HERMANN – Gasconade County taxpayers won’t be hit as hard as they could have been in picking up the cost of the capital murder trial of Kenneth Lee Simpson.

The final bill forwarded from Franklin County, the site of the trial that was moved from Gasconade County, was for $108,953 — a much lower amount than anticipated by Gasconade County officials because the legal proceedings took less time than originally projected by the judge presiding over the case.

County Clerk Lesa Lietzow, who presented the final version of the bill to the County Commission Thursday morning, noted that county administrators had included in this year’s operating budget $250,000 to cover the costs. Those costs included the selection process and transportation of the 12 jurors and six alternates from Greene County, the cost of lodging, meals and related expenses for their weeklong sequestration in Union and other trial-related expenses.

20th Circuit Presiding Judge Craig E. Hellmann initially projected about two weeks for jury selection, a couple weeks for the trial and another week for the sentencing portion, which was held in mid-June in which Simpson was handed the death penalty for killing Hermann Det. Sgt. Mason Griffith on March 12, 2023. The jury selection took only one week in late January and the trial, which began in early February, required only four days for the evidentiary portion and only a couple days for deliberations before the jury returned a guilty verdict and a recommendation to the court for a death sentence.

Formal sentencing, which included victim impact statements presented to the court, took only one day in mid-June.

Franklin County gave Gasconade County a big gift by not charging the daily expense for housing Simpson for more than two years after the case was moved on a change of venue from Gasconade shortly after his arrest. Counties that house Gasconade County inmates typically charge upwards of $50 per day for lodging and food. If Franklin County had assessed the daily charge for Simpson, it likely would have placed significant pressure on Gasconade County Sheriff Scott Eiler’s departmental budget’s line item for housing. In past years, the budget for prisoner lodging has been in danger of being depleted before the end of the year.

The remaining dollars from the amount budgeted for the trial can be redirected for other uses during this calendar year.