Sheriff punishes five deputies for leaving teens locked in - TopicsExpress



          

Sheriff punishes five deputies for leaving teens locked in courthouse BY Ron Daniel, Douglas County Sentinel Five members of the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office have been punished for their roles in leaving two teen-aged boys in a basement holding cell at the courthouse for nearly three days without food or toilet paper last month. Sheriff Phil Miller said Wednesday two ranking officers and one deputy have been removed from the courthouse. Two other deputies were also punished but will not be transferred. “The entire management staff has been removed from the courthouse,” Miller said. “All the people involved have been suspended up to one month pending the appellate process.” Miller said that process entails an appeal directly to him, which should be finished this month. From there, Miller said the punished deputies could appeal to the county’s merit system protection board. The punishments for the ranking officers and deputy removed from the courthouse range from suspensions of a week to a month “depending on the culpability,” Miller said. One of the deputies not being transferred who Miller described as “not very culpable” was written up and another deputy was suspended for a week. Miller said no one would be fired for the incident, which occurred between June 20-23. The 16-year-old and 17-year-old were originally put in the cell, which had benches, a sink with water and a toilet with no toilet paper, around 1:30 p.m. on June 20. Both teens had been in juvenile court earlier in the day. When the courthouse was locked up for the weekend, the cell where the boys were located wasnt checked, and they remained locked up until the morning of Monday, June 23, when deputies arrived and found them in the cell, hungry but otherwise OK. Miller called a press conference the following day to let the public know his department had made a mistake and that he was taking full responsibility. “My reaction is anger,” Miller said two weeks ago. “I’m upset. I’m disappointed in people that I have a ton of confidence in. This is a great agency, but it doesnt take many instances like this until people lose confidence in us.” Miller said in addition to the punishments being handed down, policies and procedures have been changed. And he said an electronic system that automatically logs when deputies check each cell is being installed. “I don’t want to ever say never, but I don’t believe there’s a possibility as a result of what weve done that it will ever happen again,” Miller said.
Posted on: Thu, 10 Jul 2014 10:13:02 +0000

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