.?

It’s also currently up to a judge’s discretion if they hold domestic hearings over Zoom, Hensley said.?

But it’s a policy she says the General Assembly should codify.?

Doing so could lessen some of the physical stress of a hearing, she said. But, there are downsides.?

“These cases can often be difficult to determine, and so much of it is based on body language and … a determination of who you believe,” she said. “And some of that is very difficult to do via Zoom.”?

While there are safety gaps, the state has a lot working in its favor: a robust network of violence prevention programs and researched-backed primary prevention, which involves educating children and other community members about intimate partner violence, said Christy Burch, the CEO of the ION Center for violence prevention in Northern Kentucky.??

“There’s barriers to staying. There’s barriers to leaving,” Burch said. “When I think about that preparation to leaving or making a big change there, reach out to your local program. We are here. You don’t have to walk that journey alone.”

Could a red flag law help???

Sen. Whitney Westerfield, the Republican chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, sponsored CARR in 2024 but he’s leaving the Republican-controlled legislature after deciding not to run for reelection this year.?

His co-sponsors for CARR were all Democrats. One of them, Louisville Sen. David Yates, is “working to build support from colleagues in the Senate to carry the bill with him” in 2025, a Senate Democrats spokesman said.?

The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention reports that people dealing with suicidality are more likely to live if they lose access to guns and other “lethal means” temporarily, until intense feelings pass. The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is 988.?

Aurora Vasquez, the vice president of State Policy & Engagement with Sandy Hook Promise, a national nonprofit that works to end gun violence, said temporary removal is key to “defuse the situation.”

“It’s often painted as though CARR is producing a permanent loss of Second Amendment rights,” she said.?

But the goal with CARR, she said, is to “give people help in the moment they need it most, so that they don’t lose their Second Amendment rights.”?

“We can’t collectively as a society — and Kentucky certainly should not, given that it has a robust gun culture — should not look away from the fact that gun owners sometimes need help, and it’s okay,” Vasquez said. “As human beings, we all sometimes need help, right? Being a firearm owner does not exclude us from that.”??

There’s no way to know if CARR could have saved Erica Riley’s life, Yannelli said.

“What we do know is that getting firearms out of the hands of an abuser will save lives,” she said.??

Thomas with GreenHouse17 agreed.?

“Weapons escalate situations and not deescalate them,” she said. “I think CARR protections … would help our law enforcement and our communities feel a little safer with temporary gun removal for somebody that’s experiencing an episode of some kind.”

Portion of a flyer issued by law enforcement on Sept. 8, the day after the shootings. (Source: FBI)

Kentucky officials on Tuesday announced a shift in the search for the suspect in the Sept. 7 shootings on Interstate 75 to focus on increasing police presence and patrols in nearby communities.

Gov. Andy Behsear said that on the manhunt’s 11th day there remains only a low probability of finding Joseph Couch, 32, in the Daniel Boone National Forest. Monitoring of the forest will continue by aircraft and surveillance cameras placed in the 28,000 acres that have been searched, officials said.

Beshear said the main goal now is to reassure people they’re safe and can go about their lives.

“It’s a reallocation not a reduction,” Beshear said during a noon briefing by state, federal and local law enforcement in London.

Couch, who left behind a car and an AR-15 rifle, is believed to have fled into the forest. Schools in southern Kentucky canceled classes and football games in response. Laurel County schools reopened Tuesday for the first time since the shootings.

Couch is charged with attempted murder and assault for allegedly shooting at cars from a ledge overlooking I-75. Five people were wounded; all have been released from hospitals.?

FBI Special Agent Quincy Barnett said the fugitive search will continue from the bureau’s London office.

Beshear advised against using the area of the national forest under surveillance for recreation, saying images picked up by surveillance cameras could prompt a law enforcement response.

House Majority Whip Jason Nemes, R-Middletown, questions officials from the Administrative Office of the Courts about the VINE (Victim Information and Notification Everyday) system during a meeting of the Interim Joint Committee on Judiciary, July 18, 2024 in Frankfort. (LRC Public Information)

A House Republican leader on Thursday criticized the Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC) for a three-year lapse in automatic notifications to Kentucky crime victims about their court cases.?

Rep. Jason Nemes, R-Middletown, the House majority whip, said the AOC should have requested the hundreds of thousands of dollars needed to relaunch these notifications through Victim Information and Notification Everyday, commonly called VINE, during this year’s session of the General Assembly.

“We would have funded it,” he said during a meeting of the Interim Joint Committee on Judiciary. “This is something very important to us. I think we’ve made that pretty clear last year.” Kentucky currently enjoys a record general fund surplus.?

The situation, Nemes said, is “extremely frustrating” as he criticized “the courts’ recalcitrance.”?

Katie Comstock, the executive director of the Administrative Office of the Courts, told Nemes that “we only have so much bandwidth and so much requests” during the budget cycle.?

She pointed to the budget priorities that were funded in the new two-year state budget — maintenance for rundown courthouses, pay increases and mental health courts.?

“I would love to say that I have unlimited budget requests when I come to you all and have priorities,” she said. “I don’t.”?

Fixing the expensive problem

VINE was created largely in response to the killing of Kentuckian Mary Byron on her 21st birthday in 1993 by a former boyfriend. She thought he was still in jail on charges of raping, assaulting and stalking her. Her family had asked to be notified of his release but was not.

VINE launched in 1996, allowing victims and others to sign up to be alerted when an offender is being released from custody and when protective orders are served or expire. Victims receive notifications via automated text, email or calls.

VINE is still providing notifications when offenders are released from custody. But in 2021 it stopped sending notifications of court dates when the AOC stopped sharing that information because of security concerns. AOC officials had begun “to have concerns about the potential monetization and protection of our court data,” Comstock testified. She later said “we have no evidence that that was happening.”?

At that time AOC stopped sharing victim data with Appriss, which operates VINE. The system is registration-based, meaning to get notifications one needs to sign up for them, said Alexis Williams, the branch manager at the Department of Corrections’ Victim Services Branch.?

Prosecutors currently inform crime victims of court updates, be it by email, letters or phone calls. VINE? still sends notifications when an offender is being released from incarceration.?

‘We ought to fix:’ Kentucky crime victims aren’t getting automatic court notifications?

“VINE relies on comprehensive data from the state to provide timely and accurate notifications,” said Jarrod Carnahan, the vice president of Government and Victim Services at Appriss. “Data elements often include case numbers, court dates, event types, courtroom notifications, and defendant identification information.”??

“I want to emphatically reiterate that our organization does not retain search history or engage in any unauthorized use of registered or victim information,” Carnahan said. “The only use of registered data is in the instance we are legally required to provide it or if it is within the provisions of the VINE service.”?

Since appearing before a legislative committee last September and being scolded for the delay in notifications by lawmakers, the parties came back to the table to discuss solutions, Comstock said.?

Appriss “has proposed a solution that addressed those data concerns” from 2021, Comstock said, but it will cost.?

“They now want us to finance the cost of the notification platform to the tune of $500,000 for a one time implementation fee and $360,000 for a service fee for the first 12 months with annual service fees increasing after that,” she told lawmakers. “That proposed cost far exceeds any cost we currently undertake for comparable services.”?

And, she said: “we don’t have the funds appropriated in our base budget to pay for the service.”?

Another potential solution is to revamp the existing court text notification system for this purpose, which would cost money but not as much. Another hurdle: the court system would need to collect victims’ contact information for the notifications to work.?

“Currently, we don’t have victim emails and phone numbers to send them notifications and collecting victim information hasn’t thus far been a function of the court system,” Comstock said.??

Meg Savage, the chief legal officer of ZeroV (formerly known as the Kentucky Coalition Against Domestic Violence), said she hopes lawmakers can find a solution “soon” to make “notifications effective, efficient and reliable.”?

“At a point in survivors’ lives when so much is already uncertain and overwhelming, removing the stress of uncertainty about when they need to be in court will be a great benefit, reducing unneeded trips to the courthouse or multiple calls to and from prosecutors’ offices,” Savage said. “A well-functioning notification system will hopefully make an already stress-filled process just a little bit easier for all victims of crime in the Commonwealth.”??

‘Not acceptable’?

“At the end of the day, this is now three years the court system has decided to stop notifying our people,” Nemes said. “It’s their responsibility to do it and they’re not doing it.”?

Carnahan with Appriss said the notifications could be up and running within 45 days if they were to get access to the needed data immediately.?

AOC could not meet its end of it within that time frame, Comstock with AOC said, because they would need to make changes to their system.?

Nemes suggested the committee bring back the court system for updates every two months until the issue is resolved. The next meeting is Aug. 23.?

“I want to be very clear that it’s not acceptable,” Nemes said. “It hasn’t been acceptable for a long time and it needs to be resolved.”??

Candles glimmer as friends and family engage in prayer during a vigil. (Photo by Hailey Roden, LINK nky)

“We have never dealt with this before,” was how Florence Police Chief Jeff Mallery described the mass shooting of seven people in the early hours of July 6.

“I know it’s gone on throughout the nation, but this is the first time that we’ve had a mass shooting in Florence,” Mallery said during a press conference that afternoon.?

Devastation ripped through the community as four victims, ranging in age from 19 to 44, died of injuries suffered at a 21st birthday party on Ridgecrest Drive. Twenty-year-old Shane Miller, 20-year-old Hayden Rybicki, 19-year-old Delaney Eary and 44-year-old Melissa Parrett were killed.

Three victims were recovering in the hospital at press time. Among them is 19-year-old Chloe Parrett.?

During a packed vigil for the victims at Crossroads Florence Church on July 9, Bruce Parrett, Chloe’s father and ex-husband of Melissa Parrett, said that Chloe’s mother is the reason she is alive.?

Chloe still faces a long road to recovery: Both of her lungs were affected by her injuries and are unable to hold air, according to her father. “She’s never going to be the same,” Parrett said.?

Attending the memorial was his first time leaving the hospital since Chloe was admitted. He said he was overwhelmed and surprised to see the outpouring of support.?

“The support is just phenomenal. I thought there would be a few people that knew us and knew the other families, but this is definitely the village coming together to help those in need,” he said.

While Parrett is grateful for the support, he said his outlook for the future is grim.?

“I mean, I’m not very hopeful for the future. I really am not after this has happened. I love the support, but it’s just so devastating. Now I’m worried about things like this happening again. If it happened to me, it could happen to anybody. And I hate to see that other families are going to have to go through situations like this.”?

He said guns are too easily accessible to people who shouldn’t have them. “I don’t know what the answer is, but I know what the answer is not,” said Parrett. “The answer is not sitting on our hands and doing nothing.”?

The party was being held for Parrett’s son at the time of the shooting, Mallery said.

Mallery said other partygoers told officers the shooter fled in a vehicle. Officers were able to track down the suspect and attempted to stop him near Farmview Drive and U.S. 42, but the suspect fled again. A chase ensued. Finally, the suspect drove off the road into a ditch on Dale Heimbrock Way near Hicks Pike. The officers found the suspect with what appeared to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound. He was transported to St. Elizabeth Hospital, where he died.?

The suspect has since been identified as 21-year-old Chase Garvey. Court documents indicate Garvey was on probation for a felony charge of unlawfully transacting with a minor in 2021, a charge he received after pleading down from two other felony charges after sexually assaulting a 13 year old girl in his car.?

He was committed to house arrest before accepting the lower charge instead of facing trial. He was then sentenced to five years in prison, but the sentence was probated on the condition that he not interact with the victim, not commit any more crimes, engage in psychological counseling and maintain employment. He was scheduled to come off of probation in 2027.

Mallery said Garvey’s motive is still under investigation and that he didn’t believe the shooting was connected to Garvey’s past crimes. It is illegal for felony offenders to own a gun, and how Garvey obtained one is still unclear.?

Remembering the victims?

Rybicki’s mother, Cherri McGuire, wrote a letter to her son in his obituary. “You were an unexpected gift from God. You were smart, witty, kind, so handsome and the most loving human being I have ever met. You made me become a stronger and better person. You are my angel. I hope you know how much I love you; I cannot even put it into words.”

Connor Velpreda remembers his best friend, Rybicki, as “a good soul.” He said that “the way he carried himself impacted so many hearts.”

“Through everything he’s endured in this life, the common denominator was always that contagious grin that never seemed to fade,” Velpreda said. “He is someone I am proud to call my best friend, and he was a best friend to more than just [me].”

Shane Miller’s aunt, Sheryl Beatty, sent LINK nky’s media partner WCPO a statement about her nephew, whom she said aspired to be a police officer.

“Shane was a young man that any parent would be proud to call their own. He was always smiling with a kind word for everyone. He was a fun person to be around; he woke every day happy with a positive outlook. He was a charismatic person when people met him they would want to continue to be a friend of his. He enjoyed his friends, but his best friend was his cousin Sergio. Family was everything to him,” Beatty said.?

“Shane was a young, beautiful, amazing man with an old soul. His joy was doing anything outdoors from fishing to kayaking. Shane bought two kayaks, one for him and one for Sergio. He was a bright light to this world and will always be one to his family. There are no words for the pain of his loss or how much he will be missed.”

On July 8, Paige Johnson, a friend of Eary’s, stopped by the memorial set outside the home where the shooting happened.

