Crime Fix with Angenette Levy - Judge Killed in Chambers May Be Tied To Sex Scandal: Audio

Episode Date: December 9, 2024

Newly-released audio recordings have surfaced that have raised questions about whether a judge shot to death in his chambers might have been having sex with women in exchange for preferential treatment. Former Letcher County Sheriff Mickey Stines is charged with the murder of Judge Kevin Mullins last September. Sabrina Adkins is suing Stines and the county after a deputy admitted coercing her into having sex with him. Law&Crime's Angenette Levy talks with Adkins' attorney in this episode of Crime Fix — a daily show covering the biggest stories in crime.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW: Download the FREE Upside App at https://upside.app.link/crimefix to get an extra 25 cents back for every gallon on your first tank of gas.Host:Angenette Levy  https://twitter.com/Angenette5Guest:Ned PillersdorfCRIME FIX PRODUCTION:Head of Social Media, YouTube - Bobby SzokeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinVideo Editing - Daniel CamachoGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this law and crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. A judge shot to death in his chambers by his good friend, the now former sheriff. Now, new details are coming to light about what could have been going on in the background involving the judge and sex in his chambers. Welcome to Crime Fix. I'm Anjanette Levy. It's been nearly three months since Judge Kevin Mullins was shot to death in his chambers in Letcher County, Kentucky. And now recordings that have surfaced that include allegations about sex in the courthouse are giving us some new insight into what may have been going on in

Letcher County. The shooting of Judge Mullins shocked anyone who heard about it. You just don't hear about something like this happening. And if you do, the shooter certainly isn't the county sheriff. But Kentucky State Police say that's exactly what happened back on September 19th. Longtime friends, Letcher County Sheriff Mickey Steins and Judge Kevin Mullins went to lunch together. And within a matter of hours, Steins was recorded on video shooting Mullins. At a preliminary hearing, a detective described what happened leading up to the shooting. Are you aware of anything so far in your investigation that would tell us there was any issues at launch between Judge- No. Mullins and Sheriff Steins?

No. Someone on behalf of the KSP has spoken to those witnesses? Yes, they've all been interviewed. And there was nothing unusual that had arisen during that luncheon? I was told that the judge made a statement to Mickey about, do we need to meet private in my chambers. That's all I was told. Do you know the context of what the conversation was before that they would need to discuss in chambers? I do not. And have you had an opportunity to review the video of the prior incident? I have. And can you describe for us what happened immediately prior to the

clip that we saw? Sheriff Steins uses his telephone to make some phone calls. He then borrows Judge Mullen's cell phone and appears to make a call on that. And that led to what you just saw. That led to then Sheriff Steins pulling his gun and shooting Judge Mullins. The entire thing was caught on video, which we've frozen and not shown you the actual shooting. It's just so horrifically violent. And after that, Sheriff Steins was taken into custody and charged with murder. In the background of all of this, a federal civil lawsuit filed by a woman named Sabrina Atkins. She was arrested in 2021 for a drug charge.

Atkins is now suing the Letcher County Sheriff's Office over a former deputy named Ben Fields having sex with her while she was on home incarceration. Atkins claimed in her suit that she couldn't afford to pay for the ankle bracelet and was afraid to go back to jail. So Fields, who was supervising her on home incarceration, offered to help her in exchange for sex. Atkins said she and Fields had sex in Judge Mullins' chambers six times. Fields eventually was charged criminally and served six months in jail. He's supposed to be on probation for six and a half years. So what does this have to do with Sheriff Steins and Judge Mullins? Well, Steins had been deposed in Atkins' lawsuit in the days before shooting Mullins. He was the boss after all. Did that play

a role? We really don't know. In 2022, investigators with the Kentucky Attorney General's office interviewed Sabrina Atkins, and she claimed to have seen tapes of Judge Mullins having sex with a woman in his chambers. He does have some videotapes of some stuff in the judge's chambers. What kind of stuff? Just with girls, sexual and stuff. What, describe? Have you seen the videos? I've seen one, partly, you know,

just him having sex with girls to further be able to get out of jail. Who was having sex? Ben and just some higher ups up there. Who? The judge and. And you saw the video? Mm-hmm, yeah.

What did you see on the video? I mean, you- I mean, I've seen Judge Walens. I'm sick with the girl. Who was the girl? I don't know. Because I don't know a lot of people from... Where was it at? In his office, in the judge's chambers.

Is that the same place that you were meeting Ben? Is that how you know it was the judge's chambers? Yeah. And this was Judge who? Walens. But you don't know who the girl was? We obtained that audio in a records request from the Attorney General's office. News Nation was actually the first to report on that audio.

But you just saw the judge. Right. Do you know for sure that was the judge? Yes. I mean, how do you know that's the judge? I'll be in front of him. His face is pretty clear on there. Sabrina Atkins talked in the interview about why she filed the lawsuit.

