New court hearing is ordered for Prairie Village councilman

The long legal saga for Prairie Village councilman David Morrison continues.

In 2013, Morrison was ousted from office by a Johnson County judge for misleading a city employee and allowing a homeless friend to spend several nights in Prairie Village City Hall in 2012.

He appealed, and last year the Kansas Court of Appeals ordered him reinstated.

Now the Kansas Supreme Court on Friday ordered the case back to Johnson County.

A majority of the court found that both the Johnson County judge and the Court of Appeals applied the wrong legal standard in their decisions.

In its ruling, the Supreme Court instructed the Johnson County judge to hold a hearing to determine if Morrison acted with a “bad or corrupt purpose.”

It does not appear that Friday’s ruling will affect Morrison’s standing on the council for now.

Morrison said Friday he had been advised by his attorneys not to comment.

Rex Sharp, one of the lawyers representing Morrison in the case, said in a written statement that it was time to “call a truce” and let the voters decide when Morrison is up for re-election next year.

“Dave Morrison admitted a long time ago that he made a mistake,” Sharp said. “It has now cost Mr. Morrison a lot of time and heartache, and the state and taxpayers an enormous amount of money.”

Morrison was first elected to the council in 2008 and was re-elected in 2012.

In October 2012, he accompanied his friend to City Hall and told a Police Department employee they were there for a meeting. Instead, he allowed the friend to stay in the building and provided him his building access code.

In its ruling Friday, the Supreme Court found that the appeals court had established too high of a standard to justify a public official’s removal from office.

On the other hand, it found that the Johnson County judge did not address the question of whether Morrison’s actions were done with a bad or corrupt purpose.

Two Supreme Court justices dissented in Friday’s ruling and said they would have upheld the Johnson County judge’s ouster of Morrison.

This story was originally published October 2, 2015 at 11:04 AM with the headline "New court hearing is ordered for Prairie Village councilman."