Hey, does anyone know the whereabouts of Richard Benda’s shotgun?
Killer Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg’s impeachment is November 9. A week before that historic House hearing, the first man on the scene of Ravnsbnorg’s fatal car crash and the second man to completely miss the body of Joseph Boever and his illuminated flashlight shining like a beacon in the night in the HIghway 14 ditch west of Highmore, Hyde County Sheriff Mike Volek, has died.
The sheriff who responded to the scene of a fatal car crash caused by the South Dakota attorney general last year has died, the Hyde County Sheriff’s office said Tuesday.
The office declined to release further details about the death of Sheriff Mike Volek, but said it planned to release a statement, KELO-TV reported. He was 69 and had served as sheriff for 22 years [“Sheriff Who Responded to South Dakota AG’s Fatal Crash Dies,” AP, 2021.11.02].
Volek never commented publicly on the Ravnsborg’s killing of Joseph Boever or his own incompetence in securing and investigating a crime scene. His only known testimony on his interaction with Ravnsborg and his ignorance of Ravnsborg’s crime is whatever he said to North Dakota Bureau of Criminal Investigation agent Joe Arenz on September 28 and October 29, 2020. Those statements are included in the investigation files that the South Dakota Department of Public Safety has released to the Legislature but which the Legislature is keeping secret. Those files also contain the Hyde County Sheriff’s Department reports on Ravnsborg’s crash submitted to Arenz on October 20, 2020, and audio recordings of a dispatch call to Sheriff Volek and a call back from Sheriff Volek to dispatch.
So if we want to know what Sheriff Volek saw that night when Jason Ravnsborg killed a man just a mile from the sheriff’s house, we’ll have to turn to Agent Arenz’s record, as Volek is no longer available to testify.
Mind-bending, crazy-making and belief-suspending: Republican politics in South Dakota never ceases to slay. If Jean Rounds is with her lord who is Mike Volek, Rich Benda and Scott Westerhuis with?
Well, this reeks. What’s ol’ Jason gonna do without his Own Personal Sheriff?
Did they find a 5-foot branch or burnt out safe next to his body? Probably just a pair of broken reading glasses.
Not to worry, Bonnie: Hughes County Sheriff Patrick Callahan tells KELO-TV that sheriffs from neighboring counties are pitching in, so they’ll surely keep Dial-a-Ride open for Jason and other top SDGOP officials who have roadside mishaps.
The sheriff had been sick for quite some time. Insinuating this CAH without any evidence is garbage and insulting to the sheriff and his family.
No doubt Sheriff Volek was an anti-mask anti-vaxxer who died doing what Republicans do best.
DR, it’s a minor insult, if at all, compared to the Gross insult the sheriff committed to the family of Joe Boever by not investigating the crime scene and discovering the body of the man Jason Ravnsborg had just killed. Volek should have done his job. He should have spoken to the press.
You claim he was sick? With what? So sick that he couldn’t do his job? What was the cause of death?
No person’s death should be trivialized; similar to insinuating a man threw himself in front of an automobile to commit suicide. I mean no offense to the family of either Joe Boever nor Mike Volek who will both are deeply missing by family and friends. Cory if you find my comment offensive please remove it. I believe we don’t know the truth from Jason on that night so speculation will run as it will.
My condolences
Much relieved about the Dial-a-Ride, Cory.
And it’s sadly evident that both Ravnsborg and Volek should have curled up like expiring bugs and died from overwhelming shame before September 14, 2020.
I won’t even repeat the trivializing joke that made the rounds here in Fall River County about Jason returning to field dress his deer and oopsie.
What contact did Maria Butina have on this? Was it Russian meddling yet again in South Dakota politics? Check for poison darts.
Come on folks he died. His older brother used to be our go to guy for the liquor store when we were underage. That’s where I first learned the term found it in a ditch. I went out with his sister. He married another girl I used to date. It’s a small town, incestuous at that I guess. He failed in the Ravnsborg case, but again, I’m sure he believed he was helping the attorney general and he treated him way too well. He was from Highmore. Its sad all the way. You have to ask yourself if Ravnsborg did anything at the scene to the body the next morning when he was there alone and how early did he arrive, but thats another story. I also met my wife at the bar in Redfield that Ravnsborg was coming from but thats really another story.
Trivialize the death? Far from it, Porter: I suggest his death may actually be a significant event, in that it may improve the quality of law enforcement in Hyde County. Imagine how different Ravnsborg’s situation might have been if Hyde County had had a sheriff capable of doing his job on September 12, 2020.
It’s a small state. Everybody is f*****g somebody that somebody knows.
Well…Bob is correct but I think Mark has a pretty good appreciation of how things work in a town of a 1,000 in a county of 2,500. Mr. Volek was sheriff for 22 years which means he dealt with the everyday tragedy that befell the citizens of Hyde County with kindness and discretion. He was not overzealous in pursuing prosecution and understood the dynamics of the interpersonal relationships of the citizens. Why he acted the way he did on that dark night is really unknown to the public, but I’m sure it was consistent with his past behavior. He was a public servant. I wish we could hear his side of the story. But, its another case of when the Republicans get in trouble, the bodies start piling up. And, nobody talks.
It does boggle the mind, as my close personal friend Lar points up, that there have been so many coincidental deaths over the past few years. Who knows what this sheriff fellow might have ponied up if he was forced in front of a committee of the legislatures. It would have been entertaining.
Let’s not paint favoritism and ignoring basic crime-scene procedures as kindness and discretion. Sheriff Volek failed to do his duty, left a man for dead in the ditch, and kept the public in the dark about it.
“sick for quite some time”? Tom Lawrence reports that the Hyde County Auditor says Volek’s death was “very unexpected and sudden.”
At Boever’s demise site, Volek ignored all the basic rules of crime scene investigations. He didn’t call in backup, he did not mark off the scene to keep people out of the area. He and Ravnsborg proceeded to stumble through the area. He did not give Ravnsborg a field sobriety test, etc. He basically messed up big time! If you can’t say something nice about the guy, tell it like it is.
May mr. Boever Rest in Peace. I hoped they would prosecute Ravnsborg like everyone else and move on. If anyone needs impeaching you know who it is. She has done much more harm than good to S.D.
CAH, my information comes from a business owner in Highmore and is by no means anything official.
Joe Sneve from the Argus has is as a heart attack
Mark Anderson:
Thanks for that whole lot of nothing
ArloBlundt:
He was NOT A PUBLIC SERVANT that night of the accident. Why don’t you ask Joe Boever and his family how they feel about his honorable, public servitude. He was in service to the dark side of corruption, manipulation, & evilness that night.