WALTERS — City Councilman Bobby Lloyd Nance pleaded guilty Wednesday in Cotton County District Court to a misdemeanor charge of cruelty to animals in the poisoning of a neighbor’s female cat and her kittens.
Nance also pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor charge of obstructing an officer when he threatened Walters City Manager Douglas Shawn Strange in reference to the investigation of the poisoning incident.
In the poisoning case Nance, 74, received a one-year county jail sentence, reduced to 30 days to be served on weekends, plus a $500 fine. On the obstruction charge he was fined $250 and was ordered to resign his seat on the city council.
Nance was accused of “maliciously and cruelly” killing a female cat and several kittens “by placing cat food laced with rat poison (brodifacoum) out for animals” at his residence in July 2021. He also was accused of ordering the city manager to shut down the investigation of the incident.
During his arraignment last year, Nance was ordered by Associate District Judge Michael Flanagan to have “no contact” with Haleigh Powell “during the pendency of this case or until further order of the court.”
Ms. Powell owned the cats that were poisoned, and her complaint to the Walters Police Department ultimately led to the criminal charges that Kyle Cabelka, district attorney for Comanche and Cotton counties, filed against Nance.
Joe Kimmons, a special agent with the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation (OSBI), related in an affidavit that he was assigned to investigate the matter. Nance was accused by Powell, his next-door neighbor, of placing pet food laced with poison in a tub on his front porch. Some of Powell’s cats died shortly afterward, the affidavit states.
After Ms. Powell notified the Walters Police Department, WPD Officer Tyler Hedges “came out and took photographs of the tub, and confiscated it” on July 12, 2021, Kimmons wrote.
Hedges also contacted Nance and interviewed him. Nance “advised he had some old cat food that he poured in a tub and left out on his driveway” but “denied putting poison in the cat food.”
City Manager Strange told Kimmons that later that day he received a telephone call from Nance in which the city councilman warned him that investigation of the poisoning episode needed to “stop here on this porch right now. Do you understand what I’m telling you? This needs to stop here, and don’t need to go any further.”
After being read his Miranda rights, Nance was interviewed by Kimmons. Nance “was shown a photograph of the tub with cat food with green pellets in it,” the OSBI agent wrote in his affidavit. Nance told him the tub was “the same one he laid on his porch”; he claimed he “found the tub” a week earlier “out by the curb of his house” and “picked it up and put it closer to his house on the driveway.”
Nance denied telling Strange to “stop the investigation.”
On Jan. 23, 2022, The tub of cat food was submitted to the Oklahoma Animal Disease Diagnostic Laboratory for analysis. The contents tested positive for brodifacoum, which is used to eradicate rodents.
The Walters City Council meets on the first Tuesday of each month; their next regular monthly meeting is set for Feb. 7.
Other members of the Walters council are Mayor Richard Anderson, Vice Mayor Clint Thurman, and Councilmen Jonathan Morgan and Byrum W. Eidson.
Nance was the second public official from Walters to appear in Cotton County District Court this week.
Cotton County Commissioner Micah Lee “Mike” Woods of Walters was charged Monday with felony embezzlement.
Woods is accused of using county employees during work hours, and in the Cotton County District 1 barn at 1124 W. Colorado Ave. in Walters, “to build campaign signs for his personal use for his re-election” campaign last November.
Woods, a Republican, beat his Democratic opponent by a 2-to-1 margin in last year’s general election.
OSBI Special Agent Kimmons said he interviewed all District 1 employees and several of them “admitted they helped Woods build campaign signs on county time during the workday around June 2022” at the District 1 headquarters.
After Woods was read his Miranda rights, he was interviewed “and denied he allowed or asked employees to make campaign signs while they were on county time,” Kimmons wrote in a sworn affidavit.
Woods was released from custody Monday on a $10,000 bond. He pleaded not guilty, told the court he intends to hire a private attorney, and a preliminary hearing conference in his case was set for March 7.