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Ed Kelly hired as Assistant Jefferson County Attorney
Southeast Iowa Union offers audio versions of articles using Instaread. Some words may be mispronounced.
FAIRFIELD – Ed Kelly is returning to the Jefferson County Attorney’s Office.
Jefferson County Attorney Chauncey Moulding met with the board of supervisors on Monday, July 7, and announced that Mike Brown would be stepping down as one of the assistant county attorneys. Joining Moulding at the meeting was Ed Kelly, whom Moulding recommended hiring to replace Brown on Aug. 1. The supervisors voted 3-0 to hire Kelly as Brown’s replacement.
Kelly told the supervisors, “I very much appreciate your support, and endeavor never to disappoint you.”
Kelly is no stranger to the county attorney’s office, and in fact was county attorney from 1971-82. He and John Morrissey started a law firm together shortly after Morrissey moved to Fairfield in 1973. Kelly said he no sooner obtained his law degree from the University of Iowa than he began his duties as Jefferson County Attorney, making him the youngest chief prosecutor in the entire country. Kelly said no other attorney in the county wanted the job, then a part-time position that paid $8,000 a year.
Kelly said he has a great love for Jefferson County, and that he has fond memories of serving on the Fairfield school board and of his children attending Fairfield High School. He told the supervisors that he was assured “nothing happens” in Jefferson County when he became county attorney, but cases he worked on were later covered by the New Yorker and National Public Radio.
Later in his career, Kelly was a federal prosecutor for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Southern District of Iowa. He’s also worked in the U.S. Senate, and more recently has worked for the State Defender’s Office, providing legal representation to clients who can’t afford it.
In 2013, the Des Moines Register profiled Kelly and his wife Sue after they completed a 500-day, 6,200-mile trip through international waters in and around Europe on their 40-foot sailboat.
Kelly said he will do the kind of cases that Brown had been doing, and that he’s open to whatever assignments the county attorney has for him.
“I’ve always done whatever’s required,” he said. “I believe that if it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing well.”
Call Andy Hallman at 641-575-0135 or email him at andy.hallman@southeastiowaunion.com