Like I said, my only goal is to make sure this don't happen to somebody else. I struggle with it real bad. I want to tell you about Upside. It's a free app that gets you cash back on things like gas and restaurants. This is real cash back. It's money that appears in your Upside app that you can transfer straight into your bank account. I used Upside when I went to Dunkin' Donuts for a cup of tea. I claimed an offer for Dunkin' on the app, paid as usual using a card, and got cash back. It's so

easy. You can also use Upside at places like Shell, Exxon, 7-Eleven, Taco Bell, and that's just to name a few. To download Upside and start earning, click the link in the description or scan the QR code on your screen and use the promo code CrimeFix to get an extra 25 cents back on every gallon on your first tank of gas. That's promo code CrimeFix for extra cash back. I want to bring in Ned Pillarsdorf. He represents Sabrina Adkins in her civil suit against Letcher County. So Ned, first of all, tell me your thoughts, your response to this audio that's come out. Obviously, you've known about this for a while, where Sabrina is basically telling the investigators,

I've seen videotapes of Judge Mullins and other higher-ups having sex with women in the judge's chambers. I was present when she told that to the attorney General Investigator. The chronology was we filed the lawsuit on behalf of Sabrina and another woman who we claim was sexually extorted for favors. That other woman, by the way, is now deceased. And after that lawsuit got filed, Sabrina sat down with a representative of the Kentucky Attorney General Office

and gave a four- five hour interview that was recorded. And in that interview, she said what you just mentioned. It's not directly involved in our civil suit. that, you know, we filed a sweeping lawsuit against the bailiff, I guess, slash ankle bracelet operator. And we alleged that the county knew or should have known specifically Sheriff Stines about the sexual extortion. And, you know, two years later, everything Sabrina said has turned out to be true. You know, how do we know that? You know, after we filed the civil lawsuit, the attorney general's office moved in, indicted Fields. And significantly, if he goes through Fields, he was the bailiff, the angled bracelet operator.

He pled guilty to everything we said. And there were some pretty sweeping allegations. And he is a convicted felon, sex offender. And, you know, in terms of Sabrina, I know she's under the spotlight. I'm not objective. I'm her lawyer. But I think she's been pretty courageous. And, you know, and probably one of the most important things in terms of the criminal justice system, I've only been a criminal defense lawyer in Appalachia for 43 years. What's changed dramatically is the number of women who are in drug court ankle bracelet situations. They are so vulnerable to sexual extortion. We don't think what happened to Sabrina and the other three women

we know feels extorted. We don't think that's an isolated incident. And we're frankly, the reason I'm talking to you today, we're hoping that the national publicity would be that if you're running an ankle bracelet program, drug court program, which in Appalachia, half the participants are women, how easily extortable these women are for sexual extortion, which is clearly what happened in our case. Sabrina mentions in the interview with the AG's office, you were there, I don't have to tell you what she said, but she says clearly that Judge Mullins was having sex with girls and she could have just meant women. We don't know, but she saw what she saw on the videotapes. Has any investigation been done, to your knowledge, by the AG's office into Judge Mullins? She said other higher-ups too. So was

there ever any type of investigation further investigation into what was going on in that courthouse i obviously don't know they i don't think they would confide in me uh what i do know is you know since then unbelievably the sheriff shot the judge and i do know the lawyer for the sheriff is a very competent lawyer. Basically said our lawsuit was I forgot his exact words were front and center of their defense. You know, everybody. That's what he told me. You know, they're going to look into every aspect of that. He made some comment after the arraignment, this is the criminal defense lawyer, Mr. Bartley. They asked him, was his case related to my civil lawsuit,

the allegations? And he basically said yes. And I know right after that, my phone was ringing. You know, I wondered from day one, I mean, we took the sheriff's deposition in the room I'm sitting in on a Monday. Three days later, we know he shot and killed the judge. Were those events related? I don't know. As a result of that, what investigations are going on, not going on?

I don't know. The only good that's come out of this unbelievable tragedy is there has been interest in making sure that the ladies like Sabrina, who I think has been courageous, and exposing how vulnerable these women are, what role Judge Mullins had or didn't have, we don't know. What Sabrina said during the interview and like I said, she says in the interview that

she saw a video, as I understand it, that another woman apparently clandestinely videoed the judge acting inappropriately and the way she saw the video was the girl's boyfriend showed it to her. We don't have the video. We have Sabrina's word for what she saw. But all I'll say is, you know, two years in, everything Sabrina sat in my office and told me two years ago is proven to be true.

