2 charged with stealing ‘Pioneer Woman' statue

INDEPENDENCE, Mo. -- Two Independence residents are accused of stealing a 6-foot bronze statue from outside the National Frontier Trails Museum and trying to sell it as scrap.

The Jackson County prosecutor's office says 33-year-old Kelli Summers and 36-year Jeremy Ratliff were charged Thursday with one count of theft. Prosecutors say the two took cut-up pieces of the statue, called "Pioneer Woman," to a metal recycler but were turned away when a worker noticed a portion of the statue's hand.

The recycling center alerted police and provided surveillance video that implicated the two suspects, neither of whom had obtained an attorney Thursday. A second man mentioned in the probable cause statement has not been charged.

The statue weighed more than 1,000 pounds and cost about $35,000 when it was dedicated in March 1990.