Citizen Standpoint News, it's in the name. My son was a good boy. He didn't deserve this at all. We're done being quiet. My son worked hard to care for his daughter, to take care of me. He made sure I was okay. My son was a good boy. He don't deserve what they did to him. There's no way my son would go walking, jumping a pond. My son went crazy. The people who did this are crazy. Let's go. WHEN I FOUND HIS CAR, HIS WALLET WAS IN THE CAR, HIS keys were in the ignition. Why? His clothes were in the car. But they didn't do nothing. CALLED THE POLICE STATION THREE, FOUR times for them to come find out. Then they found out that they had the dog stabbed on the the pond, but they didn't go searching in the pond. Let's go. Come on. Uh I currently represent Ty and Bounds and he's the chief of police of Bowling Green. The Constitution is not something that means nothing. It's not a technicality. The Constitution's a living document that we live by. What you're going to hear today is going to take moral courage for Ty Bounds to come up here and say what he's going to say. Been like this for years. It is his constitutional duty and his constitutional right to speak out today. I know that there're going to be repercussions. We are ready for them. Nothing's going to scare us from the truth. But justice will prevail for the family and I mean the entire family. Okay? I have invited Melvin Mayfield to say a few words. Now, if Tammy, if you want to or anybody from your group wants to come up and speak, I'm going to offer that as well. Okay? It's okay. Okay. But this is about putting an end to a big problem here in this county. All right, so I'm going to turn it over to Ty. We will take a few questions. Obviously, I want you to understand that because of the nature of the investigation, there will be limited by the things that we can't say. But I have all the evidence in my possession. It is safe with me. I have a copy of everything. And so, you know, justice will prevail. Ty? Good evening. Or good afternoon, I should say. My name is Colonel Ty Bounds and I'm the chief of police of the Bowling Green, Missouri Police Department. I've been a law enforcement officer for 18 years. 12 of those years have been in criminal investigations. I have no agenda other than justice for the family of Nathaniel Mueller. Because it is an ongoing investigation, I will be limited in what I can disclose. But I'm a What I'm about to say is based solely on evidence. On January 16th, 2025, I began an investigation into a robbery that occurred within the city limits of Bowling Green. As a result of the investigation, three suspects were arrested and multiple cell phones and other items were seized. Search warrants on social media accounts and devices pertaining to the case revealed the robbery and the disappearance of Nathaniel Mueller were connected. I was contacted by the Pike County detectives to begin a cooperative investigation into the disappearance of Nathaniel Mueller. The digital data obtained was analyzed by the Bowling Green Detective Unit, Pike County Detective Unit, and myself, and we were able to uncover a close, intimate relationship between one of the suspects in the robbery and a high-ranking official of the Pike County Sheriff's Office. You got it, Ty. Come on, baby. Come on, we got your back. Come on. You got it. Sorry. You got it. It is clear that the Pike County Sheriff's Office knew of the location of Mueller's body for a month prior to the discovery of his remains. The Pike County Sheriff, Stephen Cordy, was notified of this relationship, which displayed an apparent conflict of interest, but took no action to preserve ongoing and future investigations. The Sheriff's Office has sent or the Sheriff has since interfered with an investigation that placed numerous Bowling Green officers, Pike County Sheriff's deputies, and Missouri State Highway Patrolmen at risk. The Missouri State Highway Patrol Division of Drug and Crime Control has adopted the investigation into Nathaniel Mueller's disappearance. The family deserves the truth about what happened to their son and I am confident the Missouri State Highway Patrol will conduct an impartial and thorough investigation. Corruption has no place in law enforcement and cannot be tolerated. Peace officers must be held accountable for their actions, face justice as any other civilian must. The discovery of any corrupt law enforcement official in Pike County is a tragedy and will have long-lasting effects for this community. Corruption in law enforcement eliminates all trust between law enforcement officers and the communities that trust them to do the right thing. As long as I'm the chief of police of Bowling Green, corruption will be exposed and Pike County will never EXPERIENCE THIS AGAIN. CAN YOU TELL ME IF ANY SEARCH WARRANTS HAVE BEEN issued by the Attorney General's Office to search houses, data in cell phones to get this investigation going? I I don't know that answer, sir. I don't. Is the officer suspended at this time or is he still actively working? He is actively working. Can you Can you clarify if this deputy also has worked part-time for local municipal police departments in the past? I don't know the answer to that. I don't know. Can you clarify if this deputy has also worked as a school resource officer for one of the three main Pike County school districts? No comment. You seemed emotional when you started talking about this and the reason I'd asked about the tipping point for you was just it seems like there's there's some motivation for you as an officer to do the right thing. Can you talk talk more about that? Yeah, absolutely. My My motivation is surely getting justice for Nathaniel's family, all of his family. Thank you for your service. My next My next motivation is to make sure this never happens again. Uh I'm going to be attempting to uh contact the governor. I'm going to attempt to contact state representatives and I'm going to attempt to try to make a change in the way we do investigations into police because there is no police officer that's above anybody else. When you hear that we're held to a higher standard, that is not that we get a different standard if they break the law. The law is the law and that is what it is. It's broken, whether you're a cop or not, the treatment should not be special. That's my motivation. Have you been threatened by uh Have you had your career threatened or your future in law law enforcement threatened for coming public with this? Um I I don't want to comment on that at this time, but however, if I can't be a police officer because I'm telling the truth, I'm okay with that. Because if I'm getting silenced because of exposing corruption in this county, then what the hell am I doing here anyway? Chief, do you think there are additional witnesses remaining to be interviewed that may know information that haven't come forward yet? Yes. What would you say to those individuals? I would say you need to get in contact with the Missouri State Highway Patrol Division of Drug and Crime Control. You can call down to general headquarters if you would wish. However, um I know the guys investigating this case at this time and I do think they're going to do a fair and impartial investigation that could potentially lead to the arrest of a Pike County Sheriff's deputy. And you think there Do you think there is enough evidence to connect all these dots and prove the case against the deputy in question? I Over two terabytes worth. Yes, sir. And I definitely want to thank Ty Bounds, y'all, for what they did. It takes A LOT OF COURAGE. PLEASE, PLEASE GIVE THEM A ROUND OF APPLAUSE. ALL RIGHT. AND IF THEY TRY SO MUCH as to do anything to try to fire them or they try to react to y'all retaliate or anything towards these officers that stood up, we're going to fight for them, too. Do y'all understand me? These are the officers that deserve to be on our force. These are the officers that deserve to train other officers to show them the correct way to protect and serve, y'all. Nathaniel Mueller,