Would They Kill For Him?

From the Times Union:

The Florida Times-Union
November 20, 2007Security at Camden meetings a concern
By Gordon Jackson, The Times-Union
KINGSLAND - Camden County commissioners want to hire an outside company to temporarily replace their own county-paid security during meetings because of a simmering adversarial relationship with county deputies.
The goal is to hire a security company to maintain order before tonight's commission meeting, said Steve Howard, the county administrator. He said the move is temporary - perhaps the next four meetings or so - until relations calm between deputies and elected officials.
"It hasn't been warm and fuzzy what's been happening to us," Howard said of recent commission meetings. "Commissioners have been discussing some issues that are very delicate at best."
Commissioner Steve Berry said the move is being considered because of the large number of uniformed deputies who have attended recent meetings while wearing their sidearms.
Both the Kingsland Police Department and Georgia State Patrol have refused to provide personnel for security although commissioners have offered to pay them, Berry said.
Berry predicted the Dec. 4 meeting could also be very emotional because the Sheriff's Office likely won't make its payroll on Nov. 30.
Commissioners voted in August to slash the Sheriff's Office budget by $1.3 million and told the department not to go over budget. They also voted to split the $7 million budgeted into equal monthly installments as a way to control the Sheriff's Office.
Despite the monthly stipend, officials with the Sheriff's Office said they were not going to have enough money to make payroll at the end of the month because November has three pay periods.
"It's going to be volatile at the next meeting," Berry said.
There already have been some confrontations.
During the Nov. 6 meeting, deputies openly argued with commissioners as they discussed a takeover of the county's 911 emergency dispatch operations and after learning they may not get their Nov. 30 paychecks.
One deputy at the meeting "got out of line" when he openly disagreed with elected officials, Commissioner Katherine Zell said. The deputy should have withheld his comments for a public comment period set aside each meeting and not spoken as commissioners were debating the issue, she said.
"It was inappropriate," she said. "It should not have happened."
After that meeting ended, Berry, Zell and commission Chairman Preston Rhodes said they were told Col. Charlie Easterling, the department's chief deputy, shoved Marlon Mitchell, a county employee and former sheriff's deputy who is normally in charge of security at the meeting chambers.
Berry said he saw the altercation begin but his view was blocked as the situation escalated. Apparently, Mitchell asked Easterling to leave the meeting chambers after he became disruptive, Berry said.
Easterling, however, said he never shoved Mitchell, who he described as a close friend and former co-worker the past 35 years.
"There was no altercation," he said. "I don't understand where this is coming from."
Easterling said he was trying to usher an upset deputy from the meeting chambers when he and Mitchell accidentally bumped into each other.
"I was trying to get the deputy out of there," he said. "There was no harm done."
Commissioners said they also expect to ban deputies from wearing sidearms to their meetings.
Berry said he and other commissioners were "intimidated" by the armed, uniformed deputies at the meeting and who argued with commissioners.
"Common sense tells you that you don't bring guns to public meetings," Berry said. "I've never heard such a thing."
Berry accused deputies of acting like "hooligans" who are trying to intimidate commissioners at the urging of Sheriff Bill Smith.
"He's [Smith] stoking the emotional furnace of these employees to direct their anger toward the commission in order to divert attention from his own corruption," Berry said.
"I wonder, were they on the clock when they showed up at the meeting? Were the taxpayers paying for them to yell and scream at us?"
Zell said a commission meeting is no place for an on-duty deputy, and those who do attend should not be allowed to wear their service revolvers in the meeting chambers.
"You just don't know how people will react," she said.
The only person in commission chambers allowed to carry a weapon should be the person in charge of security, Berry said.
"We had a room full of armed people, loud and angry," Berry said of the most recent commission meeting. "I think it's a sad state of affairs when the law enforcement agency who is supposed to protect you is the one you need protection from."
Officials with the Camden County Sheriff's Office did not return two phone calls and two pages for comment.
Berry said Commissioner David Rainer was opposed to the proposal to hire private security to maintain order at meetings. Rainer was not home Monday and could not be reached for comment.
Rhodes said he takes the issue seriously and doesn't want future meetings sidetracked "by personal and emotional issues."
"It should be more secure," Rhodes said of meetings. "We're looking at all options, both immediate and long term."
gordon.jackson@jacksonville.com,
(912) 729-3672