Sheriff and the commissioners; backstory

     Carroll County's current board of commissioners called Sheriff Ken Tregoning in for a chat about how evidence in a murder case could have been locked up in a safe while the trial was going on.
     A special investigator is looking into the sheriff's claim that a memo about inappropriate procedure regarding the questioning of a witness who turned out to be a defendant was considered an internal issue, and therefor took precedence over the civil rights of the defendants.
     State's Attorney Jerry Barnes called for the investigation after being compelled to drop charges against two defendants in the middle of the trial. Bluntly, he said the mess was the result of a combination of ego and incompetence in the sheriff's department.
     A defense attorney says Barnes' office shares the blame, and so Barnes has asked for a special investigator to look at that, too, confident his office will be found blameless.
     All of this intrigue began before the trial began; meanwhile, the commissioners were giving Sheriff Tregoning what he had lobbied for for years -- designation as the primary law enforcement agency in the county, wresting that status from the Maryland State Police.
     All of this is just another chapter in the continuing saga of various players -- some in public office, some in uniform, and some civilians with one agenda or another -- seeking to win a game of King of the Hill. It's time for some background.
     First of all, a key factor in all of this is the fact that no commissioners, not even these very hands-on incumbents, run the sheriff's department. They have no right to call the sheriff on the carpet. Not like they would a police chief.
     As an independently elected official under the state constitution, the sheriff answers to no one but the voters.
     There are those who say that under old English law, the sheriff is the primary elected official in the land, including the state; no political power, neither by electeds nor by king, can dictate the law to the sheriff. Indeed, in their view, the sheriff can tell the commissioners or the governor how to do their jobs. They are considered by most reasonable people to be extreme in their views, but they are active and noisy.
     The idea is that a sheriff is the direct representative of the people to ensure justice.
So it could be argued that powerful people should not be able to influence his work.
     On the other hand, with literally no civilian oversight, one who is elected sheriff might get a little full of himself, with unhappy consequences regarding justice for the little guy -- apparently what Barnes was referring to with his "ego" remark.
     Tregoning has been one of, if not the best, sheriff in recent Carroll County history.
My own knowledge of local sheriffs goes back to 1963, when a former local football hero, Leroy "Monk" Campbell held the office. His wife, Millie, cooked meals for a handful of inmates, and the sheriff served summons and warrants and ran the jail with the help of three or four deputies.
     Monk Campbell did not speak to the press. If you had a question about why someone was locked up, you had to go to the court records. Monk left office only when he decided not to run again, if my memory serves.
     John Brown was sheriff for awhile, after retiring from a big city police department. He had a flair for publicity, once showing up on the front page of the local paper with handgun drawn and pointed at a purported felon. He once brought that same pistol to the table to a meeting with the commissioners at the time, along with his displeasure at the cuts the county leaders were suggesting to the sheriff's budget. A few county employees were unnerved, but Brown, like Campbell, had his fans.
     Eventually, though, his star faded, and the next interesting personality to hold the office was a retired state cop named Grover "Sam" Sensabaugh. Like Brown, he grew the size of the sheriff's department. Unlike Brown, he did not intimidate people with his weaponry. He had a level of professionalism that earned him a lot of respect, and people got used to the idea of having the sheriff's department do more local policing than it had in the old days. Still, there were some who were wary of a sheriff with too much paramilitary power. The state police remained the primary law enforcement agency.
     I believe it was former state's attorney Tom Hickman, once Jerry Barnes' boss, who pushed the idea of the Resident Trooper program, with the willing help of the commissioners.
    The Resident Trooper program, when it began in the 1970's, allowed the county to pay a portion of the cost of each trooper assigned to the county. The state paid the rest. It was a win-win for everyone but the local sheriff's department. The county got top quality law enforcement at a price it could afford, and the state police got a community policing training model that they used to train -- and promote -- troopers.
     They got money that the sheriff would like to have had -- any sheriff.
     In the beginning, the resident troopers got state cars with Resident Trooper written on the fender. The troopers were supposed to live in the general community they patrolled. They answered to the state police barrack commander.
     The rancor between top brass in the sheriff's department at brass at the state police barrack ebbed and flowed, depending on the budget allotments and the personalities in place. Most of the uniformed deputies and officers were less concerned about who was designated top cop. They had jobs to do, they cooperated, mostly, or at least as much as their superiors allowed -- or insisted, depending.
