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Former Mahoning County deputy accused of obstructing justice

YOUNGSTOWN — Kip T. Danks, 59, of Poland, a former deputy with the Mahoning County Sheriff’s Office, is scheduled for an initial appearance at 11 a.m. July 29 in U.S. District Court in Cleveland after he was named in January in an “information” accusing him of committing offenses called misprision of a felony and obstruction of justice.

Danks began working as a Mahoning County Sheriff’s deputy in June 1997 and retired Jan. 31, 2025, according to Bill Cappabianca, chief deputy for the Mahoning County Sheriff’s Office.

An affidavit in support of a criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court in the case alleges that Danks committed the offenses Jan. 9, 2023.

According to a website of the U.S. Department of Justice an “information” is a judicial procedure that “may be used when the defendant has waived an indictment.” An information “may also be used when the offense charged is punishable by imprisonment for one year or less.”

According to the Cornell Law School online Legal Information Institute, misprision of a felony involves a person “having knowledge of the actual commission of a (federal felony) conceals and does not as soon as possible make known the same to some judge or other person in civil or military authority under the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.”

AFFIDAVIT

The affidavit, filed by FBI Special Agent David Brown, alleges that in July 2021, the FBI and Mahoning Valley Law Enforcement Task Force began investigating Hure L. Orr, 61, of Youngstown, about the drug organization he operated in the Youngstown area.

An investigation established that between July 2022 and around Feb. 2, 2023, Orr trafficked controlled substances, the affidavit states. For instance, the FBI obtained court-authorized wiretaps on multiple cellphone numbers, including a device used by Orr, that confirmed that Orr sold controlled substances, the document states.

On Jan. 9, 2023, law enforcement officers executed a search warrant at a location on Glenwood Avenue on Youngstown’s South Side from which an associate of Orr sold drugs, it states. During a search, investigators located a handgun and a bag containing what lab results confirmed to be methamphetamine and fentanyl.

About 3:51 p.m., that day, investigators used a court-authorized wiretap and intercepted a call over Orr’s phone between Orr and a person whose voice the FBI agent recognized as being that of Danks, who was working for the sheriff’s office.

During the call, Orr asked Danks questions about the warrant that was served at the Glenwood location that morning, such as why it did not list a person who made allegations of criminal conduct involving that location.

Danks told Orr he did not know but he could “see what I can find out.” Orr told Danks the investigators took a car belonging to Orr but said another man had been driving it, and the investigators found a gun in it.

“Well it’s my gun. Honest, to be real, it’s my gun that I keep in there just in case,” Orr told Danks, according to the affidavit. Orr asked Danks if officers were likely to charge him with a weapons offense, and Danks stated that investigators would have to prove it was Orr’s gun before they could charge him.

“You know, it’s just, don’t use the phones,” Danks told Orr, according to the affidavit. “I already, I already know,” Orr responded.

The FBI agent stated in the affidavit that he believes that when Orr told Danks about the firearm found during the search warrant, Danks “provided advice and information to Orr in an attempt to assist Orr in providing false statements and misleading information to law enforcement to help prevent Orr from being charged federally for weapons violations.”

The document states that because Danks was a sheriff’s deputy for about 25 years, Danks “knew that it was illegal for Orr to possess this firearm as a convicted felon. Danks gave advice to Orr that would make it more difficult for law enforcement to charge Orr despite Danks receiving a full, unsolicited confession from Orr that the gun belonged to Orr.”

The FBI agent stated that when Danks told Orr not to use the phones, it appears that Danks was “attempting to provide advice to Orr to help prevent law enforcement from gathering additional evidence on Orr” through wiretaps. Danks also was formerly assigned to the U.S. Marshal’s Service Fugitive Task Force for about nine years, the affidavit states. In that role, he worked with federal law enforcement agencies, including the FBI, it adds.

A short time after the call, Orr contacted another man and advised him to stay off the phone, the affidavit states. Throughout prior wiretap interceptions, Orr “never expressed concerns over speaking on the phones until Dank’s statement,” the affidavit states.

The affidavit states that Danks contacted another law enforcement officer after his call with Orr and asked for more information about the raid at the Glenwood location. The affidavit states that Danks did so to “gain sensitive, law enforcement information concerning the investigation … and whether federal agents had linked the firearm recovered there to Orr.”

The affidavit stated that the FBI agent also believed that Danks tried to “divert law enforcement’s attention away from Orr and toward” another man, “even though Danks knew that the firearm recovered from the search belonged to Orr.”

The affidavit states that Orr called Danks the next day, and Danks told Orr not to talk to law enforcement. “In short, Danks took affirmative steps to thwart the federal investigation and conceal Orr’s admission of illegal gun possession,” the affidavit states.

In early 2023, Orr spoke with the FBI and admitted that he sold drugs, including cocaine, and that he had multiple sources of drug supply, the affidavit states.

It also describes an Aug. 10, 2023, interview of Danks by federal agents at the Mahoning County Sheriff’s Office in which Danks denied that he told Orr to stay off the phone, saying, “I would never do that.”

Orr was sentenced to 54 months in federal prison in January after pleading guilty to conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute controlled substances for selling drugs for about six months between July 2022 and early February 2023, according to federal prosecutors handling Orr’s federal case.

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