First trial in alleged plot that led to Judge Meyer’s shooting set for April 8
Attorney for woman accused of bribery tied to attempted murder scheme says he’ll ask for jury from outside Tippecanoe County. Meanwhile, man accused of being at center of plot asks for change of venue
Support for this edition comes from Purdue’s Presidential Lecture Series. Purdue University invites the Greater Lafayette community to the Presidential Lecture Series featuring bestselling science writer and documentarian Timothy Ferris on Feb. 26 at 6 p.m. in Stewart Center’s Fowler Hall. The conversation, part of Purdue’s yearlong America250 celebration, will explore how science has shaped liberty and democratic societies. This event is free and open to the public, with a general admission ticket required. Reserve your free ticket at https://am.ticketmaster.com/purdue/buy/pls0226.
FIRST TRIAL IN ALLEGED PLOT LEADING TO JUDGE’S SHOOTING SET FOR APRIL 8
The first trial connected to an alleged plot that led to the Jan. 18 shooting of Judge Steve Meyer and Kim Meyer at their Lafayette home is scheduled to start April 8.
Amanda Milsap, 45, of Lafayette, filed a request earlier this month for a speedy trial on charges, including felony counts of bribery and obstruction of justice, that accuse her of relaying an offer of $10,000 to the victim in a case against Thomas Moss, her former husband, if they wouldn’t testify in a trial scheduled to start days later in Meyer’s Tippecanoe County Superior Court 2.
On Thursday, Cass County Superior Court 2 Judge Lisa Swaim – assigned to the case of Milsap and five others tied to the attempted murder – set aside three days for the trial.
Earl McCoy, Milsap’s attorney, told Swaim he planned to file a change of venue by next week, given the pretrial publicity surrounding the shooting, the investigation and the eventual arrests in the case. McCoy told Swaim he planned to focus his request on having a jury selected and brought to Tippecanoe County, rather than moving the trial to another county.
Swaim, who during initial hearings for four of the defendants on Jan. 28 had been hedging between whether to hold trials in Tippecanoe County or in her home courtroom in Logansport, said Thursday that she was prepared to come to the Tippecanoe County Courthouse.
“I have actually visited Tippecanoe County,” Swaim told attorneys. “I visited the courtroom and am making myself familiar with the surroundings. And I think that we can make this work.”
Milsap, who has a mental health practice in West Lafayette, appeared at the hearing via video from the Tippecanoe County Jail, where she’s been held since her arrest less than a week after the Meyers were shot.
In the most recent court documents, investigators say Raylen Ferguson, a 38-year-old Lexington, Kentucky, man accused of firing a short-barrel shotgun through the front door of Judge Steve Meyer’s Lafayette home, admitted his role in a plot that initially included breaking into the house, having his wife, Kim, zip-tie the judge before killing him and leaving a note – all in an attempt to stop a jury trial set to start two days later.
According to court documents filed with charges, Ferguson was accused of going in disguise to Steve and Kim Meyers’ front door on the afternoon of Jan. 18. Investigators say he knocked, telling Steve Meyer that he was looking for a lost dog before firing a shotgun through the closed front door, hitting the judge in the arm and Kim Meyer in the hip. They continue to recover.
Investigators’ version of the plot revolves around Moss, 43, of Lafayette, who had been scheduled to face a trial on Jan. 20, on 2024 charges of intimation, domestic battery and unlawful possession of a firearm by a serious violent felon. He also faced charges of being an habitual offender. According to court documents, Meyer had rejected an attempt filed earlier in January to postpone that trial, lining up more than 50 jurors to report that Tuesday morning. That trial was postponed until May 18.
In interviews conducted since the initial arrests, investigators say Ferguson told them he tried to back out of the plot but was $22,000 in debt to Moss and did it with promises that what he owed would be erased and that he’d be up for a higher rank in a motorcycle club – labeled by prosecutors as a gang.
In court documents filed in the attempted murder case, investigators say the victim in Moss’ scheduled trial had been approached weeks earlier by Milsap, who informed her that Moss and the Vice Lords gang wanted to pay her $10,000 to not show up and testify. The woman, who has a no contact order against Moss, said she didn’t entertain the offer, according to the investigators’ account in court documents.
Prosecutors have since added a misdemeanor charge of invasion of privacy against Milsap. Swaim said the three counts would be considered together in her trial.
Milsap s being held in jail with $500,000 cash and $1 million surety bonds.