“Everybody that knew Delaney like seriously loved her so much,” Johnson told WCPO. “Like she was such a joy. Such a light in everybody’s lives.”

Johnson attended Cooper High School with Eary, who was a few years younger. The two shared a love of singing and dancing, she said.

“We had a few friends who would pick us up, and we would all just go to this club that we have for Cooper’s Navigators Ministry, and we all had sunglasses on and I’m sitting on Delaney’s lap, and we’re just like singing and we’re dancing,” Robinson said. “It was awesome. Delaney was just that type of person who would just sit there – dance, laugh, anything like that.”

Leah Moore, who was at the birthday party but left before the shooting, said she’s going to miss Melissa Parrett, who was hosting her son’s birthday party.

“What I’m going to miss most about Missy, especially Missy, is her spirit, her personality,” Moore said. “A lot of people will tell you that people close to them are one of the best people you’ve ever met. Truly, Missy was that.”

A community rallies

Shortly after the tragedy, the community jumped into action to support those reeling from the loss.?

Boone County Public Schools offered free emotional and psychological counseling July 8 to local students and families.?

“This weekend’s tragedy hit home to the Boone County community,” read an announcement from the district. “Some of the victims were connected in some way to the Boone County School District. We would like it to be known that counseling services will be available for any students or families who may need support.”

The next day Crossroads Church in Florence held a community night of prayer, at which Florence Mayor Julie Metzger Aubuchon addressed the community in an emotional speech.

“I had the opportunity of visiting Chloe, Claire, Connor [the three surviving victims] yesterday in the hospital,” Aubuchon said. “They are fighting. Tonight, as we gather at Crossroads Florence, we can connect, support one another, and begin that healing process.”

On July 10, Florence offered professional mental health and pet therapy services at the Florence Government Center.?

LINK nky Kenton County reporter Nathan Granger, LINK nky contributor Hayley Jarman, and WCPO’s Molly Schramm, Valerie Lyons, Krizia Williams and Michael Coker contributed to this story.

This story is republished from LINK nky.

About 900 companies, trade associations and other groups registered to lobby during the 2024 session of the Kentucky legislature held at the Capitol in Frankfort. Their combined spending was roughly $1 million higher than the previous record set the year before. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Arden Barnes)

FRANKFORT —?The GOP-dominated Kentucky legislature easily overrode nearly all of Democratic Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear’s vetoes Friday on the next to last day of this year’s legislative session, cementing a number of Republican priorities into state law.?

In total, Republican supermajorities in both legislative chambers overrode two dozen vetoes of bills and a resolution, including overriding nearly all line-item vetoes of budgetary bills funding state government.

Democratic lawmakers pushed back, unsuccessfully urging Republicans to uphold the vetoes on a number of bills including a sweeping crime bill, a bill creating more barriers to retire fossil fuel-fired power plants in Kentucky, and a bill changing how U.S. Senate vacancies are filled.?

The legislation with overridden vetoes will now become state law with the signature of Republican Secretary of State Michael Adams. Here are some of the key vetoes the legislature overrode.?

Budget bills

Bills funding the state executive branch to the tune of $128 billion, funding the state legislative and judicial branches and road projects saw multiple line-item vetoes from Beshear.

The governor took issue with a number of provisions in House Bill 6, legislation funding state cabinets and agencies. He vetoed provisions that capped executive branch spending to respond to disasters and forest fires, mandated reports to the legislature about the governor’s executive orders and required state executive branch officials get permission from the state treasurer to use state-owned planes for out-of-state travel.

“Executive orders by their very nature are within the Executive Branch’s authority as set forth in the Kentucky Constitution,” Beshear wrote in vetoing HB 6. “The information requested to be provided by the Executive branch in this provision far exceeds anything the Legislative branch has required under its own procedures during the 2024 Regular Session.”?

Both chambers of the legislature overrode nearly all line-item vetoes in state budgetary bills. They sustained a veto of requiring the Kentucky Department for Natural Resources to create a report on abandoned and active coal mine reclamation projects.?

Rep. Lindsey Burke, D-Lexington, echoed Beshear’s concerns on the House floor, saying “it’s not enough to say we’ll come back and have a special session when people are in crisis.”?

“They need a crisis level response. The governor is right: we should sustain his veto as it relates to responding to natural disasters,” Burke said.?

Sen. Chris McDaniel, R-Ryland Heights, said the arguments against the funding limits for natural disasters were “specious” considering the next state fiscal year for the budget begins in July and that the legislature will reconvene for its next legislative session in about six months.?

Some of the reporting requirements and studies that we direct are important,” McDaniel said, mentioning the legislature’s desire to gather more data on Kentucky State Police operations and the Medicaid waiver program.

House Bill 5

The House easily overrode Beshear’s veto of House Bill 5, an omnibus crime bill backed by Jefferson County Republicans in a vote of 73-22. The bill went straight to the Senate, whose members voted 27-10 to override the veto.?

Beshear vetoed the bill earlier this week. He told reporters Thursday that he supported some parts of the bill, such as the carjacking statute and flexibility for the Kentucky Parole Board, but other parts concerned him.?

“This bill has a number of good sections, but I do believe it was cruel to put some of these sections that would have received unanimous approval with others that individuals knew would have been controversial,” Beshear said.?

The governor added that he had been in Louisville this week to mark the one-year anniversary of the Old National Bank shooting that killed five victims, including a personal friend of his. He noted that one provision of the bill would allow for weapons used in murders to be destroyed after an auction sale.?

He criticized one of the most controversial sections of the bill — making street camping a crime in Kentucky. Advocates have argued that would largely impact people who are homeless. Beshear said several ministers contacted him about the issue.?

“I could not in good conscience, with my faith, sign a bill that would virtually criminalize homelessness and would treat an abandoned car better than a car that had a person in it who was suffering from homelessness,” the governor said.?

Beshear expressed concern about the financial impacts of increasing incarceration in Kentucky —?an issue that falls to the executive branch. Lawmakers are also finalizing the next two-year state budget this session. The governor criticized a limitation included that prevents his administration from delving “into unnecessary government expenses if our correction costs go over.”

Advocates from both right and left think tanks said the legislature should have an in-depth fiscal analysis before implementing the legislation. Beshear said his administration tried to give an estimate to the General Assembly but it “never published it — at all.”?

When the veto override vote was being considered in the Senate, Sen. John Schikel, R-Union, said the supporters of HB 5 are “dealing with real life” and not “hypotheticals about homeless people.”?

Senate Bill 299

Legislation backed by Republican leadership in the General Assembly would dissolve the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission and Department of Charitable Gaming and create a new government corporation to oversee those duties. The Senate overrode Beshear’s veto of Senate Bill 299 and forwarded it to the House Friday afternoon.?

Beshear vetoed the bill because he viewed it as an “unnecessary and unworkable bill, and its unintended consequences would tremendously affect horse racing, sports wagering and charitable gaming industries and the ability of people to serve on the newly-created corporation,” he wrote in his veto message.?

The governor told reporters that a conversation should be had about the move during the legislative interim session and pointed out that it was finalized shortly before the veto period began.?

“The Public Protection Cabinet worked so hard to get sportsbetting launched,” Beshear said. “They brought all of their resources to bear and look at how well it’s gone. There’s that old axiom, ‘if it ain’t broke,’ right? If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

House Bill 622

Beshear vetoed a measure that would end the governor’s power to fill U.S. Senate vacancies, House Bill 622. In his veto message, the governor wrote that the General Assembly had passed legislation in 2021 to change the process and criticized it for changing “its mind for the second time in three years.”?

“This administration deserves the same authority as previous administrations,” Beshear continued.?

Unsurprisingly, the House and Senate disagreed with him and overrode his veto Friday. The bill had passed through both chambers with bipartisan support.?

Senate Bill 349?

Both chambers of the legislature overrode Beshear’s veto of a bill, Senate Bill 349, backed by Senate President Rorbert Stivers, R-Manchester, creating new hurdles before utilities can retire fossil fuel-fired power plants.?

SB 349 will create a new commission, whose membership would include significant fossil fuel interests, that utilities would have to give notice to about plans to retire a fossil fuel-fired power plant before officially filing such a plan before the state’s utility regulator, the Kentucky Public Service Commission.?

This commission would create a report for each retirement request analyzing the impacts of and alternatives to the request, including impacts to the state’s electricity supply and whether the retirement would create a “loss of revenue” for local and state government.?

Environmental advocacy groups and Investor-owned utilities including Louisville Gas and Electric and Kentucky Utilities (LG&E and KU) have decried SB 349 as potentially burdening ratepayers with the costs of keeping aging, uneconomical coal-fired power plants on the power grid. Proponents, including national coal industry interests, have backed the bill as a way to secure the reliability of the state’s power grid, an assertion rebuffed by the president of LG&E and KU.?

Beshear’s veto message rejecting SB 349 said he agreed Kentucky “must have energy reliability” but said the new commission wasn’t the right solution, was unconstitutional and something that instead could “jeopardize economic development.”?

Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman has called on Blair to resign. (Getty Images)

A Kentucky prosecutor, who allegedly helped criminal defendants in exchange for sexual favors and methamphetamine, is facing federal wire fraud charges.

Perry County commonwealth’s attorney Scott Blair, 51, of Hazard, was charged with committing honest services wire fraud in a federal criminal complaint Friday, according to a release from the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Kentucky.

Federal law defines honest services wire fraud as a scheme or artifice to deprive another of the intangible right of honest services.”

The complaint, according to the release, alleges that from April 2020 to March 2024 Blair used his position of public trust and authority to assist various individuals who were facing criminal charges in Perry County. The complaint further alleges there are numerous instances in which Blair requested something of value, including sexual favors and methamphetamine, from multiple individuals, in exchange for taking actions in his official capacity to help those individuals.

The release says the charges were jointly announced by Carlton S. Shier IV, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Kentucky; Michael E. Stansbury, special agent in charge, FBI, Louisville Field Office; Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman, and Col. Phillip J. Burnett, Jr., commissioner of the Kentucky State Police.

The investigation preceding the complaint was conducted by the FBI, Kentucky Attorney General’s Office and KSP, says the release. .

Blair’s initial appearance is cheduled for Monday at 2:45 p.m.

Coleman, the Kentucky attorney general, issued a statement Friday calling on Blair to resign.?

The Kentucky Senate, Feb. 27, 2024. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Arden Barnes)

FRANKFORT — A bill that open government advocates warn would introduce loopholes into Kentucky’s open records law could make its way to Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear’s desk when lawmakers return to Frankfort later this week.?

The final two days of the 60-day regular session — Friday and Monday — are set aside to consider gubernatorial vetoes of bills that both chambers have passed. The Republican supermajority can easily reach the simple majority of votes needed to override ?vetoes.

Legislation that has yet to make it through both chambers also could come up in the final two days, including a bill to end the certificate of need requirement for freestanding birth centers and a maternal health bill that ran aground in the Senate after a late amendment was added in committee.

The Senate is expected to consider confirming Robbie Fletcher as the state education commissioner, along with appointments to other positions. Thanks to a law enacted last year, it will be the first time the education commissioner has required Senate confirmation.

Any bill that lawmakers pass would be subject to a successful veto by Beshear because the legislature would have no chance to override it.

‘Bad actors’

Beshear has voiced support for the controversial changes to the open records law proposed in House Bill 509. During his weekly news conference last week he said he needs to see the bill’s final form before deciding what action to take on the bill. “We’ll review it when it gets to me.”

The House passed the bill, but the Senate did not give it a floor vote ahead of the veto period. The Senate could give final passage to the bill when both chambers reconvene Friday and Monday.

HB 509 would require state and local government agencies to provide email accounts to public officials on which to conduct official business. However, the bill doesn’t address what happens to public records created on private devices.?

Beshear told reporters he thinks the bill would be more effective than current law in deterring officials from conducting public business on their personal devices or email accounts. He traced the controversy to the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources (KDFWR), which has waged a so far unsuccessful court fight to block release of commissioners’ text messages. The challenge is now before the state Supreme Court.

“Fish and Wildlife hadn’t issued state email addresses to their commissioners and they insisted on texting each other on their own devices,” Beshear said. “That’s wrong. So, right now, what the law says is if you do that, that is an open record. But all we can do in terms of enforcement is ask that person ‘would you please look through your phone and take snapshots of anything that we’re asking for and send them to us now?’ Do you think a bad actor who’s trying to get around the open records request is going to do that and send them to you?”

HB 509 would destroy Kentucky’s long tradition of openness. And Beshear knows it.

Beshear said HB 509’s mandate that official business be conducted on government email accounts could aid transparency by making government agencies responsible for the records. “What it does is take whether you get a record away from a potential bad actor and put it with the agency that can secure those records.”

Agencies could discipline employees who violate HB 509’s mandates — by using a personal cell phone or email account for official communications, for example — but it’s unclear if and how those records could be publicly disclosed. The bill includes no penalties for violations by elected officials. The bill also does not require agencies to search for public records on personal devices.?

When asked if he thought Beshear would veto the bill, Republican Senate President Robert Stivers told reporters as the veto period began: “You’d have to ask the governor on that. I do not know. I don’t know what he would do.”?

