A former central Kansas police chief who led a raid last year on a weekly newspaper has been charged with felony obstruction of justice. The charge against former Marion Police Chief Gideon Cody alleges that he induced a witness to withhold information about the raid of the Marion County Record and the home of its publisher. The charge, filed Monday in state district court in Marion County, is not more specific about Cody's alleged conduct, reports the AP. However, a report from two special prosecutors last week referenced texts between Cody and a local business owner after the raid.
The business owner has said that Cody asked her to delete texts between them, fearing people could get the wrong idea about their relationship, which she said was professional and platonic. Cody justified the raid by saying he had evidence the newspaper, publisher Eric Meyer, and one of its reporters had committed identity theft in verifying the business owner's state driving record. The business owner was seeking Marion City Council approval for a liquor license, and the newspaper received a tip that she had once received a potentially disqualifying DUI, per NBC News.
The prosecutors' report concluded that no crime was committed by Meyer, the reporter, or the newspaper and that Cody reached an erroneous conclusion about their conduct because of a poor investigation. Police body-camera footage of the 2023 raid on Eric Meyer's home shows his 98-year-old mother, Joan Meyer, visibly upset and telling officers, "Get out of my house!" She co-owned the paper and died of a heart attack the next afternoon. The prosecutors said they could not charge Cody or other officers involved in the raid over her death because there was no evidence they believed the raid posed a risk to her life. (More Kansas stories.)
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