This commentary is by Bob Stannard of Manchester, an author, musician and former state legislator and lobbyist.
Sexual assault charges. Missing in action. What’s going on with our county sheriffs?
I recently came across a story about Vermont in The Washington Post. It was not about our great maple syrup, cheeses, beer or our beautiful fall foliage. It was about Addison County Sheriff Peter Newton being arrested and charged with raping a woman he was supposed to be protecting from her abusive husband. Newton is not standing for reelection to the financially lucrative position of county sheriff.
Then there’s the ongoing saga of the missing Bennington County sheriff, Chad Schmidt. He’s not standing for reelection since no one in Bennington County has seen him for at least two years. He now lives in Tennessee, where he’s likely hiding out from the fallout of his own alleged sexually deviant behavior.
Schmidt was allegedly sexting (a new word for me) a young woman who also sought his help. The woman in question was allegedly in an abusive relationship with a man from Pownal, Michael Crawford.
According to a VTDigger story by Alan Keays dated Aug. 13, 2019, Crawford, who was arrested, believed that he had a “get out of jail free” card, because the lady who he was assaulting was the same lady who Schmidt was accused of sexting. Schmidt allegedly tipped off the lady in question that she was about to be served with a warrant.
From VTDigger: “Those nearly 200 messages show that an account from ‘Chad Schmidt’ tipped the woman off about a warrant for her arrest before it was sent to other law enforcement agencies. That tip, allegedly from the Bennington sheriff, enabled her to avoid jail time.” Schmidt denied any wrongdoing.
However, Sheriff Schmidt’s behavior doesn’t instill innocence. In a February 2022 article, also in VTDigger titled “Tennessee Waltz: Does the Bennington County sheriff still live in Vermont?” there’s this: “For an elected public official, Bennington County Sheriff Chad Schmidt has made remarkably few public appearances since the pandemic reached Vermont. Some town officials have complained that they haven’t been able to arrange meetings with Schmidt to discuss their security contract with the sheriff’s department. His agency’s key partners haven’t seen him in person since the spring of 2020.”
These contracts amount to over $1.16 million a year. Schmidt gets 5% or $58,000 on top of his base salary. Taxpayers have paid him over $300,000 the past two years. I’m surprised no one’s asked if he has another job in Tennessee?
Six months after the Keays story breaks, Schmidt moves to Tennessee. Crawford discovered the hundreds of messages from Schmidt to the lady allegedly abused by both of these characters, and believed that he could use these rather explicit messages as his “get out of jail free card.” Crawford underestimated Schmidt’s ability to pack up and leave Vermont. When the Schmidt fiasco was presented to our then-attorney general, TJ Donovan, he said that since the sheriffs are elected there’s not much he could do about it.
Upon reading about our scandalous county sheriffs, it does leave one to wonder just how much of this sort of thing is going on without being reported. Sheriffs are elected to a four-year term (even our representatives and senators have to stand for election every two years) and, once elected, they are on their own with very little oversight.
No, I’m not saying that all of our county sheriffs are corrupt, but sheriffs have a lot of power and little oversight — a formula for abuse.
When we vote for our county sheriffs they are usually way down toward the end of the ballot. When was the last time you voted for a county sheriff and really knew a lot about them, what they stand for and what they hope to accomplish?
This year in Bennington County there are three people running for this job; one of whom currently serves as a deputy sheriff. Of the remaining two, one is a security account manager at Southwestern Vermont Medical Center in Bennington. The other is a police officer with the Manchester police force. I don’t know any of these candidates personally, but it would seem to me as though our county sheriff’s department is in need of leadership from outside of the agency.
It’s time for our legislators to reexamine how we deal with sheriffs. Maybe the time has come to appoint these people, much the way we deal with our state police.
As the saying goes, “power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” We can see from recent press reports that elected leaders toss up their hands, declaring that there’s nothing they can do about renegade sheriffs.
Currently, the only recourse is for the Legislature to impeach a bad-apple sheriff. That was tried once 30 years ago and failed. The time has come to take a fresh look at this powerful and important position, one that can be easily abused.
