Jason Sandford
Jason Sandford is a reporter, writer, blogger and photographer interested in all things Asheville.
Reporter Russ Bowen of WLOS tweets the following:
Major development involving Asheville police department evidence room details to come
Word on the street is that the Asheville Police Department worker who had overseen the property room for years and years was suddenly gone from the department earlier this year, and there’s been no explanation.
The property room is a critical storage facility, where all kinds of stuff collected from crime scenes and seized in investigations is stored.
Asheville is familiar with property room scandals. A few years back, an audit of the property room at the Buncombe County Sheriff’s Department under then-Sheriff Bobby Medford revealed missing money, guns and so-called “rape kits,” critical evidence collected in the investigation of alleged rapes. That missing evidence could have compromised cases.
This developing story comes on the heels of a report last week that the city of Asheville is close to settling a federal civil lawsuit involving a former Asheville Police Department officer who accused her supervisory officer of sexual harassment.
From the Asheville Citizen-Times and reporter Joel Burgess:
The City Council is set to hear April 12 a settlement agreement in the case brought by former Officer Cherie Byrd against former “Officer of the Year” Eric Lauffer, the Police Department and the city.
“It has been settled, pending council’s approval,” said Martha Walker-McGlohon, the city attorney working on the case.
Byrd claimed in the suit that she reported being harassed and the city failed to adequately address the problem.
Lauffer sent her sexually explicit texts, including “messages such as ‘I must licky you,’ and ‘I am just a man. Never satisfied always wanting more,’” according to the lawsuit.
Byrd left the department. Lauffer, who was demoted, continues to work for the department.
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