The sheriff behind Cochise County’s newly proposed jail has a controversial past that has recently resurfaced as voters prepare to decide the fate of a new jail.
Cochise County Sheriff Mark Dannels insists the public supports his vision for policing and the proposed $130 million jail, which would be funded by a new tax should voters approve it come November.
“Our job is not to punish people,” said Dannels in a recent interview with KOLD. “Our job is to rehabilitate and also get them back on the streets with resources.”
This version of Dannels as sympathetic to the plight of the convicted strikes as different from the version that conspired to imprison an innocent man for murder about a decade ago.
Sources who spoke to the Arizona Daily Independent raise concerns of who will fill that jail under Dannels’ watch, knowing his past and questions as to whether he treated accused individuals unfairly no reason other than self-promotion.
Most of Dannels law enforcement experience has been in Cochise. But for a brief few years, Dannels was the police chief for a tiny rural city in the middle of Oregon. Small as his jurisdiction was, the damage he imparted on that community was anything but.
As a condition of his hiring to Coquille Police in 2008, Dannels reportedly promised to solve a notorious cold case: the 2000 murder of 15-year-old Leah Freeman.
Freeman went missing one night in June of 2000 after leaving her friend’s house on foot following an argument. Her remains were found a little over a month later, miles from her last known location.
Dannels assembled a dedicated cold case team, but then two years passed without progress. That’s when Dannels sought help from the Pennsylvania-based Vidocq Society, an independent group of “expert” cold case investigators led by Richard Walter who, by that time, was already widely reported on as a fraud.
Even so, Dannels not only sought Walter’s help but welcomed him and camera crews from ABC’s 20/20 to be part of the investigation. According to a slew of court documents, Dannels’ cold case team was allegedly not dedicated to finding Freeman’s murderer but instead proving one man was guilty. Dannels and his investigators are accused of conspiring with prosecutors to implicate Freeman’s boyfriend at the time of her death, Nick McGuffin.
It appears the resulting 20/20 episode from ABC effectively swayed the jury to charge McGuffin. Throughout filming, Walter convinced police to hone in on McGuffin and supplied them with the theory of how McGuffin allegedly murdered Freeman, which the district attorney would use in trial. Police and 20/20 staff chased McGuffin around town while filming, all under Dannels’ watch.
In August of 2010, while the grand jury was still considering the case, 20/20 aired its episode on Freeman’s death in which Walter strongly alluded that McGuffin was the perpetrator. About a week later, McGuffin was arrested and charged with Freeman’s murder. 20/20 was invited to the arrest and filmed it.
Law enforcement moved on McGuffin despite there being no DNA evidence or witnesses tying him to the murder.
Even so, the case built up by investigators influenced the jury to find McGuffin guilty of first degree manslaughter in 2011. The scarcity of evidence compelled the jury to acquit McGuffin of murder, however. There was a reason for that scarcity — a reason Dannels allegedly knew fully well.
As a result of Dannels’ handiwork, McGuffin served nine of the 10 years of his sentence. By the time he was freed, his toddler daughter was nearly a teenager. All the while McGuffin maintained his innocence. In 2019, McGuffin was exonerated thanks to the Innocence Project.
Those attorneys discovered police and prosecutors fabricated and buried key evidence to make their narrative about McGuffin stick. They buried evidence including unidentified male DNA on Freeman’s sneakers and an eyewitness that supported McGuffin’s alibi.
One of the false pieces of evidence used to implicate McGuffin was perpetuated by Dannels in official reports and on ABC’s 20/20: that one of Freeman’s shoes was found on the road with blood on it. However, there was never blood on the shoe.
Investigators also falsely claimed Freeman was pregnant at the time of her murder so as to claim McGuffin had motive to avoid a statutory rape charge. They also fabricated false testimonies placing McGuffin and Freeman together around the time of Freeman’s abduction, which Dannels also repeated as fact to the media.
The egregiousness of McGuffin’s wrongful conviction prompted Oregon to issue its first-ever “certificate of innocence.”
With less than a month before McGuffin’s trial was scheduled to begin in 2011, likely with the confidence he would get his conviction, Dannels resigned from Coquille Police Department with little explanation.
According to The World Link, Dannels had “gathered information” for the case against McGuffin during “a personal trip” to Arizona — he didn’t elaborate what would require his travels to Arizona for a murder case based entirely in Oregon.
In 2020, Dannels and other officials were sued by McGuffin for wrongful arrest, prosecution, and imprisonment. McGuffin received a $14 million settlement in September.
The case has haunted Dannels and has fueled opposition to the jail tax.
In a 2-0 vote (Chairman Frank Antenori was absent) during a special session on May 6, the Cochise County Jail District Board of Directors approved Resolution JD25-01, formally calling for an election to be held on November 4, 2025, for the purpose of seeking voter approval of an excise tax to fund a new county jail.
The resolution was adopted as part of the Board’s role as the governing body of the Cochise County Jail District, which has authority under A.R.S. Title 48, Chapter 25 (§§ 48-4001, et seq.) to propose a dedicated sales tax for acquiring, constructing, and financing jail facilities, contingent upon voter approval.
The action follows a legal settlement in the case of Daniel LaChance, et al., v. County of Cochise, Cochise County Jail District, Board of Supervisors, et al., 2024 WL 5402722 (Ariz. Ct. App. 2024), which requires the County to hold a new, legally compliant jail district election in November 2025.
If approved by voters, the excise tax would be implemented and used solely for the planning, construction, and financing of new jail facilities. Per the resolution, once sufficient funds have been collected to plan and construct jail facilities, and retire financing, the Jail District will be dissolved and the tax terminated.
The ballot measure will appear on the consolidated election date of Tuesday, November 4, 2025, in alignment with statutory requirements under A.R.S. §§ 16-204(A) and 16-225(A).
TAXES. WE NEED MORE TAXES!!!!! Ask any politician at any level.
I’m all for the critical review of public figures’ past and present actions, but as a resident of Cochise county Dannels seems to be doing a reasonable job; not yet convinced we need a new prison, though.