The open records challenge against the KDFWR was spurred by a former member of the KDFWR’s governing board requesting text messages among Fish and Wildlife officials and lawmakers. The governor and Republican legislature have also clashed over the Kentucky Senate not confirming gubernatorial appointments to the KDFWR’s governing board. Five appointments are? awaiting confirmation this session.?

Here’s a look at where some other high-profile legislation stands:?

Momnibus?

After picking up some controversial baggage in the last leg of the legislative session, the maternal health bill called “Momnibus” failed to get final passage.?

The bill would incentivize Kentuckians to get prenatal care by adding pregnancy to the list of qualifying life events for health insurance coverage, among other things. It had bipartisan support.

But a late amendment borrowed language from a bill filed by an anti-abortion lawmaker that requires hospitals and midwives to refer patients who have nonviable pregnancies or whose fetuses have been diagnosed with fatal conditions to perinatal palliative care services. Abortion rights advocates say the requirement could become coercive.

The bill awaits Senate passage and Beshear’s action.?

Meanwhile, Democrats in the Senate have filed amendments

Democrats in the Senate have filed amendments to loosen the state’s near-total ban on abortion by adding exceptions for rape, incest and lethal fetal anomalies ?and changing the word “baby” to “fetus.”?

It could still pass in the final two days but would have to be a version that meets Beshear’s approval because lawmakers would be unable to override a veto.??

Freestanding birth centers?

A bill to remove the certificate of need requirement for freestanding birth centers that meet a set of criteria was approved by the House. It has had two readings in the Senate but still needs to pass a Senate committee.?

A Senate Resolution to reestablish a task force to study certificate of need in Kentucky has also not passed.?

Crime bill awaits action by Beshear

A sweeping crime bill backed by Jefferson County House Republicans has been awaiting action by the governor for about a week. House Bill 5 has been hotly debated, with House Democrats futilely arguing on the last day before the veto period against the measure.??

The bill includes new or increased criminal penalties, bans street camping and imposes a three strikes rule on violent offenders. It requires prisoners convicted of violent offenses to serve 85% of their sentences instead of the current 20% before becoming eligible for parole, and classifies more crimes as violent.

HB 5 has gained opposition from across the political spectrum, as both progressive and conservative groups have argued that a more in-depth fiscal analysis is needed before implementing the legislation. However, the Kentucky Fraternal Order of Police and some families of deceased crime victims have expressed support for the bill.?

Beshear told reporters Thursday that he was still reviewing the bill and was supportive of parts of it but concerned about other sections. He added that he supported the carjacking provision but had reservations about provisions that could criminalize homelessness by creating the crime of illegal street camping.?

He said a part of the bill that would “allow for the destruction of a weapon used in a murder” is close to him a year after the Old National Bank shooting in Louisville. The bill would allow someone to purchase such a weapon at auction and ask Kentucky State Police to destroy it. The funds are used for local government and law enforcement grants.?

Local officials highlighted the issue of the auctions after the shooting last year. One of the victims, Tommy Elliot, was a close friend of Beshear’s.?

“Thankfully, the ATF seized that weapon, and it was destroyed,” Beshear said of the weapon used in the bank shooting. “Otherwise, I was going to have to watch a weapon that murdered my friend be auctioned to the highest bidder.”?

Beshear also added that he wished legislation like this would be broken up into separate bills. He can only issue line-item vetoes on budget bills.?

Changes to horse racing and gambling oversight

Beshear can also take action on another bill that was passed by the General Assembly just before the veto period began that would dissolve the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission and Department of Charitable Gaming.?

Senate Bill 299 would form a new government corporation to oversee the duties of the commission and department. Both of those are currently under the Public Protection Cabinet. The House and Senate have both given approval on the measure.

The bill has been backed by the legislature’s Republican leadership. In a joint meeting of the Senate and House economic development committees, Senate Majority Floor Leader Damon Thayer and House Speaker David Osborne presented the bill.?

Beshear told reporters that it does not impact gubernatorial appointment powers but would create an independent corporation that could “take regulatory action and punish different groups,” such as trainers. That raises a question about the constitutionality of the bill, he said, as an executive branch officer will not be over the corporation.

“So, how are you independent but have full regulatory and enforcement authority? I think that’s the thing to work through there,” Beshear said. “We’ve never seen it before. We don’t know of another group that acts that way, so a little complex legally.”?

New hurdles for fossil fuel-fired power plant retirements

Beshear has yet to act on Senate Bill 349, a Senate president-backed bill that would add new bureaucratic hurdles to slow the retirement of fossil fuel-fired power plants. Before utilities could retire a fossil fuel-fired plant, they would have to notify a newly created board, whose membership would be dominated by fossil fuel industries.

Investor-owned utilities and environmental advocacy groups have decried the bill, saying it could keep aging, uneconomical coal-fired power plants on the grid and burden ratepayers with the costs of their maintenance. Advocates for the bill, including coal industry interests, have argued SB 349 is needed to ensure the reliability of the state’s energy grid, an assertion rebuffed by the leader of Kentucky’s largest utility.

Beshear last month criticized the bill, saying it was going to “take authority” from the state’s utility regulator, the Kentucky Public Service Commission, which makes decisions on power plant retirement requests. He said he’s been in the “same place” as some of the people who have pushed for SB 349, but that the proposed board is “not the way” to address the issue.

Limiting power of Louisville’s air pollution regulator

Beshear on Monday vetoed House Bill 136, sponsored by Rep. Jared Bauman, R-Louisville. The bill would prevent the Louisville Air Pollution Control District from issuing fines against industries that self-disclose violations of federal pollution regulations. Critics, including the environmental law group Kentucky Resources Council, say it could give industry in Jefferson County a “free pass” from penalties when a self-disclosure of a violation happens by ending the air pollution regulator’s ability to issue penalties in such cases.

Bauman and other Republicans have argued HB 136 is needed to align air pollution regulations in Jefferson County with the rest of the state. Most Democrats have opposed the bill, worried the bill could create less accountability over air pollution in Jefferson County.?

Criminalizing documentation of meatpacking plants, ag operations without consent?

Senate Bill 16, sponsored by Sen. John Schickel, R-Union and backed by Tyson Foods and Kentucky’s poultry industry, would criminalize using recording equipment or drones at concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) and commercial food processing and manufacturing plants without the permission of the operation’s owner or manager. It would also criminalize distributing the footage.

Group alleges ‘hidden-camera’ video reveals ‘cruelty’ in chicken production in Kentucky?

Critics, including animal welfare groups, have said the bill is a so-called “ag gag” bill meant to hide from the public and prevent whistleblowers from exposing the conduct and practices of large-scale, corporate agricultural operations. An animal protection advocacy group released a video from a “hidden-camera” investigation of alleged “cruelty” within Kentucky poultry production, an investigation the group argues would be criminalized under SB 16.?

Schickel and other SB 16 supporters have said the bill is needed to prevent harassment of employees and agricultural operations that provide jobs to Kentucky communities. The bill passed through the legislature largely on party lines.?

Bills that are in the legislative graveyard or near

Anti-DEI bills: Republican efforts to limit or end diversity, equity and inclusion programs in public universities and colleges died when the Senate declined to consider changes made in its bill by the House. Any effort to revive anti-DEI legislation would almost certain be vetoed by Beshear.

Drag bill: After several edits to soften the legislation, a bill to place restrictions on adult-oriented businesses with “sexually explicit” performances sputtered on the House side despite passing a committee.??

Vaccine bill: A bill to bar employers and educational institutions from requiring the COVID-19 vaccination for treatment, employment or school, passed in the Senate but failed to advance on the House side.?

Though it could still pass in the final days of the session, Beshear, an outspoken supporter of the vaccines, would likely veto it.?

Abortion bills: None of the bills seeking to loosen Kentucky’s near-total abortion ban were assigned committees, making them effectively dead on arrival.?Those include:?

• A Republican bill to add rape and incest exceptions and clarify doctors can treat ectopic pregnancies?
• A Democratic bill to add rape and incest exceptions.?
• A Democratic bill to roll back all abortion restrictions.?

Loosening state child labor law: A bill that would allow some teenagers to work longer and later hours, voted down and then revived by a Senate committee, still needs final passage through the Senate to get to Beshear’s desk.?

Lawmakers wouldn’t have the chance to override a veto of House Bill 255 from Beshear, who in past comments panned the legislation saying child labor protections are there “for a reason.”?

Education and Labor Cabinet officials have said HB 255 also deletes language in state law that mirrors federal prohibitions on employing 14- and 15-year olds in hazardous occupations, such as jobs involving railroad cars and conveyors, loading and unloading goods from motor vehicles and requiring the use of ladders. State labor officials said they wouldn’t be able to enforce those hazardous occupation standards even if still federally prohibited.?

Bill sponsor Rep. Phillip Pratt, R-Georgetown, who owns a lawn and landscaping company, said his legislation would help minors “gain valuable experience in the workplace.”

Weakening a mine safety protection: House Bill 85, sponsored by Rep. Bill Wesley, R-Ravenna, would weaken a key workplace protection for coal miners, according to a long-time coal miner safety advocate. Wesley has argued HB 85 is needed to help smaller coal mines continue operating.?The bill would need approval from the Senate Natural Resources and Energy Committee and three required readings before being sent to the governor, who could veto it without the legislature overriding it.?

Sen. Whitney Westerfield, speaking on the Senate floor on Feb. 14, withdrew his floor amendments to the crime bill Friday. (LRC Public Information)

FRANKFORT — Chairman Whitney Westerfield, a Republican, joined two Democrats in voting against a sweeping crime bill Thursday as the Senate Judiciary Committee approved its version of the controversial measure.

Westerfield, who had proposed a rewrite of House Bill 5, said he preferred his version but “I don’t have the votes.”?

Instead the committee approved a substitute that takes language from drafts by both Westerfield and Sen. John Schickel.

Westerfield’s draft moderated some of the penalties of the original bill while Schickel focused on preserving the sections that backed law enforcement and maintaining a three strikes rule for violent felony offenders.

The committee forwarded the bill to the full Senate with seven Republican senators voting in favor. Louisville Democrats Sens. Gerald Neal and Karen Berg voted against it, and Westerfield joined them.?

Along with primary sponsor Rep. Jared Bauman, House Bill 5 is backed by several Jefferson County House Republicans. Bauman told the committee Thursday that he appreciated Westerfield “engaging with us in a constructive way so we could help sharpen this bill and make a couple of small changes to improve it.”?

The committee heard testimony opposing the bill from across the political spectrum during a Tuesday meeting when he bill was up for discussion only and a vote was not taken. On Thursday, the Kentucky Commonwealth Attorneys Association and Kentucky Fraternal Order of Police expressed support for the bill.?

Ryan Straw, vice president and governmental affairs chair of the police union told the committee that the bill can help with recruitment and retention of police officers across the state, making Kentucky “a destination for law enforcement.” He said “improving the laws” on the books could encourage more officers to stay in law enforcement.?

“I know everyone wants to have their law enforcement feel supported and want to feel part of the community,” Straw said.?

On the other hand, committee members continued to hear opposition, including to the bill’s criminalization of “street camping.” Several speakers from the Coalition for the Homeless appeared before the committee. An eighth-grader from Saint Francis of Assisi in Louisville, Elli Keeley-Fine, urged lawmakers to reconsider the bill and recounted the experiences her and her classmates have had helping unhoused people.?

The latest version of the bill says that people are guilty of illegal street camping if they remain in a public or private area used by pedestrians or vehicles when “the area has not been designated for the purpose of sleeping or camping or the individual lacks authorization to sleep or camp in the area.” Language that permits sleeping in a legally parked vehicle for less than 12 hours is still in the bill.?

“We want our state to be known as a place which truly understands that we are called to hold tightly to one another’s lives as we welcome the stranger and provide refuge for those seeking shelter from life’s traumas and storms,’ Keeley-Fine said. “We hope it will be clear that we are our brother’s keeper. Let the compassion, kindness and inclusivity that have always allowed Kentuckians to unite against life’s hardest challenges be woven into the fabric of House Bill 5.”?

Opponents have pointed to the costs of imprisoning even more people in a state that already has one of the highest incarceration rates. The progressive Kentucky Center for Economic Policy found in an analysis that the legislation would cost more than $1 billion over the next decade because of an increase in incarceration expenses. A representative from center-right group KY FREE said on Tuesday that the Legislative Research Commission should conduct an in-depth fiscal analysis of the bill before the General Assembly passes it.?

The adopted committee substitute was the fourth version the Senate Judiciary Committee considered. Westerfield publicly shared the document on X, formerly Twitter, after omissions were inadvertently left in the third committee substitute.??

“I’ll explain my vote when the bill hits the floor,” Westerfield said at the end of the meeting.?

As of Thursday morning, the bill had received one reading in the Senate. Upon a third reading, it can get a floor vote. The House previously approved the bill in a vote of 74-22.

Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman has called on Blair to resign. (Getty Images)

FRANKFORT — Kentucky’s Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday heard a slew of testimony from across the political spectrum opposing an omnibus crime bill.?

Senate Judicial Committee Chair Sen. Whitney Westerfield, R-Fruit Hill, said that while House Bill 5 was up only for discussion Tuesday, he expects a committee vote on the legislation Thursday.

The bill currently has competing substitute versions in the committee — one from Westerfield and another from Sen. John Schickel, R-Union. The House sponsors of the bill expressed support for Schickel’s version.?

