Fired Officer Who Filed Suit Runs For Sheriff Dickson, Removed From Department, Wants To Replace Former Boss Clegg

A former captain who was fired from the Kootenai County Sheriff’s Department announced Tuesday that he will run for sheriff.

Thomas H. Dickson’s announcement comes three months after he filed suit against the sheriff’s department and the county commissioners over his firing.

On Tuesday, Dickson painted current Sheriff Pierce Clegg as a poor manager who is at the root of low morale among officers.

However, the head of the sheriff’s deputies association said Tuesday that deputies have a good working relationship with Clegg and support him.

Twice-elected as sheriff, Clegg fired Dickson in March 1994.

Clegg would not discuss the reasons for the firing, citing the ongoing court case. However, Clegg said he plans to run for a third term against Dickson in 1996.

On Tuesday, Dickson criticized the sheriff’s department for a budget that is “increasing at an alarming rate” and said he would “confront the out-of-control spending.”

Although the 60-year-old Cataldo resident claimed in a press release that the sheriff’s budget was increasing by 25 percent annually, he admitted later Tuesday that he may have used the wrong statistics. According to the Kootenai County auditor’s office, the sheriff’s budget increased by 10.5 percent from 1993-94 to the 1994-95 fiscal year. The department’s budget request for next year has decreased.

Dickson pointed to a countywide employee survey done by the auditor’s office in June as a sign that Clegg is ineffective.

“The morale at the sheriff’s department continues to be extremely low due to low wages, no training, over management…” one sheriff’s department employee said in the survey.

But Sgt. Dan Soumas, president of the Kootenai County Deputy Sheriff’s Association, said Clegg is well-liked.

“I met with every patrol deputy, except three, on Sunday afternoon and there was an overwhelming support for the sheriff,” Soumas said.

He said the poor morale indicated on the survey is not because of Clegg, but instead is linked to low salaries.

Deputies have been fighting to get pay raises that would bring them in line with the pay Spokane sheriff’s deputies and Coeur d’Alene police officers receive.

“(Clegg) has been very supportive in getting his deputies more money,” Soumas said. When preparing his department’s budget last year, Clegg offered to cut managers’ raises in favor of giving patrol deputies higher pay, County Clerk Tom Taggart said. However, county commissioners did not accept the plan.

Both Dickson and Clegg will run on the Republican ticket.

Clegg was first elected to the sheriff’s department as a Democrat in 1988 and then again in 1992. But in September, Clegg switched parties because he felt the Democrats had become too liberal.

In a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court, Dickson claims his constitutional rights were violated when Clegg fired him in 1994. At the time, Dickson managed the county jail. He had been with the department since 1989. He is seeking unspecified damages for back pay, future income loss and emotional distress.

Dickson was chairman of the criminal justice program at Seattle’s Shoreline Community College in 1988 when Clegg was running for office. He said Clegg offered to give him a job if he was elected. Clegg won and Dickson took the job.

Dickson says he was promised the job for as long as Clegg was in office. Dickson claims Clegg gave him no reason for firing him.

Dickson is currently a semi-retired rancher. He said he has worked in Redlands, Calif., as a police officer and for the Los Angeles Police Department.

, DataTimes