Byrd prepares to take office as Darlington County sheriff

DARLINGTON — When Wayne Byrd takes office Jan. 6 as the new Darlington County sheriff, he said, he’ll be drawing heavily on the experience he’s gained during his time as a Darlington police captain.

Byrd decided to run for the post after incumbent Sheriff Glenn Campbell announced he would not seek re-election after serving for 24 years. Byrd won the post by defeating Campbell’s chief deputy sheriff, Tom Gainey, in special run-off election June 24 after the two ran a close race in the Democratic primary and received more votes than Lamar Police Chief Charles Woodle, who also was a contender for the office. There were no Republican candidates for the post.

Less than three weeks before he takes over as sheriff, Byrd said he knows one of the most important things is to have a good staff of deputies supporting him.

“A deputy sheriff is literally the sheriff in sheriff’s absence. They are my personal representatives,” he said. “Your people are your best resources. If you take care of your guys on the street — the ones that are out on the road every day — they are the ones that form the image of your department.

“You have to take care of those guys,” he said. “You have to keep them happy and motivated because they have the greatest impact on the public view of what you’re doing.”
Byrd said he’s already appointed a command staff and has chosen the former head of security at the Darlington Raceway, Jerry Thompson, as his chief deputy. But even he has to answer to someone, Byrd said.

His bosses are the people of Darlington County, he said. As a police captain, he worked for the city; the sheriff, however, doesn’t work for the county, Byrd said.

“The sheriff works for the people. He’s the people’s representative, he handles the people’s business,” he said. “I get a job evaluation by the city every year. The sheriff gets a job evaluation every four years and, if he’s not doing a good job, then the people have a right to replace him.”

Being responsible for the Darlington County Detention Center is a role Byrd said he will have to get used to. He remembers that this year, a murder suspect was released accidentally from a Columbia facility because of a mistake at the Darlington County jail.

Byrd said he and his staff have visited detention facilities in Horry and Newberry counties for ideas on how to operate the facility and avoid such errors.

“It may be something as simple as somebody not checking the paperwork,” he said. “A big part of the problem is how you handle it. We’ll call the news media and say, ‘Hey this guy got out by mistake. We need to get him back in.’ Certainly if somebody’s out on the street that doesn’t belong there, you need to let them know.”

Byrd said he also is looking to address the county’s gang problem by forming a county-wide task force and working with new 4th Circuit Solicitor Will Rogers, who also has plans to stamp out the gang problem.

Law enforcement and prosectors can work together and step up their efforts, but help is needed from the community, Byrd said.

“It starts at home. It’s hard for a law enforcement agency to go into the home and say, ‘You need to do this and this,’” he said. “We’re going to try and work with some of the community groups. If we get that partnership started we can build on it in the future.”

In 2005 and 2006 Darlington County led the state in the number of gang incidents that were reported, Byrd said.

“In 2007, we were No. 2 behind Florence County, who beat us by two,” he said. “You can always make the argument that Columbia and Greenville aren’t reporting the way we report and there may be some of that. Even so, it’s still a significant problem if we are on the same level with them and we have a much smaller population here.”

Byrd said he’s also looking forward to working with other agencies in the county to form a combined drug unit in Darlington County.

“There’s been some, I think, clashes of personality or differences in opinion on how to handle the drug issue,” he said. “The county has three or four guys trying to investigate (drugs). You’ve got one or two in each city ... it only makes sense to let those guys work together. You double and triple your resources with everybody pooling.”