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Three vie for Callahan County sheriff, including incumbent

Republican candidate, Callahan County sheriff

Age: 71

Occupation: Retired

Experience: 36 years in law enforcement, including a year as Lubbock police officer, 18 years as Llano County game warden, 17 years as game warden and district supervisor, multiple counties

Education: Bachelor of Science in Criminal Justice, Tarleton State University

Family: Lenora, wife; two adult sons; four grandchildren

Community involvement: Board member, Baird Masonic Lodge; vice president, Citizens EMS; substitute teacher at Robertson and Middleton Units

Republican candidate, Callahan County sheriff

Age: 50

Occupation: Retired

Experience: 25 years as an Abilene police officer; 19 months as Callahan County deputy sheriff

Education: Studied at West Texas College

Family: Divorced; adult son

Community involvement: Former Mayor of Clyde; past president, Clyde Chamber of Commerce; member, Clyde Kiwanis Club; adviser to Clyde Key Club; past member, board of trustees at Clyde United Methodist Church

Republican incumbent, Callahan County sheriff

Age: 42

Occupation: Callahan County sheriff

Experience: 21 years in law enforcement, including tenure as a patrolman, dispatcher and jailer

Education: Police Academy at West Central Texas Council of Governments

Family: Carrie, wife; Shelton, 6, son; Bethaney, 15, stepdaughter; Stephanie, 13, stepdaughter

Community involvement: “Not really any because I work all the time,” he said.

If Callahan County voters can’t agree on who should be their sheriff, it won’t be because any of the candidates lack experience.

Incumbent John Windham faces challengers Steve Livingston and Terry Joy in the Republican primary. The election is May 29; early voting is under way.

Windham has more than 21 years of law enforcement experience. Livingston has nearly 27. Joy, the old-timer of the group, boasts more than 36 years in the field.

Although they all have experience keeping a lookout for bad guys, their past law enforcement jobs differ significantly.

Windham, elected in 2008, has spent nearly his entire career in Callahan County. In 1993, he started as a dispatcher and jailer and slowly climbed the ranks to become the county’s pinnacle lawman.

“My heart’s in Callahan County,” he said. “I’m proud to be here, and I’m proud to be sheriff of this place.”

His experience in county law enforcement, he said, is what marks him as best prepared to be sheriff.

“I’ve got training in all aspects of the law,” he said. “The other candidates have experience, but it’s more limited. My experience is deeper and broader, and that’s what it takes to be sheriff.”

Livingston’s experience include 25 years with the Abilene Police Department.

“I spent my first 10 years in patrol responding to calls on anything from dog barking to homicide calls,” he said. Later, he joined APD’s traffic division, riding a motorcycle and investigating traffic accidents.

He left the force to become a deputy sheriff under Windham. But the new job lasted only 19 months before Livingston decided to retire.

“I want a sheriff that will be responsible to citizens and provide the professional service he’s elected to do,” he said.

Joy was a police officer in Lubbock for a year before embarking on a career as a game warden. Having grown up in the Admiral area, the self-proclaimed “Christian conservative” would “love to be sheriff of the county (he) was born in.”

Joy and Livingston echoed the same desires for what they want from a sheriff, using phrases like “full-time,” “on call” and “responsive to citizen’s calls.”

Windham noted improvements in the department under his tenure, including increasing the number of search warrants by more than 500 percent and instilling a dress code to garner more respect from the public and other law enforcement agencies, which, he said, sometimes used to refer to Callahan County deputies as “the hillbilly club.”

Livingston said he wants to see more changes in the agency, including requiring deputies “to live in Callahan County, where the taxpayers are paying their salaries.”

Septuagenarian Joy wants voters to know that his age shouldn’t be an issue in the election.

“I’m in great health. I keep myself in good shape,” he said, and “I’m up to date with all my certifications.”

Homeland Security Watchdog May Close Troubled Texas Office

The Homeland Security Department’s beleaguered watchdog might close a troubled Texas office amid a federal probe into its agents’ investigative practices, the Center for Investigative Reporting has learned.

Acting Inspector General Charles K. Edwards last week placed on administrative leave five more agents from the agency’s McAllen, Texas, branch office, leaving it with just four investigators. That office has been a focus of a federal grand jury probe into allegations that agents were told to fabricate investigative reports ahead of an internal inspection last fall.

