The city of Marion has to pay for claiming a text message didn't exist. (It did.)

A $75K judgment for hiding the truth.

There’s news in the Marion County Record case we just ran a two-parter on.

(If you haven’t listened, check it out. I’m proud of it: Part One. Part Two.)

Last week, a Kansas judge ordered the city of Marion to pay $75,748.22 in legal fees to the Marion County Record’s attorney, Bernie Rhodes.

Interestingly, just like the criminal charges against former police chief Gideon Cody, this ruling is not directly related to the actual raids of the Record newsroom and its publishers’ house: it’s about officials hiding evidence after the raids.

The key piece of evidence here? A text message that the city claimed didn’t exist.

Sent three days before the raid, this message shows then-Mayor David Mayfield telling the city administrator he had just met with Police Chief Gideon Cody and Sheriff Jeff Soyez, and told Cody he was “behind him and his investigation 100 percent.”

Long before we were able to see this text, the Record submitted a request to the city under the Kansas Open Records Act, asking for communications between city officials related to the police raids. This included communications from the phone of city administrator Brogan Jones. The city responded, saying they were “not aware” of any relevant text messages from Jones’ phone.

But lo and behold, the Record sued the city over this, and in a deposition administrator Jones testified that he did text about the raid in the days leading up to it. And out came this message.

It’s some of the strongest evidence that the mayor of Marion at the time, David Mayfield, was aware of the impending raids of the newspaper, and supported them. If you listened to our episodes you’ll remember Mayfield as one of the locals Eric Meyer and the Record had been clashing with over their coverage for years, who’d shared a nasty post about journalists in the weeks before the raids. When I contacted him to ask about his involvement in the raids, Mayfied wrote, “Brian, I have been sued in four separate lawsuits related to those search warrants. If you need to speak to me about anything on that you will have to talk to my lawyer.” But she never responded to me.

This key text message – the city withheld it from the Record for nearly a year and a half, forcing them to sue and fight tooth and nail to get it. Actually, it was worse than withholding about it; it appears that they lied about it, basically saying texts about the raid with the city administrator didn’t exist. The city’s behavior was so atrocious the court found that they’d acted in “bad faith”. And on Thursday, the judge ordered that the city cough up more than $75K to cover the paper’s legal fees.

“The city hid the truth, and it will cost taxpayers more than $75,000,” Eric said, in an article in his paper. “If they had told the truth from the beginning, it would have cost them nothing.”

Initially, the Record’s attorney, Bernie Rhodes, requested $125,992.32 in fees. According to Eric, the city balked, offering just $25,000 before later suggesting $60,000 to $70,000 would be more “reasonable”. The judge settled on $75,748.22, and gave the city until 2026 to pay, with interest.

In court, the city’s lawyer argued they couldn’t afford to pay now. Eric called that argument “ridiculous.”

“Not only is it spending money like a drunken fool, it probably isn’t even paying for this directly,” he said. Often payments like this are covered by insurers anyway.

Rhodes says he won’t charge the Record the $50,000 difference between what he billed and what the court awarded. “It is a sad day for the taxpayers of Marion,” he said, “that they have to pay $76,000 because [city officials] hid text messages that are clearly public records.”

Meanwhile, Eric Meyer has a federal case going against the city of Marion for violation of his and his paper’s first amendment rights. And in that suit, the city is still trying to stop the release of more information – they’ve been blocking discovery, the process in lawsuit through which the parties are supposed to disclose pertinent information to each other. Fighting off depositions and document requests.

Eric finds this suspicious. “We’re fairly certain there are other smoking guns out there,” Meyer said, “but of course we can’t prove that because we’re barred from deposing anyone.”

Amazing that this battle is playing out in a town of less than 2000 people.

Make sure to read the Record’s coverage of the court decision – and also KSHB’s.

Brian