The Alabama Supreme Court is considering a question on when Alabama sheriffs can be immune from lawsuits. The case involves the family of a woman who was murdered by her husband after local sheriffs released him from jail despite a judge’s order to keep him behind bars.
In the months and days before Ricky McKee killed both his wife and himself, law enforcement in Blount County downplayed the seriousness of the situation, according to a federal lawsuit filed by the wife’s estate.
On November 24, 2021, Sheriff Mark Moon and Sergeant Anthony Economes released McKee from the Blount County Jail, despite a judge’s no-bond order preventing his release, according to the complaint. The next day, McKee murdered his wife and shot himself.
“Instead of protecting Susie, the defendant Sheriff and Deputies repeatedly ignored her reports of abuse and did not take them seriously. They did not even open an investigation into Ricky’s escalating abuse,” the lawsuit states.
The suit argues that law enforcement relied on gender stereotypes in responding to McKee’s reports of her husband’s abuse, minimizing the situation and ignoring her complaints, in violation of the equal protection clause of the U.S. Constitution.
Both attorneys for King and for the defendants declined requests to comment for the story.
In their response filed in the lawsuit, attorneys for the defendants dispute the claim that law enforcement officers failed to take steps to protect Susie McKee or that they discriminated against her based on her gender. The also deny that law enforcement acted in violation of the law.
“Defendants deny that they released Ricky in violation of a court order to hold him with no bond, making Susie more vulnerable to Ricky, then Ricky murdered Susie.”
The case, brought against the sheriff, two deputies and a sergeant by the administrator of Susie McKee’s estate, Brandi King, was filed in federal court in Alabama’s Northern District in November of 2021. Last month federal judge Annemarie Carney Axon granted a motion to send a legal question about sheriff’s immunity to the state supreme court for clarification — whether sheriffs are entitled to state immunity as individuals in cases including damages.
The sheriff, deputies and sergeant in the case claimed that they had immunity from suit and asked the court to dismiss the case. Judge Axon ruled to dismiss the case against the deputies but not against the sheriff and the sergeant because of an exception under state law that denies immunity from employees who act fraudulently or in violation of the law.
Attorneys for the sheriff and the sergeant then requested the state court review whether the two would be considered immune from the suit because of how state law protects constitutional officers.
One group of state employees, called state agents, which includes most state workers, like DHR staff, and law enforcement officers other than sheriffs, have what’s called state agent immunity. State agents are not immune from lawsuits when they act fraudulently or make decisions outside of the scope of their authority or the law.
A second category of state employees, like the governor or county sheriffs, are known as constitutional officers, and have heightened immunity from lawsuits for damages.
Whether sheriffs have full immunity protections, even when they act outside of the law has emerged as a key question in the case and one that will now be weighed by the state supreme court.
During their 31 years together, Ricky Rae McKee physically and emotionally abused his wife, Delilah Sue McKee, called Susie, according to the complaint.
Two months before her death, he tried to kick their daughter out of the house and he became violent, kicking and hitting a door. He then took his wife’s name off their joint checking and savings accounts, according to the complaint, and disconnected her phone.
McKee and her sister reached out to Deputy Joshua Southwell at the sheriff’s department and told him that McKee was becoming abusive and that he had been abusive in the past, according to the complaint.
“He (the deputy) promised to look after Susie, but did not investigate her reports of abuse,” the complaint states.
Sheriff’s deputies were called to the McKee’s house multiple times in September of 2021, including when McKee tried to have his adult son arrested for trespassing and when his daughter called the department because her father was taking furniture and electronics from the house. Ricky McKee had the water turned off at the house and filed for divorce.
On October 4, Susie McKee filed for a protective order against her husband, testifying he had stalked her, restrained her, and sexually and physically abused her, according to the complaint. The judge entered the protection order and set a hearing.
On October 18, Ricky McKee applied to the sheriff’s department to renew his pistol permit, but the sheriff denied it without court approval. The next month, McKee followed his wife to a bar, violating the restraining order by photographing her. A few days later, he stole her car while she was inside the bar. He made her ride with him to get her car, and then parked his car in front of hers, blocking her into her driveway, according to the complaint.
By November, McKee had broken into his wife’s house with a rifle and a pistol, assaulted Susie and threatened to kill her. Deputy Michael Hicks was called to the house, where he took McKee’s rifle and gave Susie McKee’s her ex’s pistol to protect herself against him in the future.
The complaint alleges that the sheriff’s department could have further investigated McKee’s prior crimes to charge him for stalking and kidnapping his wife. Instead, it released McKee with a $2,500 bond for domestic violence, despite a judge’s no-bond order. Susie McKee heard from a friend who checked the department website that her husband had been released from jail and went to stay in a hotel, fearing for her life.
The next day, she learned that her daughter had gone to her house. Fearing for her daughter, she drove home. Her husband came to the house, forced open a door to the house, kicked open the door to Susie McKee’s room and shot her to death. He went in search of his daughter, who hid in a closet, before shooting himself to death.
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