CHANUTE — Neosho County Attorney Linus Thuston will not prosecute a couple accused of killing a Parsons man.
The Kansas Attorney General’s Office will instead prosecute Clint W. Nibarger and his wife, Kimberly J. Thomas Nibarger, accused of killing Dakota A. Patton.
District Judge Kurt Loy, assigned to review the case, removed Thuston because of a conflict of interest, the Chanute Tribune and Parsons Sun reported.
Thuston has filed to have the judge’s ruling set aside, the newspapers reported.
Loy based his ruling on a Labette County case in which Thuston represented Clint Nibarger, the newspapers reported.
Additionally, Thuston represented a Missouri resident, to whom the Nibargers apparently fled after Patton’s killing on April 26.
It was a message from the Missouri resident to Thuston, who in turn contacted law enforcement, that led officers to Patton’s body in rural Neosho County on May 8, the newspapers reported.
The Nibargers left Parsons about midnight April 25, checked into a motel in Wagoner, Oklahoma, at 2:05 a.m. April 26 and then traveled to Dallas, Texas. They rented a motel in Miami, Oklahoma, April 26 in the evening and got married April 27, returning to Parsons about noon that day.
According to the recently unsealed probably cause affidavit, at 10:34 p.m. May 5, Thuston texted law enforcement and reported he may have a location for “your body,” the newspapers reported.
A Kansas Bureau of Investigation agent then called Thuston, who said the Nibargers were in Hollister, Missouri, staying with a couple whom Thuston represented in the past, the newspapers said.
Thuston’s former clients told him that the Nibargers had confessed to Patton’s murder. Thuston instructed his former clients to get more information and the location of Patton’s body, even a map if possible.
On May 6, Thuston forwarded text messages from his former clients to law enforcement suggesting the location of Patton’s body. Patton was found at 11:40 a.m. May 8.
Thuston also told a law officer at the scene that Clint Nibarger and/or Kimberly Nibarger contacted him recently about representing them in the case, but that he had declined because the crime happened in Neosho County, the newspapers said.
Nibarger had Thuston’s number in his phone’s contact list, the affidavit said.
In his June 6 ruling, Judge Loy wrote that when Thuston told the Nibargers he could not represent them in matters that happened in Neosho County, he also offered them legal advice about not talking with law enforcement.
Thuston, in his June 14 filing, asked to have the order disqualifying him set aside. He claimed the order was made without proper jurisdiction, the newspapers reported.
