Sheriff: 4 Sedgwick Co. deputies had sex with records employee, 2 resign

WICHITA, Kan. (KWCH) - Update May 19: The article has been updated to reflect a clarification issued by the Sedgwick County Sheriff’s Office about the number of deputies involved.

Five Sedgwick County Sheriff’s deputies were under investigation and two resigned after the department said an internal investigation last year revealed four of them were having sex with a records employee, sometimes while on duty.

FactFinder 12 first asked Sheriff Jeff Easter about what happened and he said having sex on duty is not a fireable offense. But, the sheriff said two of the deputies lied during the investigation. The lying is a fireable offense, so they resigned.

“That’s not behavior that we condone or want, but those were not firing offenses. What rose to that level was the untruthfulness about it. When you’re untruthful, then the law causes us to give that information over to the District Attorney’s office for Brady-Giglio consideration,” said Easter.

Law enforcement officers lose their credibility when they lie, which means they can no longer do things like testify in court which is important to do the job.

Easter said four of the deputies worked the third shift from 10:30 p.m. until 7 a.m. FactFinder 12 asked how the deputies were able to have sex while working if they have to check in with Sedgwick County 911 dispatch and give their locations.

“There’s times where it’s very dead on third shift out in the county. They’re supposed to be out there being proactive and if there’s any criminal activity trying to prevent that from happening. So, instead of doing that, they chose to do some extracurricular activities that was reported to us,” said Easter.

Easter also said he wants the public to know, this kind of incident is rare.

“They can trust the fact that when we have instances like this, that we’re going to make corrections and we’re going to hold those folks accountable. But, please, don’t label all law enforcement, that this is what they do in their off time or this is what they do when they’re not as busy on the streets because it’s not. That’s not true. I’ve been here 10 years and this is the second time it’s happened,” said Easter.

Easter said the investigation revealed two of the deputies had sex with the records employee while on duty. Two others also had sex with the employee, but it wasn’t revealed if it happened on duty. A fifth deputy was investigated after his name was brought up during the internal investigation, but he was found to have only kissed the records employee while off duty.

Two deputies and the records clerk resigned. The deputies who resigned were on patrol for about 2 years. The records clerk had been with the sheriff’s office for less than a year.

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