RICHLAND CO.—Richland County state’s attorney David Hyde has set precedent for every sex offender in his county: if you beat someone up, you can get out of a charge of Failure to Register as a Sex Offender.
And it even helps if you beat up a second person, because that means that the first offense will be dismissed too.
Such is the case with Jonathan Trout, 20, who has entered an open plea of guilty to an Aggravated Battery case dating back to October 2010.
What took so long to bring the matter to a conclusion remains speculation, but informed sources have been advising Disclosure over the past year that Trout—a member of the vile Earp/Trout bunch that runs in small packs throughout several southeastern Illinois counties—that the violent bunch facilitates the passage of drugs through the area, and if a noob shows up in the mix, the bunch assists local drug cops in their apprehension and charges, thus padding the county’s coffers without any of the law enforcement having to lift a finger.
On several occasions, their scam has almost fallen apart; namely, Lil Nate Turrentine and Jessica Boyd in 2010, Danny English from 2010-12, and Casey King in 2012, all associates of the Earp/Trout bunch and their drug-running escapades (Turrentine/Boyd and English in pot; King in steroids) almost got the Earp/Trout bunch irretrievably busted due to their own missteps or abject stupidity.
Notable screwups
The most notable screwup the Earp/Trout bunch continues to make, however, is their own errant violence toward others…and in the case of Jonathan Trout, underage sex.
Trout was convicted on a plea in 2008 of criminal sexual assault of a 12-year-old Centralia girl with whose brother he, then 16, was on an overnight visit. The family has said that at that time, Trout slipped in to the 12-year-old girl’s room and sexually assaulted her.
In 2010, he moved to Richland County to be with his violent brothers, Flavius Doug and Michael Scott Earp, and failed to register the new address with local authorities, resulting in a felony charge, as convicted sex offenders must register.
The news that he was a sex offender came as somewhat of a shock to the locals, who knew that the Earp/Trout bunch was good at procreating, but didn’t know that one among them was inclined toward pre-pubescent girls.
Worse, no one knew he was a sex offender because since his offense occurred when he was a juvenile, there is no requirement that his name show up on the registry—for life. So had he never offended in conjunction with the sex offense, no one except the victim and her family, as well as whatever select members of the disgusting Earp/Trout bunch he chose to tell, would ever have known.
The batteries: Roy, Koehler
Just a month prior to the failure to register offense, Trout had been involved in a brutal brawl up the street from the housing complex where he and the brood were staying in Olney, which resulted in an Evansville man, Heath Roy, being beaten almost beyond recognition.
In what was a clear case of mob action—but in which only Trout was charged—the then-17-year-old was issued a single count of Aggravated Battery at that time, June 2010.
Later that year, Trout again was involved in a brawl, and badly beat David A. Koehler.
In April of 2011, Trout and his pugilistic brothers were also involved in a mob action brawl in the Hamilton County village of Broughton (where Trout ostensibly currently resides); but only one of the brothers, the late Michael Scott Earp, was charged in that.
Later in 2011, Scott Earp was shot to death as he attempted to wrestle a handgun from Texan Brandon Jenkins, which incident garnered Jenkins counts of First Degree Murder.
It was a year ago May 2 that Jenkins was exonerated of all charges, which were generated by a grand jury being lied to by David Hyde’s handpicked witnesses, including the insufferable Flavius Earp.
Favoritism shown to punks
While Jenkins awaited trial, the remaining Earp was charged with multiple felonies for intimidating witnesses in the case—charges which were dismissed against him with no explanation.
Another of their crew, Casey King, has been involved in violence and alleged dealing of steroids, but he too, has been charged and let go, much like a catch-and-release program for repeat offenders.
Catch-and-release Trout
This program was extended to Jonathan Trout, youngest sibling of Flavius and Scott Earp (there is one nasty offspring in between, a female, Breanna) on April 26, 2013, when Hyde, who favors the entire group for whatever reasons he may have, enabled Trout to enter the open plea to the battery of Koehler in exchange for dismissal of the Failure to Register charge and battery of Roy charge.
In accordance with the agreement, Trout gets a cap of three years DOC (which may mean only a year and a half).
And of course, the all-important fines and fees are persuasive to Hyde, as he gauges his leeway in either prosecuting ridiculous crimes or abjectly avoiding very serious ones on this factor. Since the late Scott Earp’s first babymomma, Victoria deWeese, was always able to post bond for each of the Earp/Trout bunch every time they got into trouble, there was plenty of cash on hold: $3,000 altogether.
On an interim (December 2012) misdemeanor charge of being a Felon in Possession of a Firearm (not a gun, but a stun device), there was a bond remainder of $292 to be applied to the fines and fees of that conviction (accomplished in February 2013), $442; on the sex offense registration file, $750; on the Roy beating, $1,208 and on the Koehler beating, another $750.
So the county comes out ahead $3,000 of deWeese funds, and Earp/Trout loathers get to be glad the youngest one is sitting in prison for several months, being made a girlfriend of inmates with names like Bubba and Demetrius.
Noxious deals
However, this doesn’t appease those who have been terrorized by the entire group over the past several years, beginning in late 2005 when the Earp brothers were still in their teens and young Trout was still a larva.
What Disclosure has learned is that the prosecutor, propped up by permissive judges, is being allowed to “make deals” with the Earp/Trout bunch and their hangers-on (such as King) in that if they “go away,” their charges will be dismissed. So apparently Hyde has come to the conclusion that with the death of Scott Earp and the ongoing violence/criminality of the remaining two and their buddies, it’s just not worth the bad public relations…along with the fact that Jenkins still has time to file a civil suit against the county for allowing the monstrosity that is the Earp/Trout bunch to continue to run without any meaningful punishment being dished out.
Currently, Flav Earp was set for yet another pre-trial conference in his witness intimidation case on May 10; it was expected that he will accept a deal to travel “out west” where there’s work in the oil patch in various states (the only thing Earp knows how to do besides be a criminal and procreate), and his charges associated with this alleged crime will be dismissed.
Casey King got a similar deal and subsequently was reported to have moved to Missouri not long ago, this after the death of Scott Earp and King’s charges of battery in an unrelated case, at which the Earps were also present. Those charges were dismissed. However, this didn’t keep King from getting in trouble in the southwestern Illinois area.
Jonathan Trout is to undergo a presentencing investigation to see what options will come his way in his three-year-cap of sentencing, set to take place on June 14, 2013.
Saline County charges…?
In the interim, it appears charges against Trout in Saline County have been resolved after a March 29 last court date, and Saline is $500 to the good over it.
There, Trout also received a Class 3 felony Failure to Report Change of Address as a Sex Offender charge, this coming last summer.
Trout was reporting that his residence was with his grandmother, Clara Young, in Eldorado, when he was actually still residing with his babymomma, Kali Royce in Broughton.
No action has been taken on the case since March 29, and records show that his $500 cash bond had been forfeited toward fines and fees.