More than half of the office’s 11 agents are off the job. The inspector general already placed the McAllen office’s top agent, Gene Pedraza, on administrative leave earlier this year. The remaining four agents may be moved to other offices.

“We’re considering all options regarding the most effective and efficient means to utilize the McAllen office,” said inspector general spokeswoman Marty Metelko.

Pedraza’s attorney, Larry Eastepp, did not return calls for comment. Pedraza could not be reached for comment.

Overall, the agency has placed eight employees, including two top-ranking Washington officials, on administrative leave pending the conclusion of a U.S. Department of Justice and FBI investigation.

The decision to put more agents on leave comes as Edwards tries to quell internal unrest and shore up support from Congress. The inspector general also has reached outside his agency for a temporary top investigator. John E. Dupuy, the Interior Department’s assistant inspector general for investigations, will act in that role for the Department of Homeland Security inspector general starting May 21, Metelko said.

The agency’s current top investigator, Thomas M. Frost, and a deputy, John Ryan, were put on leave in late March. Frost could not be reached for comment. Ryan’s attorney, Michael Bopp, has declined to comment.

Wayne Salzgaber, another deputy who oversaw field operations, was reassigned recently after he testified before the grand jury. A third deputy, James Gaughran, who had been acting as the assistant inspector general for investigations in place of Frost, will be replaced by Dupuy.

Gaughran will be detailed to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement by the end of May, while Salzgaber will go to Interpol on detail in early June, Metelko said.

Amid this turnover, critics of the agency have said the inspector general’s office needs fresh leadership. But Glenn A. Fine, who served as the inspector general for the U.S. Department of Justice from 2000 to 2011, said Edwards is hamstrung as an acting inspector general.

“You try to do the best you can, but you don’t have the full authority of the agency,” said Fine, who served six months as an acting inspector general. “People might not be sure you’re sticking around. … You don’t make changes. You don’t make reforms. And you have a little less gravitas. It’s an inherently difficult position to be in.”

The grand jury probe last month expanded its scope to include the agency’s Dallas office and the alleged mishandling of a confidential informant there.

The inspector general is the top authority to police waste, fraud and abuse within the Department of Homeland Security, the federal government’s third-largest agency. The watchdog has about 219 agents to ferret out misconduct among the department’s 225,000 employees.

Last week, the agency also began to transfer about 370 corruption investigations nationwide targeting Customs and Border Protection and Immigration and Customs Enforcement employees. Those cases were transferred to those agencies’ respective internal affairs units. The transfer amounts to nearly half of the inspector general’s 760 cases that involve employees who have been identified, rather than allegations against unnamed employees. The inspector general has said he hopes the transfer is done by June 1.

Edwards testified Thursday during a House Homeland Security oversight subcommittee hearing on ethical standards at the department that the inspector general’s investigative unit “was taxed beyond its capacity.”

In addition, the inspector general will dust off hundreds more corruption cases in which there is no known or identified employee; those cases will be returned to the internal affairs department at other homeland security agencies. The decision comes after CIR reported that a special unit known as forensic threat analysis often held investigations until the statute of limitations had expired. That practice, in turn, prevented other investigators from the FBI and homeland security agencies from investigating corruption.

Since 2004, complaints against Customs and Border Protection employees alone increased 38 percent, according to the inspector general. Overall, nearly 140 Customs and Border Protection employees have been indicted on or convicted of corruption-related charges since then.

U.S. Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee’s Oversight, Investigations and Management Subcommittee, said the majority of Homeland Security Department employees are honest and hard-working. “Public service is a public trust,” he said. “And when you see that violated … it’s just unacceptable.”

Follow Andrew Becker on Twitter:

www.twitter.com/ABeckerCIR

Firefighter applicants put to the tests, written and physical

Firefighter applicants put to the tests, written and physical

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Brian Meade swings an axe during an agility test administered Thursday as part of the hiring process for Warren County Fire and Rescue Services. Joe Beck/Daily

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Scott Richardson, of Winchester, drags a dummy along the pavement during Thursday’s testing of 23 applicants seeking jobs with Warren County Fire and Rescue Services. Joe Beck/Daily

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Firefighter applicant Brian Meade tests his climbing skills on a 105-foot ladder tilted at a 70-degree angle atop a fire truck. Joe Beck/Daily

By Joe Beck – jbeck@nvdaily.com

FRONT ROYAL – The Warren County Fire and Rescue Service is closer to hiring five new career firefighters after the last of 23 participating recruits finished written and physical agility tests on Thursday.

