Cape native now a prosecutor for Mississippi Co.

Standard Democrat

CHARLESTON, Mo. -- Guns and children will be the focus for Mississippi County's new assistant prosecuting attorney.

Ken Richardson, a Cape Girardeau native who received his law degree from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, Ill., began working in the Mississippi County prosecuting attorney's office Aug. 1.

"I'm really happy to have him," said Darren Cann, Mississippi County prosecuting attorney. "We're already working together on quite a few cases, getting him familiar with them. He's doing really good."

Richardson worked for about two years in the state attorney general's satellite office in Cape Girardeau before accepting the job in Mississippi County. Before working for the attorney general, Richardson was a staff attorney for the Division of Child Enforcement in Cape Girardeau for two and a half years.

Richardson said he is pleased that his new position allows him to continue to work on child support cases.

"That will be one of my primary responsibilities within the office," Richardson said. "We may not be able to make this a perfect world in which children do not suffer, but we can reduce the number of suffering children."

In his two previous positions, Richardson's efforts were all civil in nature.

"Of course I'll be generally helping with the load overall, but I will also be taking a special look at any gun violence and gun-related crimes," Richardson said.

The county's previous assistant prosecutor, Neal Frazier, left the prosecutor's office and joined the military to serve as a judge advocate general after the special gun prosecutor grant that funded his position ran out.