What happened? Let's go back to the deposition of Sheriff Steins. What happened during that deposition? I mean, was there anything that took place that was, I mean, was it really contentious? I mean, because he was being sued as part of this suit for not properly supervising and training Ben Fields. It was an unusual deposition in the sense that I filed other civil rights suits against public officials. Usually they're combative, they're talkative. The deposition was actually consistent with the very odd initial appearance when signs

appeared the first time in court. At that point, District Judge Wilhoyt asked him perfunctory questions, and he either hesitated, didn't answer. He had an odd demeanor. The deposition was tense. I mean, this was not a good subject. I mean, the lawsuit we filed was sweeping. We have really said, and I've used the word brothel, that they turned that courthouse into something like a

brothel. I mean, Sabrina's allegations are more than just that she was forced to have sex in the judge's chambers. The one moment I won't forget in all of this is when Sabrina was interviewed by the attorney general office. This is before Fields got indicted. She described how they pimped her out, that she was told that she could get somehow preferential treatment in the courthouse by having sex with this elderly gentleman. And she did it. She was being extorted, which goes to the point we've been trying to make is how vulnerable these women are in drug court and ankle bracelet situations. We've seen 42 years ago, I'm a criminal defense lawyer, you hardly ever saw a woman indicted. If you go to a criminal court today in Appalachia, most of the criminal defendants are women,

drug charges. I think I've got maybe 14 or 15 pending now. And they are so subject to what happened to Sabrina. We don't think what happened to her is an isolated incident. Women who are in drug court or ankle bracelet, the way the game is played, they know that a simple phone call to the judge will say, hey, she violated an ankle bracelet condition or she violated a drug court condition. They're back in jail. And they know they may not be believed if they say this is not true. So in a way, what happened to Sabrina, while in some ways it's surprising, it was almost foreseeable in that someone like Fields would take advantage of her and in his case took advantage to the extreme where I still can't get over the fact that he pimped her out and she felt compelled to comply.

Well, the alternative is back in jail. You mentioned earlier something about her possibly having sex with an elderly gentleman. You know, that was something that was brought up. Who is that elderly gentleman? I don't want to say his name. Was it Judge Mullins? I mean, he doesn't seem elderly. It was not Judge Mullins. It's in the lawsuit we filed. And it's something feels frankly acknowledged during his eventual guilty plea. And by the way, it was a guilty plea. Yes, he admitted to it fully, yes.

I spoke to the attorney general who prosecuted the case, Barbara Whaley, who's been a prosecutor here in Kentucky for 40 years. And I asked her, what was Mullen's defense? Take that back. I misspoke. What was Field's defense? And she flat out said, Ned, he had no defense. Bled guilty.

He confessed. And he was the bailiff. Well-known, well-liked figure in Letcher County. And as best I can tell, he's well-respected. And these were shocking allegations. But on the other hand, you know, when the Attorney General's office, I don't know if we contacted him. I think they contacted us after we filed the lawsuit. I could be wrong.

When we showed them the text messages from Fields and Sabrina, it left no doubt that something sexual was clearly going on. And it obviously can't be consented to. She's basically a de facto prisoner. When you say that they were running a brothel out of the courthouse, I mean, how deep does this go or how high up does it go? Because we have an allegation by Sabrina that the judge was having sex in his chambers with women or girls or however she put it. And then Sabrina is having sex because she feels coerced and compelled to do so by Ben Fields. So was everybody, I mean, were a lot of judges or other judges in the courthouse having sex with detainees in exchange for preferential treatment in their court cases? I mean, how widespread was this? And was Mickey Stines potentially getting ready to blow the whistle on it?

We don't know. What we do know is no doubt Fields has acknowledged sex with three women. One of the women is not in our lawsuit. The other woman has since died. So that's three. We know from Sabrina's statement and Fields' guilty plea that he pimped her out. So we're up to four. And then we have Sabrina saying she does not have the videotape that she saw a videotape of Mullins acting inappropriately that's about as far as I can say

is that equivalent to them running a brothel out of the courthouse well they were having sex at least twice in the judge's chambers and according to Sabrina, the pimping was to basically to satisfy the bailiff who apparently had a lot of influence in that courthouse. You know, the lawsuit was a sweeping lawsuit, but I'm satisfied two years later

that everything Sabrina has said has proven to be true. You just need to review the feels guilty plea, the felony guilty plea. What comes next with Sabrina's lawsuit? Well, I mean, it's proceeding. It was put on hold because of these extraordinary circumstances. It's proceeding. It's a civil lawsuit. And in fairness to the defendants, and in fairness to Steins, he denied liability during the deposition. He said he didn't know. And they've denied liability. It's a civil lawsuit. We may do well. We may not do well. Well, we will keep an eye on it for sure. And it'll be interesting to see whether or not all of this converges within the murder case, because there are a lot of questions still left unanswered here.

Ned Pillarsdorf, thank you so much for joining me. Okay. I appreciate you having me. And that's it for this episode of Crime Fix. I'm Anjanette Levy. Thanks so much for being with me. I'll see you back here next time.