The testing concluded at the Front Royal fire station on North Commerce Avenue with the last of the recruits scaling a 105-foot ladder atop one of the department’s trucks. When the results were tallied, only 10 of the 23 recruits passed. The survivors, all of them men, advance to an interview that will be the final stage in determining whether they will be joining the ranks of the department’s 20 full-time or 10 part-time firefighters.

Gerry R. Maiatico, the department’s fire marshal, said the rigorous testing program, now in its fifth year, has improved hiring decisions and made it easier to retain higher quality recruits after they join the department.

“We decided on a process like this to test their skills, knowledge and abilities to make sure we’re getting a quality candidate,” Maiatico said.

The deterioration in the economy a few years ago increased the number of applicants for full-time firefighter jobs, thereby spurring the department to develop “another tool to help us in the selection process,” Maiatico said.

The written test by its nature is always a bit of a mystery before recruits sit down to take it, but the physical agility segment is easily seen and understood well before it begins. The recruits must move through a six-station course that includes swinging an axe 30 times, scrambling up and down a fire escape carrying a coiled hose and 85 pounds of equipment with them, and dragging a dummy over part of the parking lot in the back of the fire station.

A passing score requires the recruit to finish the course in 5 minutes and 30 seconds. After a cooling off and recovery period, each recruit is then required to scale the105-foot fire truck ladder tilted at a 70-degree angle.

While the test is supposed to measure physical agility, the sight of recruits doubled over gasping for breath or stretched out in exhaustion on the pavement after completing the course left little doubt that strength and endurance also counted for a lot.

“It’s all firefighter competency, all things they have to do,” Maiatico said.

Maiatico said most of the recruits are either already full-time firefighters from other jurisdictions or part-timers looking to move to full-time career status. Many also are already volunteers with the Warren County department.

Maiatico said those who already have full-time jobs with other departments are looking for part-time work in Warren County on their days off.

Maiatico said the department does not take civilian applicants off the street because it lacks the time and money to include an extended, elaborate training curriculum as part of its hiring process. Some of the bigger departments in Northern Virginia provide a 22-week candidate recruit school, but Warren County needs those who have already gained basic firefighting skills as volunteers in its own department or as members in other communities.

As for those who don’t make the cut, the testing can also be helpful to them, Maiatico said.

“It’s a way for them to set a level of standards for themselves,” he said. “It lets them know what their strengths and weaknesses are.”

Secret Service Secrets

Secret Service Secrets. The name of the agency lends itself to mystery, and lately, scrutiny. Dozens of agents are under investigation for a series of scandals that may have happened while on an “advance trip” to Columbia, ahead of the President’s visit there.

Whether the issue is systemic is still up for debate. What is not? The loyalty of the men and women who sometimes give their entire lives to work in the Secret Service.

Men like Bill Mattman.

“(People) just see the president arrives and gets into a car. Well, that doesn’t just happen,” Mattman says.

The route is checked out.

“There’s surveillance going on. You go into a restaurant, there are agents there ahead of you.”

When the entourage crosses railroad tracks, “You find out what time the freight train comes by.”

Manhole covers are checked and sealed.

“You cover all your bases. And you always have a backup plan. Two or three.”

That’s the pressure of the United States Secret Service. Mattman gave 13 years of his life to the agency. Recruited from the U.S. Border Patrol in 1967, Mattman was one of the first naturalized agents in the agency. He was born in Switzerland and spoke several languages. It was a skill in high demand.

But the job was not always as glamorous as many films depict it to be.

“I had to cancel many parties, many dinners,” says Mattman. “I was not home for the kids birthdays or little league games. I missed quite a few anniversaries.”

Secret Service agents have one of the most high-profile law enforcement jobs in the world, and also the most mysterious.

“[Agents are] extremely loyal. They’re extremely dedicated to their work, and they will never shy away from what needs to be done.”

The Secret Service began after the Civil War to combat counterfeiting, although it’s best known for protecting the president. Mattman did just that during the tenure of Presidents Johnson, Nixon, Ford and Carter. Assigned to the Paris office, Mattman was also responsible for protecting visiting dignitaries. Among them, Henry Kissinger, King Hussein of Jordan, even Yassir Arafat.

