And Now-The Rest Of The Story

Famed radio broadcaster Paul Harvey recently commented on the town of Mt. Vernon Kentucky, and though I never heard the broadcast myself, you can bet it created quite a stir. A sheriffs candidate for Rockcastle County, in fact, has made mention of the broadcast in his run for office. It is a reason, he says, why he should be considered not only qualified for the office, but the only viable alternative to replace current incumbent Darrell Doan. Having been a ecetn arrival to the county, he says, he owes no one anything.

You might have figured out by now that harveys comments were not positive. If so give yourself a cigar, or a kewpie doll, or whatever. You might have, if you have seen some of my prior comments on my home county, assume that I am solidly in agreement with Harvey’s comments that, as he put it, “if you want to commit murder and get away with it, just go to Rockcastle County Kentucky.”

If so, hand back the kewpie doll. If you’ve already smoked the cigar, however, don’t worry about it, I will make allowances for the possibility that Harvey might have been engaging in a bit of heavy handed hyperbole.

Outside of hyperbole, however, the statement has no basis in fact. For all the problems I have seen in this area, only a few of which I have noted on this blog, this not only does not belong in the litany of complaints, but it could, if miscontrued-or accurrately construed, as the case well may be-be a negative force that is not in the least helpful to any long term county improvement.

In fact, it crosses the line greatly. Out of all my knowledge of Mt. Vernon and Rockcastle County Kentucky recent history, I have endeavored to remember a time when a murder in this area was committed, in which the perpetrator has gotten away with the deed, a time, in fact, in which there was never a prosecution. I have honestly tried to remember, but alas, I can not honestly remember such an event.

And it has not been for lack of occasion. There have indeed been murders in the county over the last several decades. But I can honestly think of no circumstance in which a known murder was committed that the perpetrator was not caught, and sucessfuly prosecuted. And it has been of no consequence to what station in life the victim belonged.

About a decade ago, one of the local low-lifes was murdered and buried eight feet underground. The perpetrators were cpatured and successfully prosecuted, though it did take some time before the crime actually came to light. But once it did, that was the end of the road. It turned out to have been drug related.

There have been times that convicted murderers did not, in my opinion, get their just deserts, and Harvey could legitimately be referring to such events as a man who, having shot his wife twice with a loaded gun, claimed the shooting was accidental. He received, I think, a total of two years for manslaughter. There were other instances of people murdered in the course of drunken card gams in which the penalty may not have been severe enough, but you can put this down to being spur of the moment crimes committed in the heat of anger, to lack of premeditation.

The one murder in the county I can think of, in fact, that was never sucessfuly prosecuted, was the murder of a man who seems to have been present during a great many of these card games, in at least two of them, in fact. He was shot dead in the yard, where he lay in a drunken stupor, of a friends house, where a party had been held, suppossedly by an unknown, passing motorist. To my knowledge, no suspects were ever arressted.

Be that as it may, violent crimes of this nature, while they do occur here, do so with no more frequency than in other areas of similar size and population, and what is more, the number of arrests and sucessful prosecutions for the crime are at least the equal to other areas, and possibly on the average higher. Which is why I take humbrage with Mr. Harveys comments.

Many years ago, at last fifty,and possibly more, an old man on his death bed confessed to having kidnapped and murdered a young girl who had years before this dissappearred without a trace. He gave directions to the wooded area where he had left her, and sure enough her bones were uncovered. This was another occasion of an unsoved crime, the only one I can think of, but like I said, this was at least fifty years ago.

For the one and only other unsolved murders in the county, that I can recall as of now , you of necessity need to go back to the nineteenth century, some years after the Civil War. A handful of men had recently been convicted of burning down the then Mt. Vernon courthouse. Two of them were abducted and hanged outside of town, by men reputed to be the Ku Klux Klan. The ringleader of the group had somehow managed to escape this mob justice, almost by the skin of his teeth.

For the lynching of the guilty parties, and the attempted abduction and murder of the third man, who sneaked out the back of his home as they approached from the front, no one was ever, to my knowledge, brought to trial. In fact, no one was ever identified as the Klan members supposedly responsible.

Yet,the story does come full circle, and illustrates the real problem with the county, one that has lasted up until this day. The very man who was convicted in a court of law, of burning down the old court house, the same man who had barely eluded Klan justice-all because he wanted to destroy evidence pertaining to another crime he had committed which was stored there, was indeed held to a kind of account by the citizens of Rockcastle County.

He was elected County Judge.

And so it goes. With money, with connections, the worse of the worse can acquire and maintain elected office. That is nothing new, nor, however, is it a phenomenon that is limited solely to the environs of Rockcastle County Kentucky, sadly.

Not that all of the countys elected officials are this bad. For the most part, they just have an attitude of entitlement, and a lackadaisical attitude toward making any needed changes or improvements to the County. And this needs to be pointed out,and changed. Unfortunatey, hyperbole such as Harverys, however well intentioned, is all too easy to be misconstrued, taken literally, and therefore,makes no positive contribution toward that much needed change.

Page Two, please?