In a blog post last month, I referenced the recent indictment of the Page County sheriff on 22 counts, ranging from taking bribes to sexual harassment. The charges are quite serious and carry a potential penalty of as much as 304 years in prison and fines of up to $2-million if the sheriff is convicted. Right now, the sheriff is out on $50K bail, but not allowed to work, wear the uniform, or use the cruiser; he is on some kind of administrative leave that allows him to receive his salary of approximately $100K per year while he is in this status.
Unraveling all of the activities involved in processing this case would take a couple of entries, but there has been news of late. I’ll summarize from a variety of sources, including Harrisonburg’s Channel 3 and the Page News and Courier.
The first item is the status of the petition to suspend the sheriff while the case plays out. Understandably, a number of county residents are upset that the sheriff pulls full pay during this episode – the median family income in Page, per the 200 census, is just about $40K annually – and a petition was circulated for removal, gaining 800 signatures. However, there were technical issues with the petition – it wasn’t written to match the charges, among other things, and it has been thrown out.
A second group of Page County citizens organized a legal defense fund for the sheriff. There’s not been much reporting on how much they raised, or how much the defense is estimated to cost.
The County is going through budgeting exercises right now, and an allowance has been made to gain the sheriff’s insight on the process. His communication - written only - with the staff is indirect, and must be filtered through a third party. The irony of this was not lost on the reporters, who noted that among the prosecution arguments was the issue that the sheriff was charged with using the budget of this office for personal gain.
In the Kite Hollow cock fighting ring case, an issue that is connected with the sheriff through these charges (he is alleged to have received bribes from the parties involved), sentencing for some of the operators has taken place, and jury selection for one of the defendants is just getting underway.
A last highlight of the day was the hearing yesterday in H-burg to change the venue of the trial, potentially to Roanoke, because of extensive publicity on the case. That decision is awaiting the results of the jury selection in the cock fighting case.
More to come, of course. The original post on the topic is linked below.
http://hawksbillcabin.blogspot.com/2008/11/sheriff-was-indicted.html
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