“No matter who that person is, you’re willing to step in front of them and take the proverbial bullet,” Mattman says.

And in some cases, the bullets and the threats are very real.

Rewind to May, 1979, Los Angeles.

Agent Mattman worked the crowd as President Jimmy Carter prepared to give a speech. He had a roving post, and noticed a man wearing a heavy, ill-fitting suit on a very warm day. Mattman “felt a gun in his back pocket. President Carter came out at that very moment. So I just had to get him out of the way.”

The gunman eventually told Mattman that the day before, he’d been approached by two men, who told him “to just fire a cap pistol at stage right when the president was speaking so they could fire shotguns from stage left after all the security moved over to respond to the cap pistol.”

Agents went to the man’s room in downtown L.A. and found the shotgun case and shotgun shells. Raymond Lee Harvey, known as the “Scarlett Sparrow,” wrote Mattman a note from prison.

“His accomplice, according to hotel records, was Oswaldo Espinoza,” recounts Mattman. “Kind of made your hair stand up on the back of your neck.”

Authorities never found Oswaldo Espinoza.

Mattman left the Agency before President Reagan’s more high-profile assassination attempt. Reagan was governor, campaigning in New Hampshire when Mattman had an encounter with him.

“One evening, there was a knock on the door. [Reagan] asked me if I’d seen this magazine,” Mattman shows off an old edition of People. “I said no, and he said, your pretty face is in there.” Mattman laughs, recalling the visit. Reagan offered to sign the magazine.

Homeland Security Secretary Napolitano addresses Coast Guard graduating class

Published: Thursday, May 17, 2012

Wanna Carry a Gun and be in Law Enforcement?

More cops could soon be hitting Tulsa’s streets. Both the Tulsa Police Department and the Tulsa County Sheriff’s Office are hiring.

In all more than 100 people will eventually put on a badge. Some of the jobs pay and some don’t. It all depends on your current situation, your past record and your education level.

“Pretty much one big family you work for, I mean they take care of you,” says Detention Officer Heather Byrd, who works for the Tulsa County Sheriff’s Office.

They are looking to expand their family. The Sheriff’s Office is hiring nearly 150 employees.

“With the unemployment rate so low in Tulsa it is, it’s somewhat difficult to find good solid quality applicants,” says Sergeant Shannon Clark.

He says they remain at staffing levels and but want to be at the maximum level. Fifty new deputies will be hired.

“They have all full police powers and they can work in multiple different divisions in the Sheriff’s Office,” explains Clark.

And another 50 will be hired as detention officers, like Heather Byrd.

She’s been with the Sheriff’s Office for 7 years and after getting her college degree she is hoping to become a deputy.

“You’ve got to be able to pay attention to your surroundings and multi-task, be able to watch everything going on around you at the same time,” says Byrd.

If this all sounds interesting but you have a job and can’t do it full time, become a reserve! The Tulsa Police Department is hiring 30 new reserves.

Combining the two more than 150 new law enforcement officers will be keeping Tulsa just a little bit safer.

“Our motto is ‘Total Commitment Serving Others’ we are always going to respond, we are always going to use the resources that we have available,” says Clark.
    
The Sheriff’s Office is currently hiring for the positions and 50 applicants are going through screening. There’s still about 100 positions available.

If interested in joining the Tulsa County Sheriff’s Office: http://www.tcso.org/tcsoweb/jobs.aspx

The TPD reserves will begin training this fall.

If you are interested in joining the Tulsa Police Department: www.jointpd.com or call the recruiting hotline 1-800-688-6848

Department of Homeland Security Issues Warning on Medical Device Threats

Department of Homeland Security Issues Warning on Medical Device Threats
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The U.S. Department of Homeland Security
(DHS) has issued a warning about the role of medical devices in compromising IT
networks and patient data.

In its alert “Attack Surface:
Healthcare and Public Health Sector,” issued on May 4, DHS says medical
devices that connect to IT networks may pose a threat to security.

Network-attached medical devices and
mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets could bring cyber-security
threats that result in the spread of malware and the loss of data, according to
the bulletin.

The U.S. Federal Drug Administration regulates the sale of medical devices, but not
their use, which could lead to breaches, DHS reported.

