HUTCHINSON, Kan. — A 32-year-old Hutchinson man sentenced to over 18 years in prison in a kidnapping case won a minor battle involving an earlier case.

Todd Lloyd was ordered to prison for violating his probation after he was charged in the kidnapping case. He appealed, contending the court erred in relying upon a probable cause finding made at his preliminary hearing in the kidnapping case. He was ordered to serve the two-year, eight-month sentence.

The appeals court, in its opinion issued Friday, notes that the standard of proof required to bind a defendant over for trial is a lesser burden of proof than the preponderance of evidence standard needed to establish a probation violation. The opinion says Judge Trish Rose erred and ordered the case back to District Court for a new probation violation with instructions for the court to apply the correct burden of proof. However, Lloyd had stipulated to violating his probation when Judge Rose made her decision.

Lloyd has entered a plea in this case to aggravated battery and misdemeanor theft for the case from 2012. Despite having a substantial criminal history, he was granted two years probation on the underlying sentence of two years and eight months.

The state says he violated his probation by being arrested on April 23, 2014, when he came close to being shot by two Hutchinson Police officers during an altercation where he held his girlfriend at knife point. He eventually threw the knives down and, after a brief struggle, was taken into custody.

District Attorney Keith Schroeder says that, had Judge Joe McCarvile handled the probation violation at the end of the preliminary hearing, he could have found there was a preponderance of evidence for the probation violation. Schroeder says he argued at the time of the appeal that Lloyd had been convicted in the kidnapping case.

So when the case comes back, the judge will now be able to rule using what the Court of Appeals instructed her to do.

Lloyd has another case pending where he’s charged with criminal threat. The state alleges that he threatened the life of two officers, Sgt. Josh Radloff and Sgt. Eric Buller, who were involved in the kidnapping case. After being found guilty in the kidnapping case, he allegedly threatened to kill the officers if he ever got out of jail. The criminal threat case is still pending.