A former sheriff from Kentucky, who was filmed shooting a judge at close range, has confessed to the act but entered a ‘not guilty’ plea in court. Recent legal filings shed light on his potential defense strategy.

Attorneys for the former Letcher County Sheriff, Shawn ‘Mickey’ Stines, claimed in court documents that he was incapable of intentionally killing District Court Judge Kevin Mullins, 54, in September 2024, as reported by the Lexington Herald-Leader.

The defense team argued that Stines was experiencing ‘paranoid and psychotic behavior’ when the tragic incident occurred in the judge’s chambers.

Stines’ lawyers outlined several potential defenses focusing on his mental state, suggesting he was not in control, had existing mental health issues, and bore no malicious intent.

This startling claim, presented in court on November 12, was in response to a lawsuit filed by Mullins’ widow, representing herself and their two daughters.

But it suggests the ex-sheriff’s lawyers are now mounting an insanity plea in his criminal case, in which Stines has pleaded not guilty to one count of murder of a public official.

If the defense does wind up proving mental health incapacitation or extreme emotional distress, Stines could be spared from the death penalty. 

His lawyers have made insanity arguments in the past, claiming that two weeks of intense stress drove Stines to murder his longtime friend on September 19, 2024.

Ex-Letcher County Sheriff Shawn ‘Mickey’ Stines has admitted in court documents to shooting dead his longtime friend District Court Judge Kevin Mullins in September 2024

Stines if facing one count of murder of a public official for Mullins’ death as well as a separate civil suit filed by his widow. The judge is pictured in his headshot

That day, Stines was seen walking into the Letcher County Courthouse in Whitesberg and drawing his gun – at which point Mullins tried to hide behind his desk, before he was fatally shot.

Stines was immediately apprehended and has remained behind bars ever since.

As he then languished in jail, Mullins’ widow filed a civil suit against Stines and three other Letcher County Sheriff’s Office employees on September 18.

It accused the former sheriff of assault and battery and said the three other sheriff’s employees failed to warn and protect the judge even though they noticed Stines had been exhibiting ‘anxious, paranoid and psychotic conduct that posed a foreseeable risk of violence,’ according to WKYT. 

The suit, for which Kimberly Mullins and her children are seeking damages for lost income as well as unspecified punitive damages, argued that Jason Eckles, LaShawna Frazier and Christine Bolling had a solemn duty to warn Mullins about Stines’ erratic behavior as part of their positions providing courthouse security.

It says that they are ‘mandated by Kentucky law to attend the circuit and district courts of the Commonwealth, preserve the peace, provide courthouse and courtroom security and protect judges of the Commonwealth of Kentucky.’

Attorneys for Eckles, Frazier and Bolling have moved to dismiss the civil claims, arguing they have sovereign immunity and that they lacked a ‘special relationship’ with Stines required to prove they failed to uphold a duty to protect or alert others of a potential crime. 

Meanwhile, Stines’ lawyers have also moved to dismissed the civil case under the sovereign immunity doctrine – which protects government official from civil liability claims as long as they were acting in their official capacity.

‘As sheriff, he was a county employee and, therefore, is entitled to the same sovereign immunity granted to the county itself,’ they argue.

‘Based on this, the official capacity claims against Shawn Stines must be dismissed.’

The shooting on September 19, 2024 was caught on surveillance camera 

If that doesn’t work, the lawyers also tried to dismiss the negligence claims against him on the grounds that such claims require intent.

Key to Stines’ insanity claims is a federal investigation that targeted him int he months leading up to Mullins’ shooting, related to a lawsuit claiming the sheriff failed to properly supervise a deputy who forced a women into having sex inside Mullins’ office in exchange for staying out of jail.

In that case, Sabrina Adkins accused Judge Mullins of inappropriate behavior, claiming she had witnessed him engaging in sexual acts with women in exchange for special treatment.

This lawsuit, filed in January 2022, claimed Mullins was involved in a sex-for-favors scheme within his chambers.

Adkins also alleged former deputy Ben Fields was involved, having filmed illicit encounters, some of which reportedly involved Mullins.

Stines, a close friend of Mullins for about 30 years, was mentioned in the legal proceedings just three days before the shooting.

When he then gave a deposition just days before the fatal shooting, the sheriff said he had been suffering from dizziness, sweating, headaches and memory loss brought on by California encephalitis – a neurological disease caused by bug bites.

Defense attorney Jeremy Bartley has previously said his case will hinge on that testimony – as he claimed Stines was concerned about backlash and feared his or his family’s lives were in danger. 

‘I think the deposition has several important roles in this case… it’s going to be a large portion of the story we tell,’ Bartley said. 

Attorneys representing Stines have previously argued he feared for his family after giving a deposition in a civil case accusing him of failing to properly supervise a deputy who forced a women into having sex inside Mullins’ office in exchange for staying out of jail

The claim is bolstered by footage from just before the shooting, in which Stines expressed concerns about his family and called his daughter from the judge’s phone.

Police body camera footage following the shooting also showed just how in distress Stines was as he kept insinuating he was going to die if he were to be brought to jail.

‘I leave this building, I won’t draw another breath,’ Stines told state troopers while handcuffed, his leg nervously shaking.

He then shared his fear of being transported to the Leslie County Jail, an hour’s drive away, and begged to be locked up in the one next door instead.

By the time, Stines arrived at the Leslie County Detention Center, staff said he was still in a state of ‘active psychosis,’ which lasted for days after the shooting.

A September 23 report read: ‘Upon evaluation of Mr. Stines, it appears that he is still in an active state of psychosis.’

‘He appears disoriented and is only aware of things jail staff tell him. He has no recollection of the recent past.’

Police body camera footage following the shooting  showed just how in distress Stines was 

The troopers spent the whole time trying to reassure a paranoid Stines that they weren’t going to kill him

But Stines’ efforts to get the criminal charges against him dismissed have thus far failed.

His lawyers had argued that prosecutors failed to inform a grand jury about his mental state at the time of the shooting and that a grand jury proceeding was intentionally not recorded.

A judge, however, refused to dismiss the indictment last week and rejected a request to unseal a psychiatric evaluation – ruling that the grand jury had enough evidence and there was no prosecutorial misconduct, WCYB reports.

In a separate order, though, the judge granted Stines a bond hearing in which his defense plans to argue emotional disturbance and possible insanity at the time of the shooting.

A date for that bond hearing has not yet been set, but Stines is due back in court for a hearing on the civil lawsuit on January 7.