By Liya Cui
(Reuters) - A former Kansas police chief who made news last year when he raided a local weekly newspaper will be charged with interfering in the judicial process, two special prosecutors said.
The raid on the Marion County Record newspaper led by former Marion Police Chief Gideon Cody was widely condemned by advocates of press freedom, pushing Marion, a town of just 2,000 people, into the national spotlight.
Cody led raids on Aug. 11, 2023, at the newspaper's office and the home of its publisher, Eric Meyer, who did not respond to a request for comment.
Meyer's mother and co-owner of the newspaper, 98-year-old Joan Meyer, died the next day. Meyer blamed her death on stress caused by the raid.
According to a 124-page report released on Monday by the two special prosecutors, the paper committed no crimes before Cody led the raid.
"The specter of ulterior motives, personal animus and conclusions based not on investigation but rather on assumptions permeates much of this case," said the report by Sedgwick County District Attorney Marc Bennett and Riley County Attorney Barry Wilkerson. "Small town familiarity explains but does not excuse the inadequate investigation that gave rise to the search warrant applications in this matter."
The charge against Cody will be filed later this week in Marion County District Court, the Sedgwick County Office of the District Attorney said.
A phone number listed under Cody's name in an online directory did not respond to a request for comment. The identity of Cody's lawyers in the potential new case was not immediately clear.
Last August, Cody wrote on the Marion Police Department's Facebook page: "I believe when the rest of the story is available to the public, the judicial system that is being questioned will be vindicated."
Marion police obtained search warrants to investigate whether the Marion County Record committed identity theft and computer crime when it accessed the driving record of a local restaurant owner, Kari Newell.
Cody was suspended from his job last September and resigned a few days later.
The prosecutors' report concluded that Marion police did not mislead the court or other law enforcement agents because they "genuinely believed they were investigating criminal acts."
The charge against Cody stems from possible actions he took following the raids. Two pages from a written statement by Newell were missing after they were submitted as evidence. She said they concerned her interactions with Cody, who also asked her to delete text messages between them, according to the report.
(Reporting by Liya Cui in New York; Editing by Matthew Lewis)
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