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Funny How the “Difficult Decisions” Never Start at the Top
The superintendent stood at the podium this week and did that thing administrators do when they want gravity without fingerprints. “These are tough decisions,” Demetrus Liggins said, as families pleaded for their schools, programs, and communities. Mergers. Closures. Right-sizing. The whole greatest-hits album of institutional sorrow. And yet — funny thing — none of…
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When the Cover Charge for Public Office Is Generational Wealth
Some weeks, Lexington feels less like a city and more like an invitation-only club — velvet rope, bouncer, and all. This week’s guest list: the people who can actually afford to stay in public office. Hannah LeGris left the stage recently. Not for lack of love for the job, but because the numbers simply…
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Lexington man to plead guilty in Hamburg hotel drug, gun case after failed evidence challenge
A Lexington man accused of moving fentanyl and cocaine around Central Kentucky has agreed to plead guilty in federal court after losing his bid to throw out evidence from a June arrest at a Hamburg-area hotel, where agents say they found a kilo of cocaine, nearly a pound of fentanyl and a loaded Glock…
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Federal prison lieutenant pleads guilty to falsifying records in cover-up of inmate assault
PIKEVILLE, Ky. — Former USP Big Sandy lieutenant Michael J. Childers pleaded guilty Monday to a federal felony for falsifying records in what prosecutors describe as a coordinated cover-up of an April 2021 assault on a vulnerable inmate seeking protective custody. Childers, 37, entered his plea before U.S. Magistrate Judge Edward B. Atkins after…
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City Hall Plan Passes 8–7 After Emotional Testimony and a Divided Council
In one of the closest and most contentious votes in recent Lexington memory, the Urban County Council on Tuesday approved an $86 million plan to move City Hall to 200 W. Vine St., advancing a long-discussed project after nearly two hours of impassioned public comment warning that the city was prioritizing workspace for government…
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New city hall deal could give Gen Z its own “CentrePit” moment
Tonight at 5 p.m., in a too-small council chamber inside a too-old former hotel, Lexington’s leaders will decide whether to move City Hall into a gleaming bank building on Vine Street. If they vote yes, we’ll get a renovated “Government Center” at 200 West Vine — and a whole new generation will finally get…
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Defendant in federal witness killing released to home of officer she allegedly utilized for gang intel
A federal magistrate judge has ordered the release of Casey Allison Morris, the woman prosecutors say tried to leverage her relationship with a Richmond police officer to glean inside information about a violent home-invasion investigation while her alleged gang associates plotted the murder of a federal witness. In a 15-page memorandum opinion signed Nov.…
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Lexington Wanted a Miracle. It Got a Markup Instead.
If you listened closely at last week’s press conference—the one where Vice Mayor Dan Wu announced $12.6 million in medical debt had vanished from Fayette County—there was a faint sound underneath all that civic cheer. A tiny ka-ching. Because by the time the Herald-Leader’s Adrian Paul Bryant peeled back the wrapping paper, Lexington’s feel-good…
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FCPS Tries to Muzzle Its Own Board. Of Course It Backfires.
It takes real talent to look at the summer FCPS just had — the audit, the budget fiascos, the public fury, the payroll-tax side hustle in a trench coat — and decide the next big move should be silencing elected officials. But here we are. Again. The latest stroke of genius arrives in the…
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New Defendant Added in Federal Witness-Killing Case; Trial Paused as DOJ Weighs Death Penalty
LEXINGTON, Ky. — A newly unsealed superseding indictment has added an eighth defendant, Casey Allison Morris, 29, to the federal case accusing members of a Lexington drug network of plotting and carrying out the 2023 killing of Kristopher Lewis to stop him from testifying. Morris, who pleaded not guilty during her Nov. 12 court…