Among the other five charged:
Ferguson was charged with a dozen felony counts, including attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder. After the Jan. 18 shooting, police found items seen on the man who fired the shots in neighbors’ property on Windy Hill Drive, around the corner from the Meyers’ home. That included a black and gray flannel, a scarf, earmuffs, a knitted beanie, black sunglasses, a retractable dog leash and a silicone mask. Police also say they found a short-barreled shotgun with an obliterated model and serial number, which contained a discarded shotgun round in the chamber. Court documents say an Indiana State Police lab confirmed that DNA found on the discarded mask matched that of Ferguson. He’s being held on $4 million in cash and $2 million surety bonds, along with conditions that he could have no communication with anyone beyond his attorney while awaiting trial.
Moss faces 12 felony counts, including those for attempted murder, conspiracy to commit murder, battery and intimidation. He is being held on $3 million cash and $2 million surety bond, with the same conditions as Ferguson, keeping them isolated while in jail.
Nevaeh Bell, 23, of Lafayette, was arrested nearly a week after the others and was charged on suspicion of 12 felony counts, including attempted murder, conspiracy to commit murder, aggravated battery and intimidation. Bell, Moss’ girlfriend and partner in a trucking company, was accused by investigators of being part of the planning that targeted the witness in Moss’ pending trial and helping Ferguson find and map out the unlisted address of Judge Meyer. Bell also was being held on $3 million cash and $2 million surety bond.
Blake Smith, 32, of Dayton, was charged with 12 counts, including attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder. Investigators say an Indiana State Police lab was able to recover enough of the serial number from a gun found in the Meyers’ neighborhood to link it to a sale to Smith at a local gun shop on Jan. 5. Police say Smith also that day bought the same brand of ammunition found chambered in the gun and in spent cartridges at the Meyers’ home. Police say surveillance footage of Smith buying the gun show him in a black and gray flannel hooded sweatshirt, similar to one they say Ferguson was wearing on the Meyers’ porch and shed as he fled the scene. Court records, included by investigators in charging documents, show that Smith had a divorce proceeding in Meyer’s court in 2025, in which he contested his former wife’s attempt to move with their children to Idaho. Smith lost and his parenting time was modified in that decision. He is being held on $3 million cash and $2 million surety bond, with the same conditions as Ferguson, keeping them isolated while in jail.
Zenada Greer, 61, of Lexington, Kentucky, was charged with two felony counts of assisting a criminal in an attempted murder and obstruction of justice. Charges tie a car registered to Greer and another one she rented to being at the scene of the shooting and in various other locations in Lafayette before and after the crime. Greer was ordered to be held on $1 million cash and $1 million surety bonds.
The five defendants aside from Milsap are scheduled for their next hearing March 5 in Swaim’s court.
In other developments …
THOMAS MOSS LANDS ANDREW BALDWIN, ATTORNEY IN DELPHI MURDERS CASE; ASKS FOR CHANGE OF VENUE ON ATTEMPTED MURDER CHARGES
Attorneys for Thomas Moss this week filed for a change of venue, saying he can’t get a fair trial in Tippecanoe County due to publicity around the case.
Moss, who initially told the judge during his Jan. 28 initial hearing that he planned to represent himself, now has a public defender – Andrew Baldwin of Franklin, Indiana.
Baldwin was one of the lead defense attorneys in the trial of Richard Allen, the Delphi man accused and convicted in 2024 for the 2017 murders of Delphi eighth-graders Abby Williams and Libby German.
“The scope and drama of the investigation itself generated enormous public attention,” with media coverage going beyond Greater Lafayette “and went national within hours,” the change of venue motion reads.
“The compelling, newsworthy nature of this story, especially in the True Crime genre and zeitgeist, promises additional reporting during the pendency of this trial,” the motion argues.
“By simply Googling ‘Tippecanoe County Judge shot’ an interested Tippecanoe County citizen would easily have access to hundreds of articles, including videos, concerning the shooting, including an inundation of local TV and print media in and around Lafayette. … These reports are based on one side of the story – the side of the police and the state.”
The motion calls the media coverage “far from neutral,” citing references – many pulled from the prosecutor’s probable cause affidavit – to Moss’ alleged affiliation as an “outlaw” member of the Phantom Motorcycle Club, the Vice Lords gang and his criminal record. The motion also points to statements in court documents in which investigators say Raylen Ferguson confessed to being the one who pulled the trigger while pointing to Moss as a leader in the plot and even the reason for the attempt on Meyer’s life.
“The media has done what the state cannot do at trial – it has tried the defendant on his history,” Baldwin argued.