Advocates from both liberal and conservative think tanks spoke against the bill Tuesday, but several more had signed up. Because Rep. Jared Bauman, the bill’s primary sponsor, had to leave because of another obligation, Westerfield ended the meeting before everyone who had signed up got to speak.

The meeting lasted almost two hours. More discussion may be held ahead of the Thursday vote.?

Pam Thomas, a senior fellow for the progressive Kentucky Center for Economic Policy, said the organization was concerned by the lack of information about the bill’s fiscal impacts on the state. The center’s analysis found that House Bill 5 would cost more than $1 billion over the next decade because of an increase in incarceration expenses.?

“This is a system that cannot handle the influx of new people if House Bill 5 passes,” Thomas said.?

Sarah Durand, the vice president for government affairs of center-right group KY FREE, said the Legislative Research Commission should conduct an in-depth fiscal analysis of the bill before the General Assembly passes it. Ten days are left in the 60-day legislative session.?

“There are too many provisions of House Bill 5 to cover,” she said. “Please know that many will significantly increase the burden borne by taxpayers to support the state’s corrections system.”

Joey Comley, the Kentucky director of conservative group Right on Crime, said the legislation is not based on any research in Kentucky. Additionally, he argued that while the bill has tough consequences for crimes, “consequences alone will not solve Kentucky’s criminal problems.”?

“I would submit that any comprehensive criminal justice overhaul like House Bill 5 requires Kentucky data coupled with multidisciplinary deliberation and the exercise of this General Assembly’s resolute discernment.”?

Among the several questions raised by lawmakers during the meeting, Sen. Gerald Neal, D-Louisville, pressed Bauman and his co-sponsors about the data behind the bill. A recent Kentucky Public Radio story found that Bauman’s source list appeared to be copied and pasted from a 2023 paper arguing for solutions to crime in Atlanta.?

“Well, I’ll ask a very direct question,” Neal said to the sponsors. “I said you have data that you base this upon, and will you provide it before — sufficient time — before we take action on this Thursday?”

Republican House Whip Jason Nemes, of Middletown, responded that the data also includes “conversations with a lot of experts, a lot of circuit judges, a lot of commonwealth’s attorneys.”?

Bauman said he would share the names with Neal.

The committee substitutes

The bulk of the meeting focused on differences between the committee substitute versions of the bill from Westerfield and Schickel. The committee did not adopt either yet.?

However, after the meeting, Westerfield said on X, formerly Twitter, that he appreciated Bauman for taking questions on the bill but he was “deeply disappointed that the support doesn’t appear to be there for my proposed sub.” Westerfield asked Schickel to include some of his requests in his version of the bill.?

Bauman asked the committee to support Shickel’s version at the beginning of the committee. Later, Westerfield noted at the end of the bill sponsors’ presentation that their prepared PowerPoint slides only referenced Schickel’s substitute.?

Westerfield, a former prosecutor, publicly shared a draft of a committee substitute version he worked on ahead of the meeting. Most of his changes would lean to more restorative justice approaches. He said online that his version “doesn’t make half the changes I’d like to make, but it does improve” the bill.?

His version would create a “Recidivism Reduction Task Force,” which would be made up of governor appointees, a district judge appointed by the Kentucky Supreme Court chief justice and more members representing education, law enforcement, community-based organizations and communities affected by crime or people with personal experience in the criminal justice system.?

Westerfield’s version also calls for those found violating the bill’s ban on street camping be referred to mental health or homelessness assistance resources. Another change would be that the family of a homicide victim could request firearms used in the homicide be destroyed, rather than be destroyed after auction.?

Schickel, a retired law enforcement officer, said the “meat and potatoes” of his version are the ban on street camping, the three felony strikes rule for repeat offenders and fleeing and evading police.?

“Without our police being respected, they cannot police our communities.”

Some advocates expressed a preference for Westerfield’s version. Phillip Lawson, the legislative agent for the Kentucky Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, told the committee that Westerfield’s substitute “contains significant and material changes that address our concerns,” especially for Kentucky’s violent offender statute.?

Lyndon Pryor, president of the Louisville Urban League, told the Kentucky Lantern ahead of the meeting that Westerfield’s changes do “improve the bill,” but the best outcome would be to shelve the bill entirely. The legislation does not have solutions to improve the challenges it is supposed to overcome, he said.?

“Even with the changes, it’s not necessarily going to be anything that we can get behind, but I can acknowledge that the changes, at least that I’ve seen, do seem to at least make the original bill less harsh in a few ways,” Pryor said.?

The House gave its approval to the bill in a vote of 74-22 in January. It has yet to receive a reading in the Senate.?

Sen. Chris McDaniel, R-Ryland Heights, allowed children to leave the Senate chamber before receiving unanimous approval for a bill to protect children from sexual victimization. (Photo by LRC Public Information)

FRANKFORT — A bill felonzing the intentional ownership of a child sex doll has now passed both the Kentucky House and Senate and is on its way to Gov. Andy Beshear’s desk.?

Sen. Chris McDaniel presented the bill, sponsored in the House by Edgewood Republican Rep. Stephanie Dietz, on the Senate floor. It passed unanimously 38-0 after 10 minutes of supportive discussion.?

Before discussing the bill, McDaniel gave parents and guardians a few moments of silence to take children out of the floor and balconies.?

House Bill 207 would make it a Class D felony to knowingly own or sell a child sex doll — defined as a doll, mannequin or robot that is intended for sexual stimulation or gratification and that has the features of, or has features that resemble those of, a minor.

Attorney General Russell Coleman and others in law enforcement testified previously that people who use these dolls often escalate to harming children in real life.?

The bill also criminalizes the use of artificial intelligence to create child pornography or to create fake images that use real children as the source.?

“This piece of legislation will give our law enforcement the tools that they need to protect our children from predators and exploitation,” McDaniel said. “There’s a lot of pedophiles who practice victimization of children. This bill will save countless children rape, sexual abuse and trafficking.”

Sen. Max Wise, R-Campbellsville, listens to debate on one of his bills. (Kentucky Lantern photo by McKenna Horsley)

FRANKFORT —?Despite opposition from Republicans and Democrats, a GOP-backed measure that paves the way for school districts to hire “guardians” to fill vacant law enforcement officer roles on school campuses passed out of the Kentucky Senate Tuesday.?

Senate Bill 2, sponsored by? Sen. Max Wise, R-Campbellsville,builds upon his 2019 School Safety and Resiliency Act that was enacted by? General Assembly with bipartisan support. His latest piece of legislation has what he describes as? a “layered approach” that he says strengthens school security measures while broadening support for mental health resources in schools.?

The 2019 legislation was introduced in response to the 2018 mass shooting at Marshall County High School that killed two students and injured others.

On Tuesday, the seven Democratic senators were joined by Republican Sens. Danny Carroll, John Schickel and Whitney Westerfield in opposing the bill. Twenty-eight GOP senators voted in favor of the bill.?

The provisions that would establish a school “guardians” program have received received the most attention. Those who could be certified as a guardian are honorably discharged military veterans and retired or former law enforcement officers. School districts may have them in schools to fill in for vacant School Resource Officers, a type of sworn law enforcement officer that is required in schools.?

“In no way is the guardian replacing important roles that our school resource officers are doing for our school systems. The guardian is not an arresting authority. They are simply a stopgap measure to help a school district that right now may not be able to provide an SRO,” Wise said before adding that the guardians program would not begin until the 2025-26 school year.?

Other states have similar programs. After the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in 2018, Florida established a school guardian program.?

Wise previously said 600 campuses do not have SROs for various reasons, primarily lack of funding and job applicants.. Senate Bill 2 does not provide funding for schools to hire SROs or guardians.

A few Democrats spoke against the bill. Sen. Reggie Thomas, D-Lexington, who supported the bill in a committee last week, said on the Senate floor he could not vote for the bill and urged his colleagues to take measures that would more directly address gun violence and violence in schools.?

Carroll had voted against the bill in the committee after raising concerns that law enforcement has had too little input.? He represents Marshall County and is a former police officer.?

“I regret that we’re doing this instead of appropriating the money for the districts to hire the SROs they need,” Westerfield said while explaining his no vote.?

Westerfield said? he hopes the House considers adding money to the bill. He also said the bill doesn’t answer how a guardian works with school boards, district employees and SROs and what authority they would have.?

Wise filed a floor amendment to his legislation that specified that anyone who has been convicted of indecent exposure would not be eligible to become a school guardian.??

Two floor amendments from Sen. Lindsey Tichenor, R-Smithfield, were withdrawn. They would have required schools to post signs that said people who were “armed and trained” were on school premises.?

Since the 2019 law, the General Assembly has passed a few other pieces of legislation regarding school safety. In 2022, the General Assembly passed a law requiring an SRO in each Kentucky school but provided no funding for the mandate.?

Rep. Stephanie Dietz said her bill will close a loophole used to victimize children. (LRC Public Information)

FRANKFORT — A House bill that would make it a felony to knowingly own a child sex doll in Kentucky passed the Senate Judiciary committee unanimously Thursday morning.

House Bill 207 passed the House in early February and is making its way through the Senate. It can now go to the floor for consideration. Should it pass there, it will head to Gov. Andy Beshear’s desk for a signature or veto.

The bill would make it a Class D felony to knowingly own or sell a child sex doll — defined as a doll, mannequin or robot that is intended for sexual stimulation or gratification and that has the features of, or has features that resemble those of, a minor.

It also criminalizes the use of artificial intelligence to create child pornography or to create fake images that use real children as the source.

Edgewood Republican Rep. Stephanie Dietz said in committee that her bill “closes a loophole that has allowed pedophiles to practice victimization of children.”

“This bill,” she said, “will save countless children from rape, sexual abuse and trafficking.”

Naloxone (Narcan) nasal spray can reverse the effects of opioid overdoses. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Boone County is set to hire three new workers aimed at addressing the multifaceted challenges posed by the opioid crisis.

On Tuesday, the Boone County Fiscal Court approved a resolution allowing the use of opioid abatement funds to hire up to three police navigators/social workers — a newly created position.

“This is one of the greatest uses of the dollars, overall I would say,” Boone County Judge/Executive Gary Moore said. “The program has tremendous potential in many ways.”

The money comes from a $26 billion settlement between multiple states and some of the United States’ largest pharmaceutical corporations, specifically, drug distributors — McKesson Corp., AmeriSourceBergen and Cardinal Health — and manufacturer Johnson & Johnson. Kentucky received $478 million from the settlement; half of the money was distributed to the state, while the other half went to local government.

Boone County is set to receive an estimated $4.6 million distributed in yearly allotments until 2038, according to a database published by the Kentucky Association of Counties.

To decide how to use the funds, Boone County Administrator Matthew Webster said that throughout 2022 and 2023, county staff consulted with community stakeholders impacted by the opioid epidemic, such as the sheriff’s department, drug court, and the cities of Florence, Walton and Union, among others.

Ultimately, the county created a new position under the sheriff’s department. Laura Pleiman, thedirector of Community Services and Programs for the fiscal court, worked with the sheriff’s department and other community agencies to craft a job description, protocols and plans for the new police navigator/social worker position. The position will be housed under the sheriff’s department.

Webster said the position would provide, “relief to frontline deputies while addressing non-law enforcement issues that currently require the time and attention of sworn officers with a particular emphasis on opioid use and its tangential impacts.”

Moore explained that the workers are there “when law enforcement has stabilized a situation,” but there still needs to be someone present to engage with family members or other present individuals.

The county plans to wait to hire the three staffers; instead, it will hire two in the coming months to adequately develop the program. The position would pay around $78,000 annually, Webster said.

Other police departments in Northern Kentucky already have similar staff positions. Pleiman said the county worked closely with the Alexandria Police Department social workers to develop the position.

“I would say probably that Northern Kentucky is leading the way a lot in this area,” Pleiman said.

This story is republished from LINK nky.

Politicians on both sides of the debate often connect bail policy to crime rates. But experts say doing so is problematic, because so much of the crime data that states and cities use is unreliable. (Photo by Andy Sacks/Getty Images)

Crime is shaping up as a potent election issue, and one of the key points of debate is over bail: Which suspects should be jailed before trial, and which ones should be released on bond — and for how much money?

Some conservatives argue that lenient bail policies put suspects who are likely to commit crimes before their upcoming court hearings, or who might skip bail altogether, back on the street. But some progressives?say research does not support that contention. They?argue that detaining defendants because they can’t afford financial bonds is unfair, and note that such defendants are disproportionately Black, Latino and low income.

Illinois, New Jersey and New Mexico have moved away from the use of money bonds. But other states, such as Georgia, Kentucky and New York, are moving in the opposite direction, implementing stricter rules. Tennessee is considering a constitutional amendment that would give judges more discretion to deny bail amid concerns about rising crime rates. The Kentucky House recently passed HB 5, a sweeping crime bill that restricts charitable bail organizations from posting $5,000 or more in bail. It now moves to the Senate.

Politicians on both sides of the debate often connect bail policy to crime rates. But experts say?doing so is problematic, because so much of the crime data that states and cities use is unreliable.

