Good morning! Welcome to Your Week, our subscriber-exclusive newsletter where each Sunday we feature some of our best stories about Nashville and beyond.
I am politics and investigations editor Duane Gang.
This morning, I’d like to highlight a story from justice reporter Evan Mealins. This past week, Evan told us the story of Matthew and Julie Hopkins and what happened to their herd of beef cattle in rural Marshall County.
In 2018, the Marshall County Sheriff’s Office was investigating allegations of animal abuse on the family’s farm. But the office seized cattle from the Hopkins farm without a warrant. Now, the sheriff’s office has lost a federal lawsuit over the issue and must pay the family $485,000.
I asked Evan a few questions about how he reported the story.
Thank you Evan for taking some time this morning. To start, tell us how you first discovered this case?
Evan: A lawyer told me about it first. I’d talked with Kyle Mothershead, one of the Hopkins’ attorneys, before for a different story, and once a jury came back with a verdict, he felt it was a big deal and let me know about it. It was pretty shocking news. So I started going through court records, and then I had some conversations with Matthew and Julie before eventually visiting them at their new farmhouse in Giles County.