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UPDATED: Special grand jury empanelled to investigate sheriff
Posted On 25 Jun 2010
A special Whitley County Grand Jury has been empanelled to investigate allegations of criminal wrong doing by current Whitley County Sheriff Lawrence Hodge.
Chief Circuit Judge Paul Braden empanelled the special grand jury Friday morning pursuant to a petition filed on May 20 by Commonwealth’s Attorney Allen Trimble.
Braden approved the petition on May 28 and set June 25 as the date for empanelling the grand jury.
"The purpose stated for the special grand jury is to investigate allegations of criminal wrong doing by the current Whitley County Sheriff Lawrence Hodge and allegations of criminal wrong doing by the sheriff’s office," Trimble said in a press release.
"The petition was filed a few days after the recent election in order not to impact the recent primary election. Also, certain aspects of the investigation by various agencies had not been completed."
During the May 18 Primary Election, retired Kentucky State Police Detective Colan Harrell soundly defeated Hodge by a vote of 4,765 to 1,891 in a five-way race.
"These allegations came up at a time when Sheriff Hodge was involved in an election," Trimble said in an interview Friday morning. "I’ve never liked doing something in the criminal sector that might influence an election unless you absolutely have to.
"Rather than impacting the election, we decided to wait until after the election whether he won or lost. We don’t want to be accused of being political in what we do because it is not political."
Trimble said he couldn’t comment on whether the grand jury will look at allegations related to Hodge’s audits or the December break-in at his office.
"I can’t get into details of what we are looking at. I can say that various state and federal agencies are looking into it," Trimble said.
State Auditor Crit Luallen referred findings in audits of Hodge’s books to the FBI for further investigation.
The findings revealed several problems in the office that included alleged budget deficit’s totaling more than $200,000.
In December, Hodge’s courthouse office was broken into revealing that nearly 80 guns were either unaccounted for and stolen or that they had been returned to their owners but that proper paperwork hadn’t been filled out and kept on file.
The Federal Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco Firearms and Explosives (ATF) is investigating the break-in at Hodge’s office.
"Certain witnesses that would appear before the grand jury are federal officials or federal investigators. The Department of Justice is reluctant to institute any criminal proceedings during the course of an election. Some of the investigations were also not complete," Trimble said.
He said that not all of the investigations are now complete.
Hodge said Friday afternoon that he doesn’t know what the grand jury is investigating, but assumes that it is related to the audit findings.
"I’m just glad that they’re getting on with it," he said. "I know nothing criminal that has ever gone on in this office."
A special grand jury serves for a period of 90 days and can be extended for another 90 days.
The first meeting of the special grand jury is scheduled for July 16.
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No it’s not possible. Why? Because the Sheriff is held to a higher standard than other Law Enforcement officials. THe KY Sheriff’s Association adopted certain procedures for the KY Sheriff’s to follow regarding taxes, evidence, and other administrative procedures. It’s like who Police’s the Police? If he is innocent then so be it, but when policemen break the law then there is no law. Of course he is innocent until proven guilty, and I hope he is innocent. But there is a mountain of evidence against him. FBI, ATF, DOJ and KY Auditor all have investigations going on with the Sheriff. IF I were him I would go ahead and resign and concentrate on clearing my name. Again I hope he’s innocent, but it doesn’t look good.
Jean how r u so sure the sheriff is corrupt? Do you have some first hand knowledge of the situation? If you were accused of something, wouldn’t you want people to give you the benefit of the doubt until you were proven guilty? Maybe he was just real sloppy with the paperwork or made mistakes. Isn’t that possible?
It’s not a crime for the Sheriff not to prosecute or arrest criminals. But if he commits malfeasance of office and operates his office using selective enforcement their is a problem. When you don’t charge someone with a felony for manufacturing meth there is a big problem. There can be no lesser charges when dealing with meth, heroin, or schedule 2 drugs. Yes we can wait and see, what else can we do. But there is corruption within that office. No two ways about it.
Great story with so many facts. I used to just get the paper because I love the News Journal but I had never really looked at the web site until today. It is great. Keep up the good work.
I agree with what you are saying jean but let’s wait and see on some of this stuff. If it was a crime for a Sheriff not to prosecute people then just about all of our former ones would be in jail right now.
Lets see: no felony drug cases in 2009, missing evidence, missing money, missing guns, improper tax cuts for himself.
I agree there isn’t any wrongdoing or criminal activity in the Sheriff’s Dept.
Oh, I forgot the former Wburg Chief of Police who was fired for drug abuse is the Sheriff’s Drug Investigator, so I agree there isn’t any corruption or wrongdoing. ???
Get Real.
Thankfully I have never had to deal with the sheriff dept,I didnt know Mr. Hodge. I do know his mother, and she is the most honest ,god fearing , kindest , words can’t describe her, if I didn’t know better , I’d say she could walk on water. I would have a hard time believing any wrong doing would of been from her son’s doing. I think it is more convienant for Mr. Harrell that all these allegations came up during the election…Hmmmm…oh well, we’ll see, all I can say is what goes around comes around.
It is untelling what this grand jury is going to find. Makes me more glad everyday we will soon have a new Sherrif