The reality, experts say, is that most crime data is too unreliable to pinpoint specific policies as the sole cause of increasing or decreasing crime rates. The bail system also is oftentimes misunderstood as a form of punishment rather than the process for releasing individuals before trial under certain conditions.

“There’s nothing out there that shows a correlation or a connection of any sort between increasing the rates of pretrial release and the rates of crime,” said Spurgeon Kennedy, vice president of the Crime and Justice Institute, a nonprofit criminal justice research organization. Kennedy previously served as president of the National Association of Pretrial Services Agencies.

These misconceptions about crime can leave voters vulnerable to misinformation ahead of local and national elections.

“If you ask the typical person on the streets, ‘Do you think crime is up or down over the last year,’ they will tell you, ‘Oh, it’s up. It’s way up.’ But we’ve seen reductions in crime overall and also in violent crime,” Kennedy said. “So the facts don’t follow the argument, and that’s unfortunate because that makes it much more easier to keep this out as a political football.”

Both chambers of Georgia’s legislature passed a bill this month that would add 30 additional felony and misdemeanor crimes to the state’s list of bail-restricted offenses, which means that people accused of those crimes would be required to post cash bail. They include charges of unlawful assembly, racketeering, domestic terrorism and possession of marijuana.

The bill also would prevent any?individuals?or?organizations?from posting cash bail more than three times per year unless they establish themselves as bail bonding companies, severely limiting charitable bail funds. The bill is now headed to Republican Gov. Brian Kemp’s desk.

Some criminal justice advocates say the bill, if enacted, would clash with changes made by a 2018 law to the state’s legal system for people accused of misdemeanors. That law, which was championed by former Republican Gov. Nathan Deal, mandates that judges take into account the financial circumstances of the accused when setting bail.

Proponents of the new bill, which was first introduced last year, argue that the measure is necessary to deter crime, support victims of crimes and hold repeat offenders accountable. State Sen. Randy Robertson, who sponsored the bill, said it focuses on people accused of violent crimes.

“What we’re focusing on is trying to get the nonviolent individuals back out into the workforce and back to their families,” Robertson said in an interview. Robertson, a Republican, argued that the bill would also lead to a “dramatic decrease” in the state’s jail population because it offers a pathway for organizations, such as churches and nonprofits, to set themselves up as bail bonding companies.

Those organizations would have to meet the same legal requirements as bond companies, including undergoing background checks, paying fees, and having an application approved by a local sheriff’s department.

Some opponents, though, argue that it would lead to overcrowding of jails and disproportionately harm low-income and Black and Hispanic communities. The ACLU of Georgia has threatened to sue the state if the bill is signed into law, arguing that it’s unconstitutional.

Robertson said that some of the criticisms raised are “rehash complaints” he has heard for the past 25 or 30 years.

“There has been no evidence, independent research that shows placing low bails, allowing judges to set bails at whatever they choose to, keeps a disproportionate amount of individuals held in our jails,” Robertson said. “I don’t think that [this bill] touches the third rail of constitutionality at all.”

Pretrial data and research

Several research studies, though, suggest that setting money bail isn’t effective in ensuring court appearances or improving public safety.

Pretrial policy experts say that?being in jail for even a few days or weeks can cost people their homes or jobs or damage their personal relationships, said Matt Alsdorf, an associate director with the Center for Effective Public Policy and the co-director of the group’s Advancing Pretrial Policy and Research project.

“The use of unnecessary detention has negative impacts, even if you’re just looking at it through a public safety or crime prevention lens,” he said.

Pretrial recidivism has long been studied by criminal justice experts: A 2013 study of more than 150,000 people who were jailed in Kentucky found that longer detention periods increased the likelihood that people would be rearrested both during the pretrial period and within the first two years following the closure of their case. The study also found that people who were held for two or three days had a 9% greater likelihood of failing to appear in court than people who were held for one day.

Furthermore, a study published in the Criminology & Public Policy journal last year found that Black defendants were 34% more likely than white defendants to be recommended to be held behind bars until their cases were resolved.

“The money bond system is a very regressive system that effectively ends up acting as a means of incarcerating populations that are typically already disadvantaged,” Alsdorf said.

In places that have relaxed their bail practices, audits show that pretrial jail populations usually drop following the changes. In some jurisdictions, there also are fewer arrests for certain types of offenses.

In Houston, a lawsuit claiming misdemeanor bail practices in Harris County were unconstitutional led to a settlement and consent decree in 2019. The county is required to release most people charged with misdemeanors on a personal bond, meaning defendants simply promise to attend their next court date.

In the latest independent monitoring report on the system, from 2023, observers wrote that the changes “have saved Harris County and residents many millions of dollars, improved the lives of tens of thousands of persons,” and resulted in “no increase in new offenses by persons arrested for misdemeanors.”

Brandon Garrett, the lead monitor and a Duke University School of Law professor, said in an interview that racial disparities “vanished overnight” after bail practices were relaxed. The monitors have also found an overall decline of about 8% in misdemeanor arrests between 2019 and 2022.

“There were real concerns about the racial disparities of the old cash bail system, and it was pretty remarkable just how quickly those disparities — in terms of who ended up in jail and who didn’t — vanished,” Garrett said.

‘Intentional and deliberate’

In 2017, New Jersey moved away from the use of cash bail in favor of the Public Safety Assessment, an algorithm tool that uses nine factors from an individual’s criminal history to predict their likelihood of returning to court for future hearings and remaining crime-free while on pretrial release.

The changes encouraged more “intentional and deliberate” detention hearings, recalled now-retired trial court Judge Martin Cronin, who sat on the committee that unanimously recommended the switch to a more risk-based bail system.

Cronin, now a consultant with Pretrial Justice Solutions, LLC, said the state’s new system offers more accountability and transparency.

“You’re focused on what are the permissible reasons for detention and how does the record tie into that, individualized to that defendant who’s in front of you,” Cronin told Stateline. “There is real accountability there. … It’s a fundamentally different process.”

Between 2015 and 2023, New Jersey’s pretrial jail population decreased by 27.2%, according to the state judiciary’s Criminal Justice Reform Statistics report last year.

Stateline is a sister newsroom to the Kentucky Lantern in the States Newsroom network and as a nonprofit is supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Stateline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Scott S. Greenberger for questions: [email protected].?

VOCAL-KY representatives Shameka Parrish-Wright, left, and Stephanie Johnson speak against House Bill 5. (Kentucky Lantern photo by McKenna Horsley)

FRANKFORT — Lawmakers moved a Republican anti-crime bill out of committee Thursday afternoon after hearing more than two hours of testimony, including support from crime victims and warnings from opponents that the measure “criminalizes poverty” and will drive up Kentucky’s already high rate of incarceration.

The committee adopted a substitute version of House Bill 5 that was not available online Thursday evening, but has since been published.?Rep. Jared Bauman, R-Louisville, the bill’s primary sponsor, said changes made in the substitute version include removing sections related to changes in the parole board, removing language that would affect federal funding for housing initiatives and giving schools more flexibility in reporting to law enforcement.

A priority for Republicans and dubbed the “Safer Kentucky Act,” the measure includes a three strikes law for violent felonies; provisions against street camping near businesses, homes or other public spaces; and a felony carjacking statute. A goal of the bill’s sponsors is to strengthen penalties for criminal acts.?

The House Judiciary committee approved the bill 13-5. Republican Reps. Savannah Maddox, of Dry Ridge, and Steven Doan, of Erlanger, joined Democrats in voting no. Doan said he needed to see further changes to the bill before he could support it. Rep. Kimberly Poore Moser, R-Taylor Mill, passed on voting because she too wanted changes.

“With this bill, House Bill 5, we are reasserting some basic and simple truths,” said Bauman. “And that is that criminals, not society, are accountable for their actions. And society has the right to protect itself from the criminal element. And so, that criminal element has become an all too normal part of our world today.”?

Bauman and other Louisville Republicans backing the bill brought family members of deceased crime victims to testify before the committee. Rachel Conley, the widow of Scott County Sheriff Deputy Caleb Conley, recounted the day her husband died in May 2023 after he was shot during a traffic stop. Authorities have said the man accused was connected to other crimes.?

“My story is just one of many. There are far too many stories that are just like mine,” Rachel told the committee. “Our first responders are not just a badge. They are human beings with family and friends who love them. Many of them have spouses and children that worry about them making it home after each shift. I tell my story because I hope it has an impact on your decision.”

The Kentucky State Fraternal Order of Police had previously expressed support for the bill. Ryan Straw, vice president and governmental affairs chair of the police union, told the committee the bill is “vital to the health and welfare of our law enforcement officers and to the safety of the communities they serve.”?

Ahead of Thursday’s committee meeting, critics of the bill had already been vocal in their opposition, arguing that it would increase incarcerations instead of addressing issues that increase crime. Several speakers renewed that call during Thursday’s meeting.?

VOCAL-KY Director Shameka Parrish-Wright said lawmakers should focus on legislation for “real actions that help improve conditions” for those in poverty across the state. Parrish-Wright is also a member of the Louisville Metro Council. VOCAL-KY is a community organizing group that aims to build power among low-income people.?

“The fact is Kentucky is poor,” she said. “And Kentucky is criminalizing poverty and we will not get better that way.”

Kungu Njuguna, policy strategist with the American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky, told the committee he agrees with the sponsors’ goal — “a safe, healthy, vibrant and prosperous commonwealth” — he just disagrees with how they are going about it. He noted Kentucky’s high incarceration rate and added that “means if locking people up made us safe, we’re one of the safest places on the planet.”?

Kentucky has the world’s seventh-highest rate of incarceration, according to data analyzed by the Prison Policy Initiative in 2021. Kentucky incarcerates 930 people per 100,000 population, higher than the rate in the United Sates as a whole of 664 incarcerated per 100,000 people. The study includes state and federal prisons and local jails.?

“But yet, here we sit with a bill entitled ‘The Safer Kentucky Act,’” Njuguna said, “looking to lock up more people for longer with little to no support for provisions — maybe one or two — that uplift and empower people, like funding for affordable housing, substance use treatment, mental health, victim services.”

Ten GOP members of the committee are co-sponsors of the bill, which has more than 50 Republicans as co-sponsors.?

Recent Kentucky crime data shows the state had a decrease of 17.9% in homicides between 2021 and 2022. (Photo by Ty Wright/Getty Images)

Critics of an omnibus anti-crime bill filed by Louisville GOP lawmakers said on Tuesday the state should instead make investments to help keep Kentuckians out of jail — not send more of them to prison.?

House Bill 5, dubbed the “Safer Kentucky Act” by sponsors, is a priority piece of Republican legislation that has undergone several changes since it was first publicly discussed in a September press conference. It includes a three strikes law for violent felonies; measures to prevent street camping near businesses, homes or other public spaces; and a felony carjacking statute.?

The bill, which has about 45 Republican co-sponsors, including Majority Whip Rep. Jason Nemes of Middletown, generated opposition even before it was officially filed in the House last week.?

On Tuesday, a collection of Kentucky groups such as the Kentucky Center for Economic Policy, the Coalition for the Homeless, the Louisville Urban League, the Kentucky Equal Justice Center, Kentucky Council of Churches and more held a press conference criticizing the legislation.

Felicia Nu’Man, the director of policy for the Louisville Urban League and a former assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney in Jefferson County, said during the press conference there are “many bad policy positions” in the legislation. She added that carjacking is currently covered under an existing felony charge and argued that the “increasing of punishments and the reclassification of crimes is unnecessary.”?

“We cannot continue to incarcerate everyone. It is a purely remote emotional response,” Nu’Man said. “We should only incarcerate people for long periods of time when we are terrified of the violent acts they might commit — not because we are angry that they’re making our lives inconvenient and have a mental health problem like addiction.”?

The Kentucky Center for Economic Policy, which is a progressive think tank, found in 2022 that Kentucky jails were over capacity, with 21,831 people incarcerated in jails at the end of April, along with an additional 9,835 people incarcerated in state prisons. Recent Kentucky crime data shows the state had a decrease of 17.9% in homicides between 2021 and 2022, though initially reported inaccurately by Kentucky State Police.?

After filing the bill last week, the primary sponsor Rep. Jared Bauman, of Louisville, told reporters more co-sponsors are expected to join the legislation in upcoming weeks.?

“The first duty of any civilized society is to protect its honest citizens from those that prey on their innocent fellow citizens,” he said. “Crime is something that directly impacts every single Kentuckian and it is with a deep sense of purpose and value that we put forward the critical reforms in the Safer Kentucky Act.”?

The Kentucky State Fraternal Order of Police plans to testify in favor of the legislation when it has a committee hearing. The organization expressed support for the bill, saying in a statement that it “not only addresses many of the issues we are seeing each day but gives us hope that violent offenders or those who poison our communities with drugs will have to answer for their crimes with real consequences.”?

However, Kungu Njuguna, policy strategist with the American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky, told reporters last week that the bill is not focused on “what really makes Kentucky safe.” He pointed out Kentucky’s high incarceration rate and said the General Assembly should focus on investments to help Kentuckians dealing with substance abuse disorders, mental health, lack of affordable housing and more instead of increasing criminal penalties and creating new crimes. During this session, the General Assembly will decide the state budget for the next two years.?

