photo by: Douglas County Sheriff's Office booking photo

Alfred D. Sanders

The Douglas County district attorney says he plans to file a motion to get an attempted murder suspect back in jail, after the man was arrested on new lower-severity charges over the weekend and released on a matching low bond.

DA Charles Branson said he also wanted to discuss changing procedures that allowed Alfred D. Sanders to post bond and get out of jail before Branson’s office was notified that he was in custody.

“I have requested a meeting with the Chief Judge and the Sheriff,” Branson said in a statement, emailed Tuesday after the Journal-World reported Sanders’ new arrest. “I want to determine if a new screening mechanism can be implemented that would be completed prior to a suspect being released on a scheduled bond.”

Sanders, 47, of Lawrence, has been out on a much higher bond for more than a year in his attempted murder case.

Sanders posted the court-ordered $60,000 bond on Feb. 26, 2018, a few weeks after being arrested and charged. He was ordered not to possess guns or illegal drugs while out on bond.

Late Saturday night, Lawrence police arrested Sanders on suspicion of possessing a stolen gun as well as illegal drugs and paraphernalia. Jail records show that on Sunday evening, through a bondsman, he posted his assigned $4,500 bond in the new case and was released without appearing in court first.

Douglas County District Court’s routine bond schedule was applied in Sanders’ new arrest, Branson explained.

“The Douglas County District Court has a preset schedule for certain criminal offenses and that schedule allows a suspect to bond out of jail prior to appearing before the Court,” he said. “In the weekend’s event involving Mr. Sanders, the charges he was booked into jail on were all charges listed on the Court’s schedule of bonds. He was therefore allowed to bond out of jail without going before a District Court Judge and prior to the DA’s Office being notified that Mr. Sanders was in custody.”

Branson said Tuesday that his office has now reviewed Sanders’ new case and plans to file a motion to revoke his bond altogether in the attempted murder case.

About 2 a.m. Feb. 5, 2018, two men and a woman were driving on Iowa Street near Bob Billings Parkway when a man pulled up beside them and fired three gunshots into their moving car, shattering both front windows but missing the occupants, according to a Lawrence police affidavit previously reported by the Journal-World. The victims had argued with Sanders earlier that night inside Astro’s Billiards and Bar, 601 Kasold Drive. 

Police investigated and arrested Sanders within hours. In that case he stands charged with attempted second-degree murder, three counts of aggravated assault and criminal discharge of a gun at an occupied vehicle.

Saturday, a Lawrence police officer who recognized Sanders as someone who didn’t have a license saw him driving near Sixth and Massachusetts streets and followed his vehicle, Lawrence police previously told the Journal-World.

When the vehicle stopped at a convenience store in the 1000 block of North Third Street, the officer stopped behind it and conducted a search after smelling marijuana coming from the car. The officer found a stolen handgun under the driver’s seat, plus drugs and paraphernalia in the car and in the driver’s pocket.

Sanders was cited twice in 2018 for allegedly driving on a suspended license, according to Douglas County District Court records.