Missouri sheriff involved in inmate death removed from job
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A Missouri sheriff who was arrested last month on assault and other charges has been suspended from office after he was involved in a jail altercation last week in which an inmate died, the state’s top prosecutor said.
Attorney General Josh Hawley said in a news release Wednesday that a Mississippi County judge granted a request Tuesday night to remove Cory Hutcheson from his position as the sheriff of the rural county of about 14,000 residents that’s about 150 miles (240 kilometres) south of St. Louis. He said the order will prevent Hutcheson from “interfering” in the investigation of the inmate’s death Friday and from “any further abuse of his office.” He has 10 days to respond to the order revoking his authority to serve as sheriff.
Hawley said at a news conference later Wednesday that he believes that Hutcheson “directed the altercation” at the county jail that preceded the death of 28-year-old Tory Sanders. Hutcheson’s sheriff’s license was suspended after his April arrest, which would have prevented him from acting as sheriff after he was released from jail. But the terms of the suspension still allowed him access to law enforcement facilities such as the jai, he said.
Hawley said it is unclear what Hutcheson was doing at the jail prior to the altercation and why he was directing jail personnel. He said group of law enforcement officers entered Sanders’ cell on Friday night in an attempt to “calm” Sanders. At about 7 p.m. Hutcheson appeared, apparently directing jail personnel, and entered the cell. After an altercation, Sanders was transported to a nearby hospital and later pronounced dead. Further details of the altercations remain “sketchy,” Hawley said.