By BURTON SPEAKMAN
Glasgow Daily Times
GLASGOW
June 30, 2009 02:21 pm
—
Leland Cox has stated since being accused of sexual abuse that the acts were consensual, but that he knew his actions had been morally wrong.
Yet in a 37-minute interview with Kentucky State Police Drug Enforcement/Special Investigations detectives on July 24, 2008, Cox said that while at the time he thought the acts were consensual looking back he could understand why the women involved did not.
“I knew what I was doing was wrong morally,” Cox said. “The flesh is weak.”
The interview, which was part of a criminal investigation, was obtained through a Kentucky Open Records request by CNHI News Service.
During the interview Cox said he had been married for more than 30 years without cheating and that he didn’t understand what had come over him in the year prior to his arrest.
Click here to listen to Barren County Jailer Leland Cox’s conversation with Kentucky State Police on July 24, 2008. Be aware some language may be considered offensive.
The interview came before the jailer’s arrest in July 2008 on 30 counts of sexual abuse. He accepted an Alford plea in January, acknowledging there was sufficient evidence for a conviction if the case proceeded to trial. He did not admit guilt in open court, but agreed to retire from the job on Jan. 2, 2010.
Part of the plea agreement forbade Cox from having direct or indirect contact with the women he sexually abused.
On the July 24 recorded conversation, he said he understood how the women he had touched could have been scared of him as the supervisor or believed that he was threatening their jobs.
“I’ve messed up in the last year or so morally,” he said. “I didn’t know I’d done anything, but maybe now that I think about it, something that could be in the criminal line, because of who I am not because of what I’ve done.”
Cox said he understood that because of his supervisory role he should have known better than to act the way he did.
“I’m not going to deny anything they’ve told you, because I love them people and I’m not going to cause them any more undue hurt,” he said.
Cox stated in the interview that sexual contact with the women had occurred for around a year. The incidents had always occurred with the workers at the jail that he believed he could trust.
The incident would begin with a shoulder rub and then Cox said his hands would go to the women’s breasts. He couldn’t provide an estimate on how many times he had touched his female employees although he stated with one particular woman it had probably occurred 20 times.
“All this went on about a year, but now they’re saying they were afraid of me. I thought we were friends and they would tell me if anything was wrong,” Cox said.
The contact initially was like a joke, playing around, he said.
He did acknowledge multiple times the women had told him no, but stated he felt it was in a joking manner.
“As a boss I may have been intimidating them and didn’t know it,” Cox said.
The contact could occur anywhere in the jail as long as Cox was alone with one of the women. Cox stated he couldn’t seem to stop the contact.
Cox said he did stop the contact after listening to a sermon in his church about “miracles in your life.” It was at that point he realized he needed a miracle to stop his actions.
“I let the Devil get to me on a weakness I didn’t know I had,” he said.
Cox blamed a lot of stress at the jail and spent a lot of time questioning the motives of the complainants.
He also stated during the interview he had spoken with all the women involved about what had occurred.
“Their memory of it is certainly different than mine, but it don’t really have any effect on what I’ve done,” Cox said.
One of the women stated that she had been saying no for a year, he said.
“You weren’t making it that plain to me,” Cox stated. “In my mind maybe she should have been more adamant and maybe in her mind she may have been afraid I was going to do her job.”
Cox acknowledged that he was the person in charge should have known better professionally and morally. He also stated that he would have been willing to go beyond touching with one of the women. “I was very attracted to her.”
In another incident he couldn’t understand why one woman had gotten so upset because she had a reputation for going with men at conferences and the actions didn’t seem to bother her at the time, Cox said in the interview.
During the interview while talking about one woman he said, “she was the one who had shown her breasts so I didn’t think it was any big deal to rub them.”
Cox said he told the women he was sorry for what he had done, but that none of his actions had been malicious. He stated most of the women seemed to forgive him, but there was one who wouldn’t speak with him.
He said the women were mad at him at the time of their complaint because he was on them about their work at the jail.
“The job’s not getting done. They don’t want to come in here and talk to me about things,” Cox said.
Cox stated he never threatened any of the women’s jobs.
During the interview Cox asked the detectives who had filed the report against him. At the time the detectives could not answer. Cox questioned if the complaint was made by Barren County Judge-Executive Davie Greer because several female jail employees had spoken with Greer.
Greer admitted last week that she had made the initial call to KSP during a meeting with the women.
“I met with them on June 18, 2008. I’ll never forget that day,” she said. “I called KSP before they even left the office. I didn’t feel like I had any other choice.”
Although Cox stated in the interview he offered to step down from his leadership positions at church during the interview, but didn’t say anything about the position of jailer. He repeatedly said during the interview that he didn’t want to cause the women he had touched any more stress than necessary.
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