     In public, there was no problem between the agencies. In private -- in reality -- there was an ongoing, deep-seated determination by each agency to retain top cop status.
     It was about funding, for one thing. It was about career development, professional status, and -- some say it was a combination of vindictive intent and ego. In any case, the games of one-up-manship continued behind the scenes.
     As Julia Gouge, Perry Jones, and I settled into working as a new board of commissioners, the sheriff increased his personal lobbying to be designated the primary law agency in the county. He visited each commissioner individually, making his case in private meetings.
     The state police, too, came visiting, both in public and private, one-on-one meetings with each commissioner. The top state cop under Gov. Robert Ehrlich pushed for retention of the resident trooper program and the continuing designation of the state police as the primary enforcement agency. When a new governor took over, and a new state police superintendent put in place, he, too, came calling for private visits, and was more insistent that the state police remain the designated enforcement leader.
     One thing both superintendents stressed was their concern about the handling of evidence in, say, a murder case. Both were clearly skeptical of the ability of the sheriff's office to meet the highest standards.
     Under both administrations, we got mixed signals as to how long the resident trooper program could continue, especially as they raised the amount the county was paying toward the resident trooper program in Carroll County.
     The program, which started with the county paying less than half the cost of a uniformed officer, was now costing us nearly 130 percent, as we were being billed for administrative expenses. The state virtually dictated the terms of the contracts.
     There was underlying tension between the agencies, a few cases of missed communications and mistakes in responses. Obviously, policing procedures could be improved, but there was deadlock, and the sheriff talked publicly of cooperation, but privately insisted he was entitled to the honored status he sought.
     He apparently had the support of Perry Jones. Julia was adamantly opposed to giving the sheriff that designation. I was primarily interested in ending the competition between the sheriff and the state police. Also, I felt we needed to heed the points made by the sheriff that training and staffing his department was less expensive than continuing to meet the costs dictated by the state police.
     Eventually, I came to believe we needed to form a study group that would independently examine all the options -- retain the status quo, switch over to the sheriff and end the resident trooper program, or perhaps split the sheriff's growing roster into two departments -- the traditional sheriff, plus a county police force, filled with hires from the sheriff's improved, better trained officers.
     In candor, I told the sheriff that I had a problem with the power that could be wielded by a sheriff with populist support; laws might be interpreted, more than enforced, by one whose power was based on popularity, rather than due process. Besides, I pointed out: He had shown competent leadership, but if the past was a predictor of the future, the next person to hold the office should have some restraints.
    The sheriff told me that he would support a study and open, public dialog and processes to determine the best way forward.
     There is a time, between the formation of an idea and its possibilities to the actual initiation of a formal proposal, that word gets out that something is under consideration.
It's a dangerous time for good intentions, because rumors and leaks and old grudges can create an us-versus-them alignment before the real facts can be put on the table for consideration. Those who play games use the undercurrents of public opinion, misrepresentations and enmities to check the prevailing winds, and determine how to play the next moves.
     When it was time to meet as a board of commissioners to set such a process in place, the sheriff changed direction. He said the commissioners' actions were a surprise to him. He said the commissioners were not really opening a dialog, but rather, shoving changes down the throats of the people.
      The controversy that ensued brought out populist support from sheriffs' associations, anti- state police elements, constitutionalists who agreed that the sheriff was as the Sheriff of Nottingham -- the supreme elected official of the land. Aspirants to political office spoke up at public meetings and there was a lot of "We the People" talk about over-reaching politicians in general and these commissioners in particular.
     The sheriff appeared before the county delegation asking for legislation to preclude Carroll County's commissioners from changing the form of law enforcement in this county, even though the state constitution clearly stated that county officials had the right to create a county police force. The delegation happily went along with the idea.
     The lawmakers in Annapolis struggled with changing the constitution, but got over it by recognizing a time-honored tool to perpetuate vote swapping; "local courtesy." They kept the constitutional assertion that every county could choose its own form of policing -- with the exception of Carroll County. Then, when it was pointed out that such a discrimination was probably not constitutional, either, they amended it to expire when that current board of commissioners' terms expired.
     One of the sheriff's staunchest political allies at the time told me that he was disappointed at the way things turned out. Ego, he said, apparently had trumped good policy.
     Competition between agencies can erode good practices, but the last thing you want is a law enforcement boss with absolute power, and little or no civilian oversight or accountability after election day.
     Someone like that might feel justified in stomping on constitutional rights of defendants, or fouling evidence in the courts.