Baldwin also pointed to the compounding effect of social media and often inflammatory comment sections that follow “by prospective jurors,” including indications in the probable cause affidavit that the victim in Moss’ other pending case went to police with information after seeing comments on social media about the shooting of Meyer.
“Beyond the prejudicial pretrial publicity and comments made by prospective jurors, Judge Meyer’s prominence in the community makes a fair trial – in this county – impossible,” the motion argued, while laying out Meyer’s public roles, including as a Lafayette City Council member for 23 years before becoming a judge.
Baldwin argued that short of a change of venue, a jury from another county would be in order.
As of Thursday afternoon, Swaim had not ruled or scheduled a hearing on the request.
Also pending is a motion, handwritten by Moss and filed in court records Feb. 9, asking that be allowed to contact family members while in jail awaiting bond or trial. A condition laid out by Swaim at the initial hearing Jan. 30 was that Moss – and others charged with attempted murder – not have contact with anyone inside or outside the jail, besides their attorneys.
For more on the alleged plot and charges
THIS AND THAT/OTHER READS …
DA BEARS. DA REGION?: Is this Chicago Bears to The Regional actually happening?
Indiana Capital Chronicle’s Tom Davies had this report Thursday from the Statehouse: “The Chicago Bears and Indiana officials announced a potential deal Thursday for the NFL franchise to cross the state line and build a new stadium in Hammond. Indiana lawmakers released a package including new restaurant and hotel taxes in northwest Indiana to help finance infrastructure work connected to the project. House Speaker Todd Huston said the Bears would invest $2 billion toward the stadium. The Bears said in a statement that passage of Indiana’s Senate Bill 27 ‘would mark the most meaningful step forward in our stadium planning efforts to date.’ ‘We are committed to finishing the remaining site-specific necessary due diligence to support our vision to build a world-class stadium near the Wolf Lake area in Hammond, Indiana,’ the team’s statement said.”
Whoa.
Here’s more from the Indiana Capital Chronicle: “Chicago Bears call Indiana deal ‘step forward’ for building new stadium in Hammond.”
DRUG BUST: This is from J&C reporter Ron Wilkins: “Police arrested three men last week whom they believe are responsible for dealing nearly $700,000 worth of fentanyl, meth and cocaine in the Lafayette area, according to prosecutors.” For more: “3 arrested in Lafayette meth, cocaine and fentanyl dealing scheme.”
SYRINGE EXCHANGES COULD CONTINUE, AS BILL ADVANCES: Via the Indiana Capital Chronicle, this news for needle exchanges, including Gateway to Hope in Tippecanoe County: “Indiana’s syringe exchange programs are poised to continue for another five years as both legislative chambers have now supported extending those efforts aimed at stemming the spread of disease among people using intravenous drugs. Indiana House members voted 70-22 on Wednesday in favor of a bill allowing counties to keep the programs offering sterile needles while placing new restrictions upon them. … Six of Indiana’s 92 counties now have such programs offering sterile needles, disease testing and addiction counseling referrals, but they face persistent criticism of enabling illegal drug use and the spreading of health dangers from discarded needles. Changes made by the House since the Senate endorsed the extension last month would require a participant to present identification proving residency in the exchange program’s region and limit the program operators to providing one sterile needle for each used one handed in. Other new restrictions would prohibit needle distributions within 1,000 feet of a school, licensed day care center or a religious worship building without their permission.” For more: “Needle exchange program extension clears Indiana House. New restrictions could impact the programs.”
Thanks, again, for support for this edition from Purdue’s Presidential Lecture Series, presenting bestselling science writer and documentarian Timothy Ferris Feb. 26. Reserve your free ticket at https://am.ticketmaster.com/purdue/buy/pls0226.
Thank you for supporting Based in Lafayette, an independent, local reporting project. Free and full-ride subscription options are ready for you here. https://www.basedinlafayette.com/p/police-video-arrests-of-3-charged
Tips, story ideas? I’m at davebangert1@gmail.com.
Every peer-reviewed sports economics study finds that public investment in sports venues is a money loser, they never pay for themselves, no matter what politicians claim. But, Indiana politicians will happily give a huge sum of money to a family worth over $6 billion in exchange for some seats in the owners' box. What a damn scam. And the politicians who vote for it will still have the gall to claim to be small government "conservatives".
Any politician who votes for this while Indiana's roads are filled with potholes and while counties need to pass referendums to pay for schools should be run out of the state. Massive taxpayer welfare for billionaires (in this case out-of-state billionaires!) is beyond stupid, and a totally negligent waste of taxpayer money.