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Sheriff: FDLE must investigate

Three Brooksville employees are suspended, the city manager resigns and the sheriff offers someone to oversee policing.

By JONATHAN ABEL
Published January 10, 2007

ADVERTISEMENT [Times photo: Maurice Rivenbark] Brooksville police chief Ed Tincher addressed the City Council on Monday night but turned away and left after saying he thought his words weren't being heard. The council voted to place Tincher and two other city employees on paid suspension.

BROOKSVILLE - The Hernando Sheriff's Office declined Tuesday to investigate possible crimes at the Brooksville Police Department, a day after Brooksville's City Council asked for the sheriff's help.

The request came out of a wild meeting Monday night, which began with the resignation of City Manager Richard Anderson and ended with the suspension of police Chief Ed Tincher, police Lt. Rick Hankins and city human resources director Ron Baker.

The three were suspended so an outside agency could look into the latest accusations in a running feud between the Police Department and Baker.

On Tuesday, Mayor David Pugh Jr. met with Hernando Sheriff Richard Nugent and a representative of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to talk about options for investigating Brooksville police.

Pugh went into the meeting with the council's support to ask for a full criminal investigation, but the Sheriff's Office told him it would not be willing to take part in a criminal investigation, that would have to be done by the FDLE.

"I can't force an outside agency to do an investigation if they feel they don't want to do it," Pugh said.

The Sheriff's Office did, however, offer to handle an internal affairs inquiry and to assign an officer to run the Brooksville Police Department while Tincher and Hankins are under suspension.

The department is now being run by Sgt. Duke Maeder.

The other option the sheriff offered, according to Pugh, was for outgoing City Manager Anderson to run the investigation, a choice the council rejected Monday night.

Late Tuesday, Pugh said he would have to bring the issue back to the council at an as-yet-unscheduled special session.

August drug arrest heated ongoing feud

The recent problems among city staff members stem from a nasty feud between Tincher and the Police Department on one hand, and Baker on the other.

Baker was arrested in August and charged with giving Xanax to a co-worker. The charges have since been dropped and Baker has maintained that he was arrested because he clashed with the police chief.

Over the last week, the feud has bubbled to the surface again, and Monday, the council decided it had seen enough.

The meeting started out with the surprise resignation of Anderson. Earlier in the day, Anderson said he would resign if he didn't feel he had the support of the council.

Then he heard that council member Lara Bradburn was planning to ask for his termination because she believed he had dropped the ball on a number of projects important to her.

Anderson said that when he heard of Bradburn's plans, he decided it was time to hand in his resignation, effective Feb. 9.

Finance director Steve Baumgartner was picked to take over for Anderson as interim city manager while the city looks for a permanent replacement.

The meeting then puttered on through discussions of water pipes, condemnations and land use.

At the end of the meeting, after 10 p.m., individual council members had their chances to bring up issues.

Bradburn opened up the discussion by saying the feuding between the Police Department and the human resources director had become so destructive to the city that it had to be dealt with.

She recommended the suspensions of Tincher, Hankins and Baker.

Bradburn also explained that she had asked a county sheriff's deputy to come to the meeting to protect her against the city's Police Department.

"Before I was elected, I can't tell you how many times I had been told to watch my back," she said. "I was concerned for my well-being and that's why I asked for the deputy."

Council member Richard Lewis, a strong supporter of the police chief, said it was offensive to him to have a deputy in the parking lot, that Brooksville could provide its own security.

He called the night's actions a "conspiracy" and said after the meeting that it was nothing more than a move by opponents of the Police Department to put the Sheriff's Office in charge.

"I really believe tonight that it was the first step in dismantling the Police Department," Lewis said.

After Bradburn made her motion, council member Joe Bernardini quickly seconded it.

"Let's just fire them all," he said. "How is that for resolving the problem?"

While the council members discussed his upcoming suspension, Tincher approached the podium. He stood there staring at Bradburn.

"I'm blown away that anyone on the council could think I'm going to harm them," Tincher said. "That's ridiculous."

He added that, "In making those decisions, you are casting a shadow on people who haven't done anything."

Bradburn responded: "If I would have had definitive proof, I would have called for your firing."

Tincher made his case, saying he hadn't done anything improper and that he welcomed an investigation.

Then, he threw up his hands.

"What I'm saying is falling on deaf ears," he said.

The council voted to put the three on paid suspension and to ask the Sheriff's Office to investigate.

The tally was 3-2, with Lewis and Vice Mayor Frankie Burnett dissenting.

Tincher, Hankins and Baker all got up and walked out.

And the council was left trying to figure out what to do next.

Jonathan Abel can be reached at jabel@sptimes.com or (352) 754-6114.

[Last modified January 9, 2007, 22:20:12]