MADISON – Boone County Prosecuting Attorney Donna Taylor has resigned amidst an investigation into her “incompetence and neglect of duty.”
Taylor submitted her resignation May 31 to the Boone County Commission, which held an emergency meeting later in the day to accept the resignation and discuss the situation. Her resignation is effective June 4, and assistant prosecutor Frank Curnutte was named the interim for a 30-day period starting June 5.
Taylor cited a “hostile work environment” as the reason for her resignation. She was facing charges from the state Lawyer Disciplinary Board and impeachment proceedings from the county commission.
Messer
| Courtesy photo
“This is a positive development for Boone County,” Commissioner Jacob Messer told The West Virginia Record. “I look forward to working with the future prosecuting attorney.
“It is time to move on and work toward the goal of providing justice to victims of crime and their families. They deserve it, and we owe it to them.”
Earlier this year, Taylor was charged by the state Lawyer Disciplinary Board for multiple violations of the Rules of Professional Conduct. She was accused of failing to prepare at least 98 orders from abuse and neglect cases and juvenile cases, failing to file 83 releases of judgment after payments were made in full, filing insufficient indictments and being unprepared for trials. She also had hired her boyfriend to be an assistant prosecutor with a yearly salary of $80,000.
In March, the Boone County Commission voted to seek Taylor’s removal.
“The respondent hereby denies all other allegations not enumerated and respectfully requests this court dismiss this petition,” Taylor said in her answer to the LDB’s charges.
During a March 27 county commission meeting, several members of the public spoke and expressed concerns about how Taylor had handled cases since she took office in 2021. Most of those who spoke talked about pending murder cases.
“This is not a happy day for Boone County,” Commission President Brett Kuhn said after that March 27 meeting. “The report from the Office of Disciplinary Council outlines a dysfunctional prosecutor’s office that endangers every single Boone County citizen. This commission takes very seriously our responsibility to protect the citizens of Boone County, and there is a clear and present danger. …
“I think it is clear the judicial system in Boone County has suffered significant damage over the last two years, and this situation must be rectified.”
Messer agreed.
“In the legal world, there is a term known as double jeopardy,” he said. “It ensures that no one can be convicted of the same offense twice. In Boone County, there should be a term known as double victimization. It would ensure that no one would be victimized by the same crime twice. Unfortunately, that is exactly what is happening again and again here because of our current prosecuting attorney.
“We have citizens who are victims of crimes, including murder, who are victimized not once, but twice because of the incompetence of our prosecuting attorney and her neglect of duty. Their families, particularly those of murder victims, are suffering the same fate, which is even more painful for and unfair to them. This has to stop. Our citizens and communities deserve better. Our law enforcement officers and judicial system deserve better. The victims and their families, more than anyone else, deserve better.”
Commissioner Jeff Petry said the citizens of Boone County are the commission’s primary concern.
“Whether it’s the good folks, the bad folks, we have to do what’s right for the people of the county,” he said. “The findings by the ODC, as commissioner Kuhn indicated, are staggering. The more you read into it the more disturbing it gets. …
“It’s unfortunate what the citizens and families of our county have endured over the past several months and past couple of years. As commissioners and elected officials in this office, we have to do what’s right."
Taylor was elected as Boone County’s first Republican and first female prosecutor in 2020. Soon after, one of the office’s two assistant prosecutors – Jennifer Anderson – resigned. At a December 2020 meeting of the Boone County Commission, Taylor asked to post the position with an annual salary of $80,000. She then hired boyfriend Branden Ledford for the job. Timothy Gibson, the other assistant, notified the state Ethics Commission about the situation.
In March 2021, the Ethics Commission ruled Ledford had an unfair advantage and ordered Taylor to terminate his employment. The next day, Gibson told Taylor she should resign based on the ruling. He also sent a letter to the county commission saying she should resign or be impeached.
Taylor then fired Gibson the same day, and Ledford’s employment ended March 15, 2021.
The statement also accuses Taylor of neglecting her duties by not preparing orders in abuse and neglect cases in a timely manner, creating a backlog that resulted in 98 missing orders in cases where hearings had taken place.
An order from former Boone Circuit Judge William Thompson said the backlog had created an “inexcusable delay” and held the cases up “from permanency, to paternity testing not being performed, to the unnecessary delay of dispositional hearings, the requirement of paying for the service of publication for amended petitions that were not filed, among other things.”
The LDB opened a complaint against Taylor for that issue on May 17, 2021, accusing her of violating rules of competence, diligence and fairness to opposing party and counsel. She blamed the delay on staffing issues and COVID-19 quarantines and exposures in the courthouse, but she said she and an assistant prosecutor got everything updated.
A third count accuses Taylor of not issuing timely notices of payment and releases of judgment. It says from January 1, 2022, to November 1, 2022, Taylor only filed one release of judgment despite having 84 that should have been done. As of January 31, 2023, it says there were 15 that had not been filed. The statement says her actions have resulted in needless delays in the cases.
A fourth count says Boone Circuit Judge Stacy Nowicki-Eldridge sent a complaint to the ODC accusing Taylor of making improper requests for the court to take judicial notice, having little knowledge of how to lay foundation for exhibits, seeming unaware of the processes needed to refresh a witness’ recollection, presenting many insufficient indictments, failing to cite proper law to support her arguments in written pleadings, not reviewing files in a timely manner, being unaware of the evidence turned over to her office by law enforcement officers and failing to timely disclose evidence to the defense.
Taylor denied the allegations in her response to the complaint.
In the final count in the statement, Taylor is accused of not contacting law enforcement officers to discuss a case in which she listed them as potential witnesses or prepared them to testify in the trial. It says she also, among other things, improperly marked exhibits in that first-degree murder trial properly.
“Everything that has occurred thus far in the courtroom, I can’t help but come to the conclusion in my mind that the state is either woefully unprepared or is not competent to try this matter,” Nowicki-Eldridge stated on the record in court proceedings.
The judge eventually called for a mistrial because of a COVID outbreak in the courtroom. A few days later, the sister of the murder victim filed a complaint with the ODC saying Taylor was “very unprepared” and had never asked the family anything about her brother or the case in general.
She said she had called Taylor’s office numerous times and never had a call returned. She says the family never was informed of upcoming hearings or even the trial date. She says Taylor even forgot the victim’s name during pre-trial hearings.
Taylor “would never take the time to talk” or answer questions, the sister stated. “She would literally keep walking as we are trying to talk to her.”
“It was like she had no ideas what she was doing,” the sister stated. She “had no idea how to even ask witnesses questions” and “even left her trial notes on the projector screen where the entire courtroom could see them” until the judge advised her of it.
The sister said “Boone County families deserve better … before she destroys many lives and families.”
Taylor was admitted to the State Bar in 2017. She previously worked as an assistant prosecutor in Wood County and Kanawha County. She took office in Boone County on December 21, 2020.
Lawyer Disciplinary Board complaint numbers 21-03-186, 22-05-188 and 23-05-029