A recent review of employee conduct at the DeKalb County jail resulted in an officer being fired, Sheriff Melody Maddox announced Friday.
A press release said the officer’s termination was based on a pair of incidents that were discovered during the review, which Maddox initiated after taking over as sheriff in December. The release provided few details but said both incidents occurred prior to Maddox’s tenure and said that “abuse of office and violations of public trust” would not be tolerated.
The sheriff’s office declined to provide further information.
“All officers and representatives of this agency are required to operate with excellence, accountability and respect when in the community and when managing the inmates in our care,” Maddox said.
The announcement came just a few days before the start of early voting in a special election that will determine if Maddox stays in office.
Maddox became DeKalb's first full-time female sheriff after her predecessor, Jeffrey Mann, retired in November. Mann had been battling a state panel over his law enforcement certification since his 2017 arrest in Piedmont Park, an incident that involved the now-former sheriff exposing himself to an Atlanta police officer and attempting to run away.
As chief deputy at the time of Mann’s retirement, Maddox took the helm. But a special election was called to fill the remainder of Mann’s expired term, which runs until the end of the year.
Early voting in the March 24 election, which will coincide with Georgia’s presidential preference primary, starts Monday.
Maddox is one of nine candidates in the already contentious race. Each of the other candidates also has significant law enforcement experience.
They include Geraldine Champion, a retired Atlanta police homicide detective; Harold Dennis, a former DeKalb deputy; Adam Gardner, a homicide investigator for the Fulton County District Attorney's Office; Ted Golden, a retired Drug Enforcement Administration agent; Antonio "Block" Johnson, a military veteran and former jailer and marshal in Fulton County; Kyle Keith Jones, a retired law enforcement officer and businessman; Carl Mobley, a retired DeKalb County police office; and Ruth Stringer, a Marine Corps veteran who briefly served as interim sheriff in 2017.
It’s unlikely that any candidate in the crowded special election will get 50% of the votes cast, meaning an April 21 runoff between the top two vote-getters could be in the cards.
The winner of that election would only take over as sheriff until the end of the year.
The process of selecting DeKalb’s next full-term sheriff won’t begin until party primaries in May. Any necessary primary runoffs would be held in July, with November’s general election to follow.
