Judge throws out case against former BPU attorney accused of stealing $400,000

The ghost of Chuck Thompson is still haunting Wyandotte County 21 years after the Democratic Party Chairman’s murder. Questions about Thompson’s murder has led a Kansas judge to dismiss the case against an attorney accused of stealing $400,000 from the Kansas City, Kansas, Board of Public Utilities. 

Kansas Senior Judge Jack Lively told The Kansas City Star that he threw out the case against Rodney L. Turner because Wyandotte County prosecutors let KBI Special Agent William Delaney undermine the grand jury process by repeatedly making statements about the murder.

In testimony before the grand jury, Delaney “tainted the grand jury and violated Mr. Turner’s rights of due process” by making statements that attempted to connect Turner to Thompson’s murder, Lively wrote. 

“The murder was

irrelevant to the alleged Board of Public Utilities violations that the

Grand Jury was charged with investigating, but the State allowed

information and speculation about the murder to be thrust into the

hands of the grand jury proceeding,” Lively wrote.