TRIAL STOPS AND STARTS AT MITCHELL COUNTY COURTHOUSE IN BELOIT MONDAY JULY 18TH

Criminal Trial Starts and Stops at Mitchell County Courthouse on Monday

By Terry Bailey

The Mitchell County Courthouse was abuzz with activity Monday morning, July 18^th. The Mitchell County District Court was preparing for a possible four day jury trial and a jury was in the process of being empaneled Approximately 70 potential jurors selected from driver’s license rolls for Mitchell County had been summoned for possible jury duty.

Thirty-seven names were randomly chosen to be seated in the jury selection area. County Attorney Mark Noah, State’s prosecutor in the case, briefed the potential jurors on the process of serving on a jury and asked a number of general questions such as “Do you believe you could remain unbiased and be able to render a fair and impartial verdict if you served on the jury?” Noah also asked questions regarding previous knowledge of the trial, preconceived ideas as to guilt or innocence, personal, family, or business associations with the defendant and so forth. At the conclusion of Noah’s questioning the defendant’s attorney Roger Struble repeated the process from a defendant’s point of view.

After this lengthy process was concluded, the Honorable Kim Cudney, presiding judge for the trial, Mr. Noah and Mr. Struble recessed to the judge’s chambers to select 12 jurors and one alternate from the 37 potential jurors.

After a period of time, the attorneys and the judge returned to the courtroom. The selected jurors were called one at a time to the jury box along with one alternate.

After preliminary remarks by Judge Cudney to the jury, the Court was recessed for lunch. It was announced the trial was to begin at 1:30 p.m. when the Court returned to session after the lunch break.

The case in question was the State of Kansas vs. Tommy Boden. Boden was facing three charges:

Rape of a female less than 14 years of age.

Aggravated indecent liberties with a child less than 14 years of age.

Electronic solicitation of a child less than 14 year of age.

These actions were alleged to have occurred between July1, 2013 and July 31, 2013.

Boden pled not guilty to all charges.

Mark Noah, Mitchell County Attorney was serving as the prosecutor. Representing the defendant were Roger Struble and Allie Prester of the Blackwell and Struble Law Firm of Salina.

At 1:30 p.m., the scheduled time for the court to return to session, neither attorneys nor the Judge were in the Courtroom. At 1:45 there were some comings and goings but of no substance. 2:00 came and went with no activity. At approximately 2:30 all the parties returned to the Courtroom and Court was called into session. It soon became apparent that the reasons for the delay was because of deliberations between the prosecution and defense.

New charges were read to Boden:

Count 1 - Aggravated Battery – Level five person felony.

Count 2 – Criminal Threat – Level 9 person felony

Count 3 – Aggravated Child Endangerment – Level 9 person felony

Boden pled guilty to all three charges. The bottom line was that by pleading guilty to these charges the original charges were dismissed.

Sentencing for this matter is scheduled for August 11 at 1:00 p.m. Boden was dismissed with the same sanctions in place previous to this trial. The recently selected jurors were then dismissed.

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Beloit, KS 67420, USA