Remember the mystery deputy jailer, Gabriel Cox, whose questioned hiring date last fall prompted an uproar and investigation into the actions of Benton County Sheriff Kelley Cradduck?
Cox is the 19-year-old who inexplicably listed his address in October as the same as Cradduck's without an explanation from Cradduck. He's also the person whose hiring date two employees claim the sheriff instructed them to backdate. That would have provided the young man with a week on the payroll that he didn't actually work.
The duo refused, choosing instead to report the alleged backdating request to authorities. They contend they were demoted by Cradduck as a result of their actions. The sheriff says this problem is all due to misunderstanding and confusion within his department and strongly denied any wrongdoing. Both employees were reinstated. An ongoing Arkansas State Police investigation ensued.
Well, Cox was back in the news along with Cradduck the other day after a story by reporter Amye Buckley said Cradduck fired his former houseguest after Cox was arrested by Rogers police on misdemeanor charges that included possessing a controlled substance and drug paraphernalia, and driving an unregistered vehicle.
Cradduck reportedly fired the enigmatic Cox after the arrest last Saturday.
Cox is reported to have been among three people in a vehicle stopped early Saturday. Andrew Stoltman, 18, and a juvenile Cradduck said is his son also were cited with similar drug-related misdemeanors.
This week, Cradduck finally told taxpayers that, in any effort to help a struggling young man, he'd taken a homeless Gabriel Cox into his home and provided him with a job. Nice gesture. But why not just have explained that months ago when this he-said, she-said "backdated hiring" mess was revealed? Regardless, Cox's arrest only adds to a string of negative headlines that shine an unfavorable light on Cradduck.
These have been trying times for the sheriff, and I truly hate to see him placing himself in such tenuous positions in the public eye. But it is what it is. And for a sheriff and former public affairs officer with the Rogers Police Department (who of all policemen certainly should be savvy about media dealings), I continue to be stunned by his actions and reactions to all the bad news of late, especially where the press is concerned.
For instance, following this latest arrest and revelations, the sheriff chose to speak about them with at least one TV reporter at the jail, but is said to have refused to allow a reporter for this newspaper, who was already at the jail, into that Sunday session.
I've written before that this isn't the behavior of a lawman I came to respect for his refreshing candor and dreams only a few years ago. He contends the bulk of his woes are purely political.
But this convenient excuse casts fault for a host of problems Cradduck has created himself with an approach that consistently has been far less than forthcoming or fully transparent. What I've been seeing instead, over the past year, is an odd pattern of inexplicable and painful self-inflictions.
Terror on the freeway
It was one of those bizarre scenes none of us hopes to encounter on an interstate. On the day after the Liberty Bowl in Memphis, I was with family at 12:30 p.m. driving I-240 in Memphis when an SUV in front of us began swerving wildly from the far-right lane back across traffic to the concrete barrier separating north and southbound traffic.
The driver would cut sharply in one direction, then another, forcing those near him or her to slam on brakes or yank steering wheels in terror to avoid a collision.
Within a mile the driver did hit the barrier and scraped along its side for 50 yards or more before jerking back into traffic. By now most vehicles were slowing to back away. The erratic behavior continued as my daughter, Anna, called 911 to report the danger and insist, "someone's going to die if this person isn't stopped now."
The surprisingly abrupt operator said police already been notified. She acted almost disinterested.
Meanwhile, the irrational driver continued for another mile, straying widely from the barrier to the far right and then back again, repeatedly striking the barrier and twice almost flipping the vehicle.
A female motorist who heroically tried to block the insane driver wound up having her car seriously damaged. Another following behind flipped on warning flashers.
After several minutes of cringing in disbelief, we watched the driver slam hard into the barrier and wind up ejected to become sandwiched between the SUV and the concrete. Police were just arriving on the scene where a half-dozen cars had stopped.
My daughter turned around as we drove past. She said it was a gruesome sight we didn't want to see. "That person is gone, dad. From the mess I saw, they couldn't possibly have survived."
The next morning, 8-year-old grandson Trenton said he'd experienced nightmares over the incident.
I later tried finding out more about who and what we'd witnessed, but gave up after four futile calls to Memphis Police, a force that obviously could use an active public-affairs officer. Wear your seat belts, valued readers.
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Mike Masterson's column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Email him at [email protected].
Editorial on 01/09/2016