Former Kansas police chief to face criminal charge after newspaper raid, prosecutors say

The former Kansas police chief who led the raid on a newspaper last summer will be charged with interfering with the judicial process, special prosecutors announced Monday.

The charge against Gideon Cody will be filed in Marion County District Court, according to a report by Sedgwick County District Attorney Marc Bennett and Riley County Attorney Barry Wilkerson.

The two were appointed to review the Aug. 11, 2023 raid at the Marion County Record. The investigation generated nearly 10,000 pages of documents.

The 124-page report analyzes the execution of the search warrants at the newspaper and the fallout after the raid, which drew international condemnation. The anticipated charge appears centered on text messages exchanged between Cody and Kari Newell, a local business owner, following the raid.

Searches were also conducted at the home of former Vice Mayor Ruth Herbel and the home of the newspaper’s publishers, Joan Meyer and her son Eric Meyer. Joan Meyer, 98, died the next day.

The report acknowledged that Joan Meyer was extremely upset by the searches and may not have died Aug. 12 if the raids had not been carried out. But the prosecutors concluded that the officers were not criminally responsible for her death.

The warrants were withdrawn the next week by the local prosecutor who found there was “insufficient evidence.”

Reached by phone on Monday morning, Eric Meyer said it was too early for him to react because he was still reading the report.

Cody did not return a voicemail seeking comment. Cody, a former Kansas City police officer, resigned from the Marion Police Department in the weeks after the raid.

Several lawsuits were filed in the wake of the raid. The newspaper alleges the raid resulted in First and Fourth Amendment violations and is seeking more than $10 million in damages.

Herbel — who filed a lawsuit against several local officials, including Cody, for the raid on her house — said she was glad to be cleared of any wrongdoing in the report, but disappointed that Cody is the only person facing a criminal charge.

“I’m sad that more people — more players — have not been charged because it went past Cody,” Herbel said in a phone interview. “There were a lot more people involved in this whole process, and it’s caused a lot of damage to Marion and to the people who were involved.”

Report findings

The raids were carried out under the pretense that a Marion County Record reporter, Phyllis Zorn, had illegally obtained information about Newell’s DUI conviction on the Kansas Department of Revenue’s website.

According to the report, Marion police officer Zach Hudlin called the state agency to ask about their system on Aug. 7. 2023. The representative said the agency was “trying to fix” an issue because “anybody can pull it up.”

Hudlin, the report said, “reached the erroneous conclusion” that Zorn had falsified her identity to access Newell’s driving record. It was difficult to tell if his conclusion was a result of confirmation bias, a hurried investigation or a misunderstanding with what the KDOR representative was explaining, the report said.

Hudlin was named interim police chief after Cody resigned.

The report noted that authorities did not interview Zorn prior to carrying out the searches.

It clears Zorn and everyone else who obtained Newell’s information, including Herbel and Eric Meyer, as the information can be accessed on a public-facing website.

The newspaper alleged that the raid was conducted to retaliate against its investigation into Cody’s history. He left the Kansas City Police Department while under internal review for allegedly making sexist comments to a female officer.

During the search, Cody looked through a reporter’s desk and says, “What’s in this? Hmm, a file on me? Keep a personal file on me, I don’t care.”

The file was not removed from the newsroom during the raid.

“If Chief Cody harbored ill-motives toward the Marion County Record, he managed to keep them hidden in personal communications with other officers both verbal and electronic,” the prosecutors’ report concluded. It goes on to say that “it is not a crime under Kansas law for a law enforcement officer to conduct a poor investigation.”

Fallout from the raid

As negative attention exploded in the days after the raid, Cody tried to defend his actions. He told Marion County Attorney Joel Ensey that the Kansas Bureau of Investigation was “100% behind me.”

A KBI investigator said “he had to live in fantasy land to get that picture.” She went on to describe Cody as “a rabid squirrel in a cage.”

Marion County Sheriff Jeff Soyez reportedly told Ensey, “You’re getting ready to get a big, old, nasty, hairy case dropped in your lap. I would suggest you hire a special prosecutor and just stay away from this entire case.”

Ensey consulted with other prosecutors, including Bennett and Wilkerson, to review the search warrants that had been executed. The special prosecutors said they had no involvement in the case again until they were asked by the Colorado Bureau of Investigation to review the case.

Even as Cody expressed worry, he doubled down, preparing charging affidavits on Eric Meyer, Zorn and Herbel on Aug. 16, 2023. The affidavits included allegations of violations of federal law, even though state prosecutors would not have a role in such cases. Charges were not filed.

On Sept. 29, Marion City Administrator Brogan Jones found out that Cody had instructed Newell to delete text messages. Cody was put on administrative leave and he resigned on Oct. 2.

The Colorado Bureau of Investigation took over the case in mid-November and handed over its investigation to the special prosecutors.

The prosecutors’ report concluded that “there is no evidence that Marion law enforcement agents recognized the inadequacy of the investigation or intentionally or knowingly misled either other law enforcement agents of the court.”

It also said that the warrant for the newspaper was “insufficient to overcome additional protections afforded to the press by virtue of the Kansas Shield Law,” which grants protections to journalists and that search warrants of newsrooms “should be sought only in extraordinary circumstances and with extreme caution.”

This story was originally published August 5, 2024 at 10:12 AM.