Pubdate: Mon, 25 Apr 2005
Source: Bluefield Daily Telegraph (WV)
Copyright: 2005 Bluefield Daily Telegraph
Contact:  http://www.bdtonline.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1483
Author: Larry Hypes

TAZEWELL COUNTY SHERIFF SAYS TIME ARTICLE MISLEADING

TAZEWELL, Va. - H.S. Caudill doesn't mind interviews when he has the
time. Tazewell County's busy sheriff simply wishes reporters would
stick to the facts and the quotations.

Caudill said he was correctly quoted some of the time and taken out of
context some of the time when Richmond Times-Dispatch staff writer Rex
Bowman did a correspondent piece for Time magazine's edition dated
March 28.

"I talked to Mr. Bowman for a maximum of 10 minutes," Caudill said. "I
am disappointed in the slant he took toward Tazewell County including
ideas like 'criminality in rural towns' as if there might not be such
a problem in the cities."

Caudill said the overall picture of the county including "sagging
barns" and "patch of Appalachian Virginia" was not necessary and gives
a stereotypical image of Four Seasons Country.

"Yes, we do have a problem with OxyContin, for instance, but I did not
suggest that it should be called 'coal miner's cocaine' at any time.
In fact, it was Mr. Bowman who asked why I thought it might be called
that. I told him I didn't know but I would guess it might be that
injured coal miners, who were in a great deal of pain sometimes, were
given the drug to ease their suffering."

Caudill also said he didn't know where Bowman got the information that
12,481 of the county's 44,362 residents are allegedly on some type of
disability.

"I cannot respond to that statement. There was no reference to it in
our conversation. Like the rest of the readers, I didn't know it would
be there until I saw the article, and I do not know if either of those
numbers is valid," continued Caudill.

Since taking office on January 1, 2000, Caudill and his staff have
worked to adjust to overcrowded conditions at the county jail, with
several caused by drug-related cases. Part of the overcrowding comes
from other reasons.

For several years, the towns of Pocahontas, Bluefield, Tazewell,
Richlands and Cedar Bluff have transported prisoners to the county
facility as the town jails were discontinued. Those persons, in
addition to the ones placed by county deputies, have combined for an
excess of inmates.

An increase in drug traffic has, as Caudill readily notes, compounded
the problem.

"When I became sheriff, we had one officer working primarily with
narcotics, although it was on a part-time basis. I immediately made
him full-time. I added a narcotics officer in the latter part of 2001,
and another in '02. We now have three employees working with narcotics
cases," he says.

"To give an example of how strongly the sheriff's office has worked in
this area, through the first four months of this year, we have
directly opened 15 of the 16 narcotics cases (94 percent).
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MAP posted-by: Larry Seguin