Judge Issues Arrest Warrant for Former Republican Governor

A judge in Kentucky issued an arrest warrant for former Governor Matt Bevin on Tuesday amid a legal battle with his estranged son.

Jefferson Family Court Judge Angela Johnson found Bevin in contempt after she said the ex-governor ignored repeated orders to provide personal financial records in a child support case involving his adopted 19-year-old son, Jonah Bevin. Matt Bevin had been ordered to appear in the courtroom, but instead, he joined via Zoom, stating that he had been out of state for a funeral and was returning to Kentucky. Bevin did not say where he was dialing in from. It was the second time Bevin appeared in court via Zoom after being told to show up in person.

“Your arrest warrant will be issued today,” Johnson told the former governor. She later issued a written order for his arrest and sentenced him to 60 days in jail unless he posts a $500 cash bond and submits “financial records, bank statements, tax returns and all other documents that would show the receipt of income.”

It is unclear when the warrant would be served.

The former governor alleged in a filing on Monday that the judge is making rulings based on a desire for media coverage.

“She is using me as a political piñata,” the filing stated.

Bevin is currently embroiled in an ongoing divorce case with his ex-wife, Glenna Bevin. Meanwhile, Jonah Bevin, whom Kentucky’s former first couple adopted from Ethiopia in 2012, alleges that the former governor used him to “boost” his 2015 gubernatorial campaign. Matt Bevin served one term as governor, losing his reelection bid to Andy Beshear.

In one of his last acts as governor in 2019, Bevin pardoned a convicted child rapist because the victim’s “hymens were intact.” As one Kentucky medical examiner noted at the time, “Rape is not proved by hymen penetration… “He not only doesn’t know the law, in my humble opinion, he clearly doesn’t know medicine and anatomy.”

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