John Jessup is currently a Hancock County Commissioner, but won the primary in May to be on the ballot as a Hancock County Councilman in November.
SHIRLEY — Officials with the Shirley Police Department (SPD) tell the Daily Reporter they received word from the Las Vegas police department in April that Hancock County Commissioner John Jessup was under investigation for sexual assault in Clark County, Nevada.
Shirley Chief of Police Brian Pryor noted that his department helped with the investigation and interviewed Jessup in April about a possible sexual assault alleged to have happened while Jessup was in Las Vegas in January.
Officers with the SPD arrested Jessup on Friday and took him to the Shelby County Jail where he is being held for extradition to Las Vegas to face a felony charge of sexual assault.
“They reached out to us at the end of April, early March and explained to me what they had, and they sent me all the case information and reports that they had and asked if we would interview him,” Pryor said. “Of course we said yes, we’d help.”
Pryor said at first he thought perhaps officials with the Hancock County Sheriff’s Department should do the interview with Jessup but then realized Jessup, who is an elected commissioner and was recently elected to be on the ballot to become a Hancock County councilman, oversees that department.
“I thought no, that’s their boss, and it would be better for an outside agency to do the interview,” Pryor said. “So I told the officials in Las Vegas we’d help.”
Pryor made a list of questions after reading the report and sat down for an interview with Jessup in March.
“He agreed to his Miranda warning and agreed to talk to us,” Pryor said. “I then sent a digital message to Vegas of that interview, and they got a warrant. Once the warrant was attached, they called me and asked me to serve the warrant, so we did.”
When asked if, after conducting the interview, Pryor felt Jessup had committed a crime, Pryor answered, “absolutely,” and said he too would have issued an arrest warrant.
“He (Jessup) ended up confirming the situation,” Pryor said.
However, since it was a Las Vegas case, all Pryor could do was tell Jessup that he was sending the interview to officials in Nevada, and if they felt a crime had been committed, they’d issue an arrest warrant. Or, if they didn’t, he’d never hear from anyone about the case again.
Pryor said that he and his department treated Jessup like they would have any other suspect, and when the warrant was issued by Las Vegas officials June 11, he called the Sheriff’s Department and spoke with Sheriff Brad Burkhart and suggested taking Jessup to the Shelby County Jail for safety reasons.
“It wasn’t to cover it up in anyway, but I called the Sheriff and told him we were getting ready to arrest Jessup and I asked him, ‘Do you want him in your jail’ and he said, ‘No,’ which I figured was the answer because anytime you arrest a public figure or someone with a high profile, you do not want them held in your county,” Pryor said. “It really is a security risk.”
Pryor noted that Las Vegas officials received the sexual assault complaint against Jessup in January, and it took some time for it to make its way through the legal process.
“When it got to us, I just treated it like I would have any case where I have to interview someone,” Pryor said. “Vegas called me right after they got the digital interview we did and told me, ‘Absolutely’ they were filing charges.”
After receiving the warrant late last week, Pryor said he sent two of his officers to Jessup’s home in Shirley to arrest him and take him to Shelby County on Friday. They then called Las Vegas officials and told them where Jessup was located. Officials at the Shelby County Jail tell the Daily Reporter Jessup is still listed as an inmate in their facility, and jail officials will give Las Vegas officials 30 days to come pick him up.
