Culture of Corruption

I recently received a copy of the letter officer Ian Seivewright wrote just before taking his own life. He hadn't been with the Sheriff's Office very long, only a few years. He had no way of knowing what to expect, or how to respond to what was happening. If you aren't prepared to deal with the "system", you will definitely have problems. When an officer first hires in, they expect all the leadership to be the best officers, and that they will be honest and trustworthy. I only wish it were so at the SCSO.

From the letter, it seems Ian had called out for help on several occassions, but nobody cared enough to listen, or maybe the ones who could help didn't think it was in there best interest.

The sheriff claimed he was going to rid the SCSO of the "culture of corruption" when he first took office, back in 2002. As I recall, that was his mantra. There was a culture of corruption at the SCSO and he was going to clean house and make everything better.

Ian Seivewright tried to enlist Mark's support several times, according to the letter I have. It seems there are also several recordings Ian made over the past several years. I would hope whoever has them would get them to the news media and the news media would air them. Here's an excerpt of Ian's letter where he tells about how he felt Mark covered up for people who were on his team:

"So Then I called The Shelby County Sheriff, Mark Luttrell, and spoke with him three different times. He told me that he was going to get to the bottom of it, which he did…..made it go away, that is one hell of a SHERIFF OF THE YEAR!!!!!!!! LOL, Right!!!!! I hope that the recording of are meeting in his office and twice on the phone don’t come out to show the line of s__t he was talking. "

Ian never really had a chance. He wasn't on the "A team", so if there was a situation between him and one of those who was connected, he would be odd man out. This is how it works at the SCSO. Ian spoke of how the administration deals with someone they want to shut up. Here's another quote from his letter on that subject:

"I know that while everyone is reading this the Sheriff’s Dept is looking hard for something to discredit me, LOL. Guess what nothing there except stories that you better make up quick. I have had 1 (one) Write-Up and 1 (one) day no pay for the deer. I hope they are working hard to make up some. So I come out of the class in the top 3, I was #1 or #2 on the list of highest stats for the shift except for the last few months. I have had perfect attendance for several years except when I hurt my ankle off-duty. So why do I get over looked on internal jobs that get posted. That’s right I’m not connected and I called out the Chief son for misconduct. More Misconduct would be reported if it wasn’t that everyone knows that they will have a hard time the rest of their career. They see what happens if you do the right thing.
"

Ian was right. They tried to pull the same stuff on me when I ran against Luttrell for Sheriff as a write in. Mark was also right, the culture of corruption needs to be fixed. However, if you are a part of that culture, you cannot fix it. I am right too. It's time for a new Sheriff.

More to follow....