Once considered the most redneck of Pinellas County law enforcement agencies, the Pinellas Park Police Department has changed. In fact, its current chief is a woman.
A deputy with the Pinellas Sheriff's Office believes his agency could learn a thing or two from Pinellas Park.
Despite a history of discrimination, the sheriff's office still has a reproachable record of recruiting and promoting minority deputies. For Deputy Lendel Bright, the situation has become so intolerable that he would like the federal government to intervene.
Bright, president of Minority Law Enforcement Personnel of Pinellas County, has written a letter to the U.S. Department of Justice asking for a compliance review of a 1981 consent decree, which the feds had the sheriff's office sign to open its ranks to minorities. According to the decree, 10 percent of deputies must be racial minorities.
"Some current and past members (of Minority Law Enforcement Personnel of Pinellas County), including myself, believe that discriminatory policies and practices have continued at the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office," Bright wrote in his June 10 letter. "These discriminatory policies and practices affect sworn and civilian African-American employees of the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office."
According to a 2000 report by the county Office of Human Rights, the sheriff's office had 1,468 deputies, 168 of whom were African-American; 53 Latino and 11 other minority races, a total of nearly 16 percent minority.
But those numbers are skewed, according to Bright, since they combine figures from both the corrections and law enforcement wings of the sheriff's office.
In 1996, 51 African-American and 15 Latino deputies were among the sheriff's 582 law enforcement personnel, bringing the minority representation to 11 percent. That percentage has not changed, although the number of African-Americans has declined. Today, the sheriff's office has 44 African-Americans, 16 Latinos and five deputies of other minority races enforcing the law. The highest-ranking minority is a lieutenant. While the current minority percentage is in compliance with the consent decree, Bright believes it's not good enough.
At the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office, 336 of its 1,111 deputies, or 30 percent, are minorities. The highest-ranking minority, a Latino, is a colonel.
"The sheriff has the power to make changes," said Bright. "But you have to be dedicated to diversify this agency."
Unlike the St. Petersburg Police Department, the Pinellas Sheriff's Office does not sponsor minority applicants through the police academy.
Pinellas Sheriff Everett Rice referred Weekly Planet's interview request to his spokesman, Sgt. Greg Tita, who said minority recruitment and retention is not an issue for the agency. While the sheriff's office does not sponsor minority applicants, it does recruit at job fairs and over the Internet.
"Race isn't an issue," said Tita, who added that the feds audit the agency's minority ranks each time they review accreditation. "Those folks would find fault if we need adjusting."
Tita believes Bright has raised the issue "to keep interest in this so we won't let the vanguard down."
In addition to minority recruitment problems, Bright told the Justice Department that the Pinellas Sheriff's Office reprimands minorities more severely than whites.
And Bright should know. Last year, the sheriff's office launched an internal probe of Bright, then a sergeant, after receiving a tip that he was having a sexual relationship with one of his assistants, Belinda Parker.
Her husband, Mark, made the claim. Among the evidence that surfaced was an e-mail sent from Bright to Parker in which he wrote: "When I make love to you, I don't want to stop, I just want to give it to you more and more each time, feeling your heart and your body with the fiery passion you release inside me every time I lay my eyes on such a beautiful woman, friend and my lover."
Bright said he sent the e-mail to Parker for her to personalize and give to her husband. It was a message Bright had sent to his wife when their relationship was on the rocks, according to his deposition in the internal-affairs investigation. He thought it might be helpful for Parker to use in her troubled relationship.
On Feb. 21, 2001, Mark Parker requested Rice drop the investigation of Bright.
Internal affairs investigators could not prove Bright had an inappropriate relationship with Belinda Parker but did demote him to deputy for not informing a superior that Parker had told him about spousal abuse.
"Because Deputy Bright worked in the Child Protection Investigation Division, which deals with abuse, those charges were taken very seriously," said Lt. Steve Allen, who is assigned to internal affairs. Bright is now the community police officer for Rainbow Village, a public housing project in Largo.
Leighwynn Howell, an African-American working in corrections, received a similar demotion from sergeant to deputy after internal affairs found him guilty in a sexual harassment claim.
But two white deputies found guilty of comparable indiscretions received lighter punishments:
… Internal affairs found corrections Capt. Peter Nesbitt guilty of having a "paramour" (sexual) relationship with a subordinate. He received a 14-day suspension.
… Sgt. David McKenzie pursued personal interests on public time and accessed "inappropriate Internet sites" on his county computer, according to his internal affairs file. He received a two-day suspension.
"We've had a lot of blacks leave the sheriff's office because of the perception that it's a racist agency," said Bright.
But internal investigations are based on procedures and facts, not race, stressed Allen. The agency categorizes offenses according to level, from one to five. Howell's sexual harassment was a Level 4 offense, while Nesbitt's paramour relationship constituted only a Level 3 offense. Moreover, being a captain, Nesbitt is a member of Rice's "command staff," which means the sheriff could use more discretion in reprimanding his deputy. Bright's was a Level 5 offense, which fell under "duties and responsibilities," for which he could have been terminated.
Although an internal affairs review board recommends punishment, the final decision goes to Rice. "We try to do a thorough investigation and look at all the facts," said Allen. "We do not base any decisions on race."
While Tita and Allen disagree with Bright's assertion that minorities are treated unfairly, this is not the first time the race issue has been raised on Sheriff Rice's watch. In 1996, Georgia Brandstadter-Palmer made an unsuccessful bid for sheriff using Rice's poor record with minorities as a major campaign issue. Rice then ran unopposed in 2000, but has promised voters not to run for reelection in 2004.
The St. Petersburg Times covered Rice's racial report card in '96, when Brandstadter-Palmer was hitting the media over the head with facts, but the newspaper hasn't reported on the issue since.
Bright wrote to the Justice Department last month because he would like to hear the issue discussed again. "The bottom line is perception," Bright said. "If you have a disparity, you need to fix it."
Contact Staff Writer Trevor Aaronson at 813-248-8888, ext. 134, or trevor.aaronson@ weeklyplanet.com.
This article appears in Jul 10-16, 2002.