Did Mickey Stines’ Own Deputies Watch Him Fall Apart Before the Shooting and Say Nothing?

Three of Mickey Stines’ deputies are named in a wrongful death lawsuit filed by Judge Kevin Mullins’ widow. According to the suit, they saw their boss deteriorating — and they never warned the man he allegedly killed. The lawsuit says they had a legal duty to act. They didn’t.

But it wasn’t just the deputies. Attorneys who sat across from Stines during a four-hour deposition three days before the shooting reportedly watched a sitting sheriff fall apart in real time. He took ten breaks. He told people in the room he was having an episode. A fellow attorney later told Kentucky State Police that Stines was “losing it” and described what he saw in clinical terms. A staffer from the sheriff’s office told investigators she believed Stines was in a psychosis.

Stines is charged with first-degree murder in the September 2024 shooting of District Judge Kevin Mullins inside his courthouse chambers. He has pleaded not guilty and is pursuing an insanity defense. His aunt’s new testimony describes a man who hadn’t slept in a week, was watching security cameras all night, and FaceTimed her minutes before the shooting to ask for a grandmother who’d been dead for two and a half years. The prosecution argues premeditation: he closed the door and cleared the room before firing. With the Mickey Stines trial still pending, the judge has three major rulings under advisement. No trial date set.

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