“We already have sufficient laws on the books,” Njuguna said. “In fact, we have a law known as the persistent felony offender statute, where people are already subject to enhanced penalties upon the second felony. So again, we need to focus on things that keep people out of the criminal legal system and not create new laws.”?

Bauman’s bill is getting national attention. The Bail Project, a national nonprofit that assists low-income people with bail and pretrial support, said in a statement that it opposes the bill because “it doubles-down on policies fueling mass incarceration, which will only harm the poorest and most vulnerable Kentuckians.” The bill includes several new regulations for bail organizations, including preventing charitable bail organizations from giving bail in amounts of more than $5,000.?

The Bail Project said the regulations “will only harm the most disadvantaged and already vulnerable Kentuckians in the state.”?

“Cash bail creates a two-tiered system of justice that benefits the rich and disadvantages those without money, upending the fundamental principle in our justice system that everyone is innocent until proven guilty,” the nonprofit said. “It’s for these reasons that charitable bail organizations are so crucial — they even the playing field by restoring the presumption of innocence and ensuring that everyone gets their fair shake during trial. Kentuckians broadly agree that our criminal justice system is in need of reform — the Safer Kentucky Act will not achieve that.”?

When asked if he anticipates any challenges in passing the bill, Bauman said he welcomes them as the legislation moves forward and added he hopes they help “put forward the most effective policy for our state.”

“We do want it to be strong, we want to hold violent criminals accountable, and we want it to be very effective as well,” he said. “Everyone is welcomed with a seat at the table, so those conversations will continue.

Louisville Republican Rep. Jared Bauman stands a podium backed by fellow lawmakers after presenting the "Safer Kentucky Act" in a committee. (Kentucky Lantern photo by McKenna Horsley)

A sweeping anti-crime bill backed by several Louisville GOP lawmakers got its first committee hearing Friday.?

Since unveiled in September, the proposal has undergone several changes, said primary sponsor, Rep. Jared Bauman. Provisions removed include establishing a Kentucky State Police Post in Jefferson County and creating a statewide wiretapping law for police officers, but the latter may become separate legislation.?

What’s left includes a three strikes law for violent felonies, regulating bail fund organizations, and strengthening privileges for business employees and owners to “use a reasonable amount of force necessary” to protect themselves or prevent a person detained for theft from escaping.?

“The simple truth is that the criminal element has become an all too normal part of our world today,” Bauman told the committee. “Our constituents are fed up. Kentuckians are fed up across generations.”

Bauman, whose upcoming legislative session will be his second, appeared with House Republican Whip Rep. Jason Nemes and longtime member Rep. Kevin Bratcher in front of the Interim Joint Committee on Judiciary. Both Nemes and Bratcher are also from Jefferson County.?

The proposal, dubbed the “Safer Kentucky Act,” seeks to “tackle crime at many levels and modernize criminal statutes, some of which were written almost 50 years ago,” a House press release said.?

Though initially reported inaccurately by Kentucky State Police, recent Kentucky crime data shows the state had a decrease of 17.9% in homicides between 2021 and 2022.?

Lawmakers on the committee received a draft of the bill ahead of the meeting Friday morning. A copy of the bill was listed in the meeting materials section on the Legislative Research Commission’s website by Friday afternoon.?

During the meeting, Rep. Lindsey Burke, D-Lexington, questioned the proposal because a recent report found that if Kentucky were a county, it would have the seventh highest incarceration rate in the world. In response, Bratcher argued that many homicides are not prosecuted. According to one report using FBI data, the rate at which murders are solved or “cleared” was below 50% in 2020.?

“To say that there’s too many people incarcerated takes out of the equation that there’s a lot of them out there that don’t even come into the statistics,” Bratcher said.?

When asked in a press conference after the meeting if funding to alleviate overcrowding in Kentucky jails would be in consideration with the legislation, Bauman said not at this time and that he does not believe Kentucky has an issue with overcrowded jails.?

The Kentucky Center for Economic Policy, a progressive think tank, found in 2022 that Kentucky jails were over capacity again, with 21,831 people incarcerated in jails at the end of April, along with an additional 9,835 people incarcerated in state prisons.

Bauman, along with other legislators from Louisville, discussed the proposal during a Louisville Forum luncheon. There, Democratic Rep. Nima Kulkarni, voiced concern about a part of the bill aimed at preventing “street camping,” noting that could largely affect people who are experiencing homelessness.?

“The issue is housing. The issue is being able to address underlying mental health issues and substance use disorders and any trauma that is occurring,” she said. “There are a lot of reasons people are on the street.”

In response, Bauman said the bill would not criminalize homelessness.?

“Homelessness will still be allowed. It just prevents certain areas where they can camp,” Bauman said, adding that such prevented areas include in front of businesses

Louisville lawmakers supporting the bill unveiled their plans ahead of Kentucky’s general election. Republican Attorney General Daniel Cameron, who lost to incumbent Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear, made a post on X in favor of the bill, noting some of the proposals from his public safety plan were in the proposed legislation.?

The 68-page bill is subject to change ahead of the regular legislative session, which begins Jan. 2. During the interim session, lawmakers cannot take action on legislation.

According to the Kentucky Division of Forestry, nearly 900 fires this year have burned 14,530 acres. A third of the fires are the result of arson. (Kentucky Energy and Environment Cabinet)

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear declared a state of emergency Thursday in an effort to provide more resources for combating wildfires across the state, particularly in Eastern Kentucky.?

A Kentucky Energy and Environment Cabinet release Thursday afternoon said that state Division of Forestry officials are responding to dozens of wildfires across the state and are working on 31 fires that continue to spread.?

As of Thursday morning, a Kentucky Emergency Management report stated 314 firefighters were responding to more than 9,100 acres of “active fires,” with fires of concern in Knox, Bell, Pike, Lawrence, Pike and Harlan counties. Harlan and Letcher counties have declared states of emergency because of the wildfires. Forestry teams from Idaho, Utah and Oregon were helping with the wildfires.?

“We are taking action to make sure that Kentucky families and communities have the resources they need,” Beshear said in a statement. “We appreciate everyone on the front lines stepping up to fight the fires, and we pray for their safety and that these fires can be put out quickly.”

Beshear in his state of emergency order said drought conditions have led to “numerous uncontrolled wildfires” across the state with future weather forecasts creating the potential for more wildfires. Much of Eastern Kentucky is under moderate drought conditions, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor.?

The release from environment officials states the emergency order allows the state to activate resources including the Kentucky National Guard if needed to control the wildfires. Beshear in another order has also activated the state’s price gouging laws; incidents of price gouging can be reported to the Kentucky attorney general.?

The largest wildfire of concern, according to state emergency management officials, is in Knox County near Alex Creek Road; that fire has burned more than 2,500 acres so far. Knox County emergency management director Mike Taylor in an interview with the Lantern said the wildfire thankfully is relatively remote and isn’t near any homes or businesses.?

Another wildfire near the community of Flat Lick, he said, had local residents digging a trench around a home to keep the fire from spreading. Nothing was damaged from that fire.?

“I think it was yesterday or the day before, it was really just smoky throughout the whole county,” Taylor said. “We’ve been really lucky because the wind’s not been real bad down here.”

More than a dozen counties have countywide burn bans in place, which generally prohibit open fires, including campfires, fireworks and open pit grilling.

According to the Division of Forestry, nearly 900 fires so far this year have burned 14,530 acres. The most common cause of reported fires this year was arson, accounting for more than a third of reported fires.?

Wildfires can be reported to a Division of Forestry field office, to a local fire department or by calling 911.?

Republican presidential candidate Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, center, speaks at a campaign event earlier this month in Tampa, Fla. DeSantis touts Florida’s low crime rate, but fewer than 1 in 10 law enforcement agencies in his state reported their crime statistics to the FBI in 2021. (John Raoux/The Associated Press)

When Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis announced his presidential campaign in May, he proudly told the nation that Florida’s crime rate in 2021 had reached a 50-year low.

But really, DeSantis couldn’t say for sure.

That’s because fewer than 1 in 10 law enforcement agencies in his state had reported their crime statistics to the FBI. In fact, more than 40% of the Sunshine State’s population was unaccounted for in the data used by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement in its 2021 statewide crime report.

In Wichita, Kansas, Democratic Mayor Brandon Whipple claimed in May that violent crime had decreased by half during his term. But Whipple’s source, the FBI’s Crime Data Explorer, missed half the violent crimes recorded by the Wichita Police Department, possibly because the agency couldn’t mesh its system with the FBI’s recently revamped system.

Across the country, law enforcement agencies’ inability — or refusal — to send their annual crime data to the FBI has resulted in a distorted picture of the United States’ crime trends, according to a new Stateline analysis of the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting program participation data.

“We have policymakers making policy based on completely incomplete data. We have political elections being determined based on vibes rather than actual data. It’s a mess,” said Jeff Asher, a data analyst and co-founder of AH Datalytics, a data consulting firm.

Experts warn that some policymakers, knowingly or unknowingly, use those flawed statistics to tout promising crime trends — misleading voters. The inaccurate data also can affect efforts to improve public safety and criminal justice, potentially leading policymakers to miss the mark in addressing real community issues.

“The problem for voters is that they don’t have very good information about what levels of safety actually are,” said Anna Harvey, a politics, data science and law professor at New York University. Harvey also is the director of the university’s Public Safety Lab and the president of the Social Science Research Council.

“They’re a little bit vulnerable to politicians who are kind of throwing around allegations and claims about crime that may or may not be accurate,” she told Stateline.

DeSantis faced criticism for repeating the incomplete numbers, and NBC News this summer reported that law enforcement rank-and-file had warned that the statistics weren’t correct.

The Florida Department of Law Enforcement defended the numbers to NBC News, saying, in part, that “criticism about FDLE’s robust data collection methods is unfounded.”

FBI’s switch to a new system

A year ago, when the FBI initially released its 2021 national crime data, there wasn’t enough information to tell whether crime went up, went down or stayed the same. The FBI had estimated results for areas that declined to submit data or were unable to do so.

That’s partly because the FBI had rolled out a new reporting system. The data collection system, called the National Incident-Based Reporting System, or NIBRS, gathered more detail on individual incidents but also required training and tech upgrades by state and local policing agencies.

For the first time in two decades, the national law enforcement reporting rate fell below 70% in 2021, primarily due to the FBI’s transition. In 2022, many law enforcement agencies across the country were not NIBRS-certified in time to submit their 2021 crime data, which contributed to lower reporting rates.

Even before the new system launched, there was a gap in reporting nationwide. Prior to 2021, 23% of U.S. law enforcement agencies on average did not report any crime data to the FBI. In 2020, 24% of agencies did not report, and in 2021, it surged to 40%.

Inconsistent reporting not only hampers the ability to draw comparisons over time and across state lines, but also injects uncertainty into discussions about crime, said Ames Grawert, senior counsel for the Brennan Center for Justice’s justice program. The Brennan Center is a left-leaning law and policy group.

“Issues like that are invariably going to lead to some people having a misunderstanding of crime data — makes it harder to talk about crime in some states, especially given the low participation rate in Florida, for example,” Grawert said in an interview with Stateline.

The FBI’s latest crime report, released earlier this month, offers a glimmer of progress toward transparency: Seventy-one percent of law enforcement agencies nationwide submitted data through NIBRS or the FBI’s previous reporting system, up 11 percentage points from last year. About 60% of participating law enforcement agencies submitted their data exclusively through NIBRS this year. The FBI accepted data through both NIBRS and the older system this year, a change from last year’s NIBRS-only approach.

According to the incomplete numbers, violent crime in the U.S. dropped last year, returning to pre-pandemic levels, while property crimes saw a significant increase.

While crime data reporting to the FBI is optional, some states, such as Illinois and Minnesota, have laws requiring their local law enforcement agencies to report crime data to their state law enforcement agencies. State law enforcement agencies often serve as clearinghouses for local crime data, and in some states, they are responsible for sharing this data with the feds. Some local agencies also may send their data directly to the FBI.

But some states lag.

Florida, Illinois, Louisiana and West Virginia, for example, all remain below the 50% reporting mark, which means less than half of the police departments in their states submitted 2022 crime data to the FBI. Despite these reporting rates, the data shows that greater shares of these state’s populations were represented in last year’s data than in 2021.

Florida has had the lowest reporting rate two years in a row — 6% in 2021 and 44% in 2022 — partly because of the state’s ongoing transition to NIBRS. For 2021, the FBI did not accept Florida’s data through the previous data collection system, which would have represented about 58% of the state’s population, according to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement’s Public Information Office.

“It’s a problem in both red and blue states, it’s also a local issue,” Kylie Murdock, a policy adviser with Third Way, a left-leaning national think tank, said in an interview with Stateline.

“When people use this data to back up tough-on-crime approaches, and say, ‘Our approach in this state is working’ —?when in reality, that’s not necessarily the truth because you don’t know the full scope of the problem,” said Murdock.

Roughly a quarter of the U.S. population was not represented in the 2022 federal crime data, according to a Stateline analysis. More than 6,000 of 22,116 law enforcement agencies did not submit data.

Major police departments, including those in big cities such as Los Angeles and New York, did not submit any data in 2021. NYPD said it couldn’t submit summary statistics in 2021 as it had previously because of the FBI’s change in requirements, but was NIBRS-certified this year. Both cities’ departments did submit summary data to the FBI in 2022 through the old reporting system.

