A School Resource Officer working at Wilson High School in Florence School District 1 has been dismissed by the Florence County Sheriff’s Office for inappropriate conduct involving a student.
The deputy wasn’t identified by the sheriff’s office or Florence 1 in their press releases issued Thursday. The school’s Web site, www.fsd1.org/wilson, however, lists its SRO as Chase McDaniel, who also is listed in the 2009 S.C. Sheriffs' Association directory as an SRO with the Florence County Sheriff’s Office.
The parents of an 18-year-old female Wilson student and the SRO had developed an association, one which the parents deemed inappropriate, according to the Florence 1 press release. The student and her parents said the association wasn’t sexual.
The Florence County Sheriff’s Office Command Staff was notified about the association between the student and the officer, and the officer was suspended from his duties at the school immediately pending an investigation by the State Law Enforcement Division.
The matter was investigated by SLED because it involved a sheriff’s office employee, according to the sheriff’s office press release.
The sheriff’s office told Florence 1 officials that while the SRO didn’t violate the law, according to SLED, his conduct was inappropriate and unacceptable.
The former SRO will face no criminal charges, according to the sheriff’s office. He was hired by the sheriff's office June 9, 2004 and becamse Wilson's SRO July 31, 2006, Sheriff Kenney Boone said.
“Based upon the allegations and the circumstances, we believed that the appropriate response was to terminate the SRO,” Boone said in the release. “School resource officers provide an important service to our schools, and parents must have confidence that our officers are there for the protection of the students.”
The sherff's office employs nine SROs at Florence County schools.
Florence 1 officials said in the release they will work with the sheriff’s office to find a replacement for the officer who has been dismissed from his duties at the school.
SROs, according to the S.C. Association of School Resource Officers, serve in schools as law enforcement officers, law-related educators and law-related counselors. The first SRO program in South Carolina utilizing this model was developed in 1994 in Beaufort County, according to the association’s Web site, www.scasro.org.
The association was developed two years later as a statewide organization for officers to contact on what programs were adn weren’t working in schools, how to handle certain situations and aas a clearinghouse for lesson plans. The association later worked with the General Assembly and the S.C. Criminal Justice Academy in developing a standard for SROs and a state law giving SROs statewide jurisdiction while on a school function.
On the Web
Florence County Sheriff’s Office, www.fcso.org
Wilson high School, www.fsd1.org/wilson
S.C. Association of School Resource Officers, www.scasro.org
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