“The expanded use of wireless
technology on the enterprise network of medical facilities and the wireless
utilization of MDs opens up both new opportunities and new vulnerabilities to
patients and medical facilities,” the bulletin from the DHS’ National Cybersecurity and
Communications Integration Center stated.

“Smartphones with poorly designed
security protections are frequently connected to medical IT networks and
provide a new vector for malware transmission,” DHS reported.

Even some medical devices implanted
inside patients could hold sensitive information and lead to theft of medical
data and intrusion onto corporate networks. These devices could also cause Denial
of Service (DoS) attacks due to their sensitivity to battery life, the report
stated.

“Implantable devices can present a real danger to patients
through interruption of their function, tampering with their communications or
by causing them to act or perform in a manner that is harmful to the person
they are attached to,” Mac McMillan, CEO of health care security
firm CynergisTek and chair of the HIMSS [Healthcare Information and Management
Systems Society] Privacy and Security Policy Task Force, told eWEEK in an email. 

The
fact that the DHS has issued an alert on medical devices shows that a real
cause for concern exists, said McMillan.

“I
think it is a very big issue, and health care entities need to take it very
seriously,” said McMillan. “The fact that we have well-publicized
security conferences like Black Hat, Defcon and RSA giving stage time
to researchers and hackers who demonstrate and discuss the vulnerability in
medical devices and systems ought to serve as a wake-up call.”

The DHS report mentioned a
demonstration at the 2011 Black Hat conference in which security researcher
Jay Radcliffe, who is a diabetic, was able to shut down or change the settings on an insulin
pump without the patient’s knowledge. He also discussed how
someone can use an oscilloscope, an instrument that displays waveforms, to
eavesdrop on a glucose monitor’s transmission, the DHS reported.

In another demonstration, a
researcher at the 2011 RSA conference showed how he could intercept an insulin
pump signal and direct it to give a lethal dose to a patient, McMillan noted.

AT&T named vendor for Homeland Security

OAKTON, Va. — ATT Inc. said Tuesday that it was named a prime vendor for a $3 billion contract with the Department of Homeland Security, giving ATT the ability to compete for work under the contract.

The so-called Tactical Communications Equipment and Services contract is a base contact for two years and three one-year extension options. Homeland Security uses the contract to buy communications devices, infrastructure and services used by first responders.

As a prime vendor, ATT will compete against other companies for individual awards under the program.

ATT will compete for DHS business through its Government Solutions unit, which is housed in ATT’s affiliate ATT Corp.

Shares of ATT fell 4 cents to $33.49 by early afternoon.

$1 Million in Waste, but No Bathtubs

Posted by Chris Edwards

(Image Credit: Google Plus)

Occasional episodes of government mismanagement explode into big scandals, such as the General Services Administration’s party in Las Vegas that wasted more than $800,000.

Other waste gets flagged by auditors but generally goes unnoticed. I came across this new Inspector General (IG) report revealing $1 million of waste at the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA). Unlike the GSA scandal, it included no photos of bureaucrats in bathtubs, so you probably won’t see it on the cable news.

Still, the BIA episode revealed many standard elements of federal waste. According to the IG, the episode included:

• A Politician Seeking Something: Then Senator Byron Dorgan (D-ND) pressured the BIA to hire more law enforcement officials.
• An Incompetent Agency: The BIA contracted-out head-hunter activities to a group called the National Native American Law Enforcement Association (NNALEA). The IG says that the BIA “violated federal procurement regulations” a variety of ways, and it was clearly duped by the contractor. The NNALEA “capitalized on the bureau’s failures.”
• A Contractor Doing Shoddy Work: The applications sent by the NNALEA to the BIA for the law enforcement jobs were of very poor quality. Of the 514 reviewed by the IG, for example, 104 simply didn’t meet the age requirements. All in all, “none” of the applications was of any use to the BIA.
• A Lack of Personal Responsibility: NNALEA’s leaders generally refused to be interviewed by the IG regarding their failures. And because the IG’s new report came out a couple years after the events took place, the key BIA personnel responsible have moved on, including the then-head of the BIA, Larry Echohawk.

In sum, routine bureaucratic and political factors resulted in the BIA spending $1 million from which taxpayers and the intended recipients received “no benefit,” according to the IG. So no bathtubs on this one, just a run-of-the-mill Beltway boondoggle.

Chris Edwards • May 14, 2012 @ 1:52 pm
Filed under: Government and Politics; Tax and Budget Policy

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