The FBI’s 2021 agency participation data shows that the 10 states with the lowest reporting rates included a balanced mix of both blue and red states, while last year’s data shows more red states among the 10 states with the lowest reporting rates.

Political and social consequences

The gaps in the FBI’s crime data create significant challenges for researchers and policymakers attempting to make sense of crime trends. As elections draw near and crime has reclaimed the spotlight, these challenges become increasingly pressing.

During last year’s congressional elections, 61% of registered voters said violent crime would be very important when making their decision about whom to vote for, according to a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center.

While the overall violent crime rate has steadily declined on average over the past 20 years, the Pew Research Center suggested that voters might be reacting to specific types of violent crime, such as homicide, which saw a 30% increase between 2019 and 2020 — one of the largest year-over-year increases on record.

“Voters tend to not have that kind of access. Politicians then try to play on voters’ concerns about crime, but without giving voters the information that will actually be useful for them,” Harvey said.

Experts expect that the challenge of incomplete national crime data — and the incomplete picture it presents — will persist for years because many law enforcement agencies still are working to adopt the new reporting system.

That could affect how policymakers allocate money for law enforcement, crime prevention programs and other public safety initiatives. With crime data, it’s important to know what types of crimes are included and to avoid narrow timeframes when describing trends, said Ernesto Lopez, a research specialist for the Council on Criminal Justice, a nonpartisan research think tank.

“Oftentimes relying on the FBI data, which tends to be outdated, really allows politicians to sensationalize a few news stories. Without having more up-to-date data, it may not be accurate,” Lopez told Stateline.

“Politician or otherwise, when we talk about crime, it’s really important to have a larger context.”

Federal assistance

Law enforcement agencies nationwide have received over $180 million in federal funding to help with the transition since the FBI’s switch to its new NIBRS reporting system was announced in 2015. Many law enforcement agencies are still working to fully transition to the new system.

For example, in Louisiana, the agencies serving some of the state’s most populous cities, including Lafayette, New Orleans and Shreveport, did not report any data to the FBI last year because they were implementing new records management systems, according to Jim Craft, the executive director of the Louisiana Commission on Law Enforcement.

Louisiana’s low reporting rate may be due to smaller law enforcement agencies reporting crime statistics through their local sheriff’s office, which makes it look like fewer agencies are reporting, Craft wrote in an email.

In Hawaii, the police departments serving Maui and Hawaii counties were not certified in time to submit data through NIBRS to the FBI last year, according to Paul Perrone, the director of the Hawaii Uniform Crime Reporting program. Last month, Hawaii became one of the few states where all law enforcement agencies are NIBRS-certified, Perrone wrote in an email.

Meanwhile, even as more law enforcement agencies submit data in coming years, experts warn that the FBI’s database accounts only for crimes reported to the police. And according to the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics, over 50% of violent crimes and about 70% of property crimes are never reported.

This story is republished from Stateline, a sister publication to the Kentucky Lantern and part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Stateline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Scott S. Greenberger for questions: [email protected]. Follow Stateline on Facebook and Twitter.

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Expect a national emergency alert on your cell phones Wednesday afternoon, but don’t worry – it’s just a test.?

The? Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) will test the Emergency Alert System (EAS) and Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA) to make sure widespread alerts are functional and effective ways to inform the public about real emergencies.?

“Testing the nation’s emergency alert systems is of utmost importance to make sure there is no disconnect during serious emergencies,” Jody Meiman, executive director of Louisville Metro Emergency Services, said in a statement. “We count on these systems to work when we need them and consider them a powerful tool in our toolbox to help alert residents of severe weather, traffic advisories, hazardous materials incidents, missing individuals and other emergencies.”

Cell phones will get an alert from EAS. Televisions and radios will receive a separate alert. The alert is set to go out at 2:20 p.m. EST on Oct. 4. Should weather or other circumstances delay the test, it will happen on Oct. 11 instead.?

The cell phone message will read, in English: “THIS IS A TEST of the National Wireless Emergency Alert System. No action is needed.”?

If a phone is set to Spanish, the test will say: “ESTA ES UNA PRUEBA del Sistema Nacional de Alerta de Emergencia. No se necesita acción.”

The television and radio message is: “This is a nationwide test of the Emergency Alert System, issued by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, covering the United States from 14:20 to 14:50 hours ET. This is only a test. No action is required by the public.”

ZeroV, a Kentucky nonprofit dedicated to ending domestic violence, advises that “while these alerts are invaluable for public safety, they can pose risks to survivors who have hidden phones by alerting the abuser that the phone exists.”?

ZeroV and other similar organizations have recommended that anyone in such a situation should “power off their devices during the test and not schedule phone calls on their hidden cell phone during that time.”?

You can reach the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 800-799-7233 or text START to 88788.?

Republican Rep. Jared Bauman speaks about an omnibus anti-crime plan backed by Louisville GOP state representatives, Sept. 26, 2023. (Kentucky Lantern photo by McKenna Horsley)

LOUISVILLE — Republican state representatives from Louisville plan to file an 18-point omnibus bill in the next legislative session that aims to tackle an “epidemic of crime in our commonwealth,” said the bill’s lead sponsor, Rep. Jared Bauman.?

The bill, which focuses mostly on issues within Louisville and Jefferson County, is backed by seven Republicans and will be reviewed in a Dec. 15 meeting of the Interim Joint Committee on Judiciary. Speaking in a Tuesday afternoon press conference at the River City Fraternal Order of Police headquarters, Bauman said the legislation will give support to law enforcement while adding harsher penalties to criminals.?

“We remain committed to taking serious and meaningful action to support the restoration of stability and society by supporting Kentucky families, supporting our law enforcement and ensuring that our great Commonwealth has the strongest policy possible to hold criminals accountable for their actions,” Bauman said.?

The General Assembly, which has a Republican supermajority in both the House and Senate, will return to Frankfort in January, after Kentucky voters choose their next governor — either? incumbent Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear or Republican Attorney General Daniel Cameron.?

Some proposals in the Louisville Republicans’ plan, such as changing? the state parole board and establishing a Kentucky State Police post in Jefferson County, are part of Cameron’s previously released crime plan. The attorney general expressed support for the legislation in a Tuesday statement.?

Beshear has said that adding a post in Louisville “shows a lack of confidence” in the Louisville Metro Police Department.?

House Republican Whip Jason Nemes, another Louisville lawmaker, said the goal is to make residents feel safe in their communities.?

“When we walk around in our districts, what we hear all around Louisville, all around Kentucky is, ‘Crime’s out of control. I want to go downtown, but I feel unsafe,’” Nemes said. “And so what we’re trying to do is we’re trying to make people safe and make them feel safe.”

According to the Gun Violence Archive, a nonprofit data tracker, Kentucky has had 590 incidents of gun violence since the start of this year. Louisville has had 324 incidents in that time frame. The next highest number of incidents was 73 in Lexington.

According to data from Jan. 1, 2022 to Sept. 26, 2022, 626 incidents were reported in Kentucky and Louisville had 306 incidents. Lexington had 120 incidents in that timeframe.?

Louisville made national headlines earlier this year when a gunman entered the Old National Bank downtown and killed five people. At the time, Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg called on the General Assembly to allow cities to make their own policies to tackle gun violence. State law prohibits local governments from enacting regulations on guns or ammunition.

When asked if anything would be added to the bill to give cities more local control regarding gun violence laws, Bauman said lawmakers are open to hearing more from key stakeholders including Greenberg.?

“We are very eager to, again, as the legislative process plays out over the next three months, work on ways to sharpen the Safer Kentucky Act and really make it the best version possible for the Commonwealth,” Bauman said.?

What’s in the plan

Here’s the 18 points in the Safer Kentucky Act, according to a press release:?

• Create a “three strikes law” for violent persistent felony offenders, which would require life without probation or parole for those convicted of a violent felony that doesn’t qualify as a capital offense if the person already has two separate violent felony convictions on their criminal record. This would also allow the death penalty to be used if the third violent felony is a capital offense.?
• Allow the death penalty or life without parole for people who knowingly sell fentanyl or a fentanyl derivative to someone when the consumption of the substance causes death.?
• Make providing contraband substances — such as fentanyl, carfentanil and fentanyl derivatives — within a jail, prison, or other type of detention center a Class B felony, which carries a sentence between 10 to 20 years.
• Establish a Kentucky State Police post in Jefferson County.?
• Regulate bail fund organizations by preventing charitable organizations from furnishing bail of $5,000 or more; making it unlawful to give bail in any amount for an offense of domestic violence or for a person being held under a civil court order or warrant pursuant to Casey’s Law; requiring those who post bail to give photo ID; and requiring charitable bail organizations to give annual reports to the Interim Joint Committee on Judiciary and make the reports available online. This part of the legislation is named “Madelynn’s Law” after Madelynn Troutt, a 17-year-old who died in a head-on car crash in 2021. A bail organization had posted bond for the driver before the accident. A judge dismissed a lawsuit against the organization in 2022.?
• Allow business employees and owners to “use a reasonable amount of force necessary” for self-protection, stop someone detained from escaping and prevent the loss of goods for sale. This would also give civil and criminal immunity for the employees and owners.?
• Increase penalties for people convicted of attempted murder by requiring them to serve at least 85% of their sentence before becoming eligible for early release and adding attempted murder to the violent offense statute.?
• Require parents to attend juvenile court hearings. The act would also create a fine up to $500 and require up to 40 hours of community service for those who violate the law.?
• Require identification cards or operator’s licenses to be issued to eligible felony offenders as part of re-entering society after incarceration.?
• Create a carjacking statute that would make carjacking a Class C felony, which carries a five to 10 year sentence. If the carjacker causes serious physical injury, the crime would rise to a Class B felony and become a capital offense if the victim dies.?
• Increase penalties for vandalism of public or private property.
• Prevent a person from being eligible for any form of release before completing their sentence if they used a firearm that was possessed in violation of a state law.?
• Allow those with eligible mental illness to be remanded to a sheriff or peace officer’s custody when discharged. The goal is to allow mental health treatment facilities and law enforcement to better coordinate for treatment and transport.?
• Create a state law to allow law enforcement officers to use wiretapping in investigations.?
• Change laws regarding the auction of confiscated guns to allow citizens to bid on murder weapons that will be destroyed by state police. This would allow the gun to remain off the street after being used in a crime while continuing to allow police to collect funds from the sale.?
• Add provisions to prevent street camping on “public streets, sidewalks, paths, or public areas normally used by pedestrians and/or vehicles, private property, homes, or businesses in any way.”?
• Require the death penalty in cases where a law enforcement officer has been murdered.?
• Change the Kentucky Parole Board to allow a governor to remove members and require an unanimous vote of three six-member panels to approve parole.

Terri Redwine, president of the local NAACP chapter, right, addresses, from left, Hopkinsville Police Department Chief Jason Newby, Hopkinsville Mayor James Knight and Christian County Judge-Executive Jerry Gilliam during a meeting on Aug. 21. (YouTube screenshot)

In the wake of an officer’s controversial social media post that drew both support and outrage from community members and tens of thousands of TikTok users, Hopkinsville Police Chief Jason Newby says he’s coordinating plans for all officers to undergo diversity training.

Officer Jerimiah Kline came under fire early this month after posting a TikTok video of him lip syncing “Try That in a Small Town” by country musician Jason Aldean. The song was described by critics as a call to racist vigilantism after the July 14 release of its music video, which was filmed at the site of a historic lynching and included news clips of violent clashes between police and protesters at Black Lives Matter demonstrations in 2020.

As debate stirred in the weeks following the video’s release, the song rose to No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 list, ignited widespread criticism, and had its video pulled by Country Music Television. It was later replaced with a version that omitted the most violent images.

In Kline’s TikTok video — posted the week after Aldean’s video release — he’s in uniform and next to a Hopkinsville police cruiser with emergency lights flashing. It prompted responses from critics who questioned why Kline would post a video featuring the Aldean song after the recent controversy surrounding it.

The concerns carry added significance in a diverse community. Approximately 27% of Hopkinsville residents are Black.

The video, which received more than 150,000 likes, was shared by dozens of supporters who posted videos of themselves lip syncing alongside Kline. Often, the posts included the hashtag #standwithjasonaldean.

Local officials first began receiving complaints about Kline’s video after TikToker Michael McWhorter — who has amassed 5.8 million followers under his handle @TizzyEnt by denouncing apparent racist, homophobic and violent behavior — drew attention to Kline’s take on the Aldean song.

As of Aug. 25, McWhorter’s response, which also points to other Kline videos that he argues are homophobic and unprofessional, had 1.8 million views and nearly 8,000 comments.

Kline, who uses the handle @nlc_gunsanddonuts, has since deleted the video and made his account private. However, his original Aldean video is the sole post under an account using the handle @nlc_gunsanddonutss. The description for the account says “Not agency affiliated. All Toks made off-duty.”

Police department responds, ‘addresses issue’

After receiving complaints about the video, Newby posted a statement to Facebook on Aug. 3 assuring the community that the “issue has been addressed and will not be an issue moving forward.” He went on to note that he was working with city officials to modify policies regarding employees’ use of social media.

In a brief interview with Hoptown Chronicle, Newby declined to identify Kline as the subject of complaints he received. But in an Aug. 4 letter obtained through a Kentucky Open Records Act request, he wrote the following to Human Resources Director Kenneth Grabara:

“Officer Kline had no ill intention when he made the video. He was simply suggesting that Hopkinsville Police Department is not going to tolerate criminals coming into our community and putting our citizens in harm’s way.

“Officer Kline acknowledged that even though he had no ill intention, he understands now how being in uniform while posting on social media can cause issues and it will not happen again.

“Officer Kline did not violate any Hopkinsville Police Department policies, however; I do feel there is a need to adjust our social media policy to better guide our employees in the use of social media and the reflection it may have on our city and agency.”

Newby also told Grabara that Kline would complete diversity awareness, workplace positivity and harassment prevention training.?

On Aug. 4, 10 and 15, records show that Kline took three online courses — Creating a Positive Work Environment; Diversity, Inclusion & Sensitivity; and Preventing Discrimination & Harassment: US Employees. The three classes — provided by online compliance training company Traliant — lasted a combined 1 hour and 25 minutes, Grabara said.

The day before Newby published his statement on the Hopkinsville Police Department’s Facebook page, Kline posted a TikTok that included an image that stated, “Disliking me is one thing. Being able to whoop my ass is another story. Stay safe.”?

The post included an audio clip that looped in the background. It said, “I just want to say this from the bottom of my heart. I’d like to take this chance to apologize … to absolutely nobody.” Still viewable on Aug. 16, the post has since been removed.?

Kline, 26, has been a sworn officer with HPD since March 2020. Previously he was a public safety officer, a position that can lead to sworn officer status after completion of the state police academy’s 20-week course.?

Hoptown Chronicle, in messages sent to the City Clerk’s Office and to Newby, requested to interview Kline. He has not responded.

An Aug. 2 email from Hopkinsville-Christian County Human Rights Commission Director Raychel Farmer to Newby and Hopkinsville Mayor James R. Knight expressed concern for the sentiments in Kline’s video and the negative attention it brought to Hopkinsville. In the email, Farmer urges the officials to “make a public statement of non-support of Officer Kline’s actions and that some disciplinary action will be taken.”

No disciplinary action or recent change in employment status is indicated by the records the city provided to Hoptown Chronicle. City officials said there were no records of citizen complaints involving Kline.?

The city denied Hoptown Chronicle’s request for Kline’s employee evaluations, citing a privacy exemption to the open records law. Hoptown Chronicle filed a second request, asking the city to reconsider based on a substantiated public interest that outweighs the privacy interest in this case. The city again denied the request for Kline’s evaluations.?

Community members express outrage, support?

The debate surrounding Kline’s social media messaging dominated the Aug. 15 meeting of Hopkinsville City Council. Fifteen people spoke before a packed council chambers, and of those, 10 were critical of him. Some said HPD should fire the officer for his online behavior.?

Kline, in civilian clothes, was present but did not speak.

While the video featuring “Try That in a Small Town” initially generated most of the pushback against Kline, the criticism heard at the council meeting centered around his use of the “OK” hand signal throughout social media.

The gesture has been adopted in recent years by white supremacists as a “white power” symbol. Kline’s supporters at the council meeting said it has a different, benign meaning to them. They described it as a game many have played since they were children, where the symbol is flashed to make someone look — similar to a “gotcha” game.??

In July 2018, four police officers in Jasper, Alabama, were suspended for flashing the same hand symbol in a photograph.?

“One of the issues was the picture with the hand sign. I don’t actually care what he thought it meant. It doesn’t matter,” Hopkinsville resident Becky Dearman told city council members.

“He is supposed to protect and serve all of us, and I feel not that protected,” she said. “The contents of his TikTok were not just racist, they were homophobic. One of the things that I told Mayor Knight was, ‘I’m going to be honest I wouldn’t feel super secure if I had a call to the police in the middle of the night and a cop that had put blatantly homophobic material up showed up to my house.’”

Nancy Askew, who is Dearman’s fiancée, said, “There wasn’t just a symbol on a photo. … There’s a clear pattern of behavior for his public image and the image that he portrays with his badge on.”

Jeff Taylor, a former state representative and economic development official for Tennessee Valley Authority and the state of Kentucky, asked for the “immediate dismissal” of Kline. He said the council should consider how many employees of a store, a factory, bank, hospital or school would keep their job if they flashed a symbol that community members view as racist.??

“He’s ruining it for a lot of good officers,” said Taylor. “And there are good officers.”

Taylor later told Hoptown Chronicle, “I truly don’t believe there’s (another) police force in the entire nation that would allow this.”

Cherry West, who previously owned a liquor store in Hopkinsville, spoke to council about negative views of Hopkinsville and the police force for past allegations of aggressive behavior toward soldiers and minorities. The perception persists, and it’s why? Clarksville, Tennessee, has vastly outpaced Hopkinsville in population growth, she said.

Robert Bussell, a Black man who described a longtime friendship with Kline and his family, said the meaning of the hand symbol has been blown out of proportion.?

“It’s as simple as, ‘I got you,’ or ‘Made you look,’” he said, adding, “It’s not about race.”

Bussell said he has personally seen Kline helping Black residents in distress.?

Former Hopkinsville Police Chief Clayton Sumner, who stepped down earlier this year, said retirement allows him to speak with no filter. He described Kline’s TikTok videos — which frequently appear with the hashtag #humanizethebadge — as a light-hearted approach to help the community see police officers as people. He said those criticizing Kline are trying to cause controversy rather than trying to fix things.

Transparency, cooperation sought

During an NAACP meeting Aug. 21 in Hopkinsville City Council chambers, Newby told local chapter president Terri Redwine that he wants her to review changes that are coming to HPD policies in light of recent criticisms.

“We are changing nearly every policy that the Hopkinsville Police Department has. Once we have those in place … I would like for you and whatever committee to go over those with us for any recommendations for changes,” Newby told Redwine.

The meeting included several NAACP members who observed while Redwine questioned Newby, the mayor and Christian County Judge-Executive Jerry Gilliam on several race-related issues. The city taped the meeting and published the video on its YouTube channel.

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A few days before the NAACP meeting, Redwine and Newby met to discuss the controversy over Kline’s social media, she said.

Newby declined to elaborate on their discussion during the meeting. “The concerns were heard. It has been addressed and it is still being addressed. And that’s about as much as I can say,” he said.

While Redwine said the NAACP “will not continue to debate the Jerimiah Kline debacle,” she also spoke about race relations more broadly and what is at stake in Hopkinsville.

“I feel that too many of our Black people are moving out of the city of Hopkinsville because they are being racially profiled,” she said, adding her siblings won’t even come to the city because they believe it is “blatantly racist.”

Local officials cannot control everything, but others pick up “the vibe that you portray,” she told Newby, Knight and Gilliam.

“We do not want another Breonna Taylor here in Hopkinsville. We don’t want division. We want this community to remain our community as a whole. We don’t need outsiders here telling us how to run our community,” she said.

But if outside help is needed, it will happen, she said.

Redwine said her approach is to go straight to local officials for answers. But others won’t do that, she warned.

She also addressed members of the community. Prayer, transparency and communication are key, she said, adding “stay off social media and the madness.”

Complaining on social media is useless, she said. If someone has a complaint, they ought to file a formal complaint. “We must have a paper trail,” she said.

Redwine, who became the chapter president earlier this year, encouraged local residents to join the NAACP. The organization is not a “secret society,” she said.

“I don’t want it to be us versus them. I want it to be we the people,” she said.

She also said, “I live here in Hopkinsville. I will not be harassed by no police officers because of what I said, because you are going to hear it if I do.”

Looking forward

Newby told Hoptown Chronicle in an Aug. 22 email that the city’s human resources office is working with Hopkinsville Community College to provide diversity training for the officers. The details are pending.

Since Newby became chief earlier this year, HPD has made several hires and now has 79 officers. It is the first time in about 10 years that all of the department’s positions have been filled, officials said at the Aug. 1 city council meeting.

“It is my plan to have all officers attend the training,” Newby said in the email

This article is republished from Hoptown Chronicle.

Gov. Andy Beshear released his public safety plan on Wednesday, Aug. 9, 2023. (File photo for Kentucky Lantern by McKenna Horsley)

Gov. Andy Beshear on Wednesday called for more money for training, body armor and raises for law enforcement in what he says will be the first of several spending plans he’ll announce over the next month.

Beshear acknowledged that governors typically reveal budget proposals around the time lawmakers return to Frankfort in January, but said he was taking this tack because House Republicans filed an executive branch budget proposal before he unveiled his own in 2022.

Of course, it remains to be seen who will oversee the executive branch when the General Assembly convenes for the 60-day session to decide on appropriations. Beshear, a Democrat, is running for reelection against Republican Attorney General Daniel Cameron. Voters will decide between them in November.

“These are real steps, real actions,” Beshear said after introducing his plan. “It’s one thing to say you back to blue and it’s another to do something about it, to provide the resources, to take the steps that improve public safety.”

In response, Cameron, who released his own 12-point public safety plan last month, issued a statement saying Beshear was “trying to rewrite his record” in an election year. He called Beshear the “catch and release candidate,” referring to a 2021 report about inmates who were released early during the pandemic. The report found a third were later charged with a felony.

“I am still the only candidate in this race with a plan to reduce crime,” Cameron said. “And I am the only candidate in this race who actually has the relationships in the legislature to deliver.”

Here’s what Beshear is calling for in the next state budget:

• Changes to law enforcement pensions, which includes moving all law enforcement pension plans back to defined pension benefits as well as increasing pension income for retired KSP troopers and local jurisdictions in those plans.
• A $2,500 raise for all KRS Chapter 16 employees, which includes troopers, vehicle enforcement officers and more.
• Raising the current $4,300 training stipend for local law enforcement officers to $4,800, building on a $300 increase in the current budget. Beshear would also like to make part-time local law enforcement officers eligible for the training stipend.
• Making grant funds available to upgrade body armor for local law enforcement officers.

Cameron’s public safety plan included $5,000 bonuses for all Kentucky law enforcement officers, opposing subpoena powers for civilian review boards that give oversight to police departments, and focused largely on Louisville.

Both Beshear and Cameron highlighted a surplus in the state’s “rainy day fund” in their announcements. Kentucky finished the 2023 fiscal year with a revenue surplus estimated at $1.4 billion, the third year in a row the surplus has topped $1 billion, while bringing in a record $15.1 billion in general fund tax revenue.

The two candidates have also racked up endorsements from various law enforcement officers in the state.

On Wednesday, Beshear was joined by Kentucky State Commissioner Col. Phillip Burnett Jr. and KSP Trooper Billy Ball, who survived an event that Beshear said inspired the proposed body armor grants.

Ball was among officers who responded to what would become a deadly shooting in Floyd County in 2022. Three troopers and a police dog died. Ball recounted how body armor protected him during the incident so he could aid other troopers.

“I decided to leave cover and move forward to locate the shooter but little did I know I would be the next target,” Ball said. “I was blinded by the evening sun and the shooter fired but missed me. The next shot struck me in the back as I turned to retreat to cover. The round hit my plate carrier which provided such protection, I initially questioned if I’d even been shot.”

Ball encouraged other police officers to wear body armor not just to protect themselves, but make themselves a better officer and allow them to continue to serve.

Burnett, appointed by Beshear in 2021, said that recent pay increases for troopers supported by the governor and the General Assembly have made KSP competitive in recruitment. KSP went from ranking 74th among state agencies for starting pay when Burnett started in 2021 to now being in the top five. The agency has been advertising its starting pay as $65,000.

“We’re really good right now but we have to be looking at how our agency operates,” Burnett said. “We have to be looking out into the future. And by doing these things, we’re looking out into the future to make sure that we always remain competitive.”

Crime in Kentucky was down in 2022 compared with the previous year. (Photo by Brandon Bell, Getty Images)

Incidents of violent crime decreased across Kentucky in 2022 compared to the previous year, according to an annual state report released Wednesday.?

The 2022 Crime in Kentucky Report showed about a 9.2% drop in the number of reported Group A offenses — which include the state’s most serious offenses including arson, homicide, bribery, burglary, and fraud — compared to 2021 as reported by local law enforcement agencies. The data comes from the National Incident-Based Reporting System.

Among Group A offenses, reports of animal cruelty increased by 19%, reports of homicide decreased by 33% and reports of counterfeiting and forgery increased by 19%.?

The most common Group A offenses reported were drug and narcotic related, which made up 22.6% of the total offenses, and larceny and theft, which accounted for 23.9% of the total Group A offenses. Both those categories of offenses were down from 2021.

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear during a Wednesday news conference said Kentucky State Police attribute some of the increases in specific crimes to “more law enforcement bringing the crime to light and making arrests.”?

“Like every crime, we will make sure that our state and local law enforcement have the resources they need to fight back,” Beshear said.

Among the more than 300,000 total reported Group A and Group B offenses, Black people were disproportionately arrested in the state, reflecting nationwide racial disparities in arrests.?

Black people were arrested 50,169 times for various offenses in 2022, about 15.4% of all offenses that year. Black Kentuckians make up about 8.7% of the state’s population.?

The report also includes a breakdown of offenses by county, data on reported hate crimes and breakdowns of offenses by age, race and sex.?