The below column is from The Tampa Tribune’s Daniel Ruth on 01/05/02:

Jan 5, 2003

At Last, The End Is Near For Hillsborough's High Sheriff

DANIEL RUTH


It sure took long enough, but the high sheriff of Hillsboroughia, Cal Henderson, finally did something right. He announced he won't run for re-election in 2004.

Thanks for the heads-up, Cal.

It's going to take this long just to fumigate the office for your successor, who is likely to be the sheriff's hand- picked supernumerary, Rear Adm. Starship Fleet Commander Spectre No. 1 David Gee.

Good grief, this guy's risen up through the ranks faster than Odai Hussein.

Either the heir apparent has some interesting photographs of his boss or the sheriff simply likes having a successor around whose name he can spell.

But at least the end is in sight for the regime of Cal Henderson as the high sheriff of Hillsborougham, a style of leadership perhaps best defined as Barney Fife with a mean streak.

By the time Henderson slinks out of office, he will have held the highest and most powerful law enforcement position in the county for a decade. And what did he do with the opportunity?

Stark Terror

Instead of building on the efforts of his predecessor, Walter Heinrich, to create a professional law enforcement agency, Henderson turned the department into a den of cronyism that would make Tammany Hall look like an egalitarian Quaker congregation.

Having this guy control a $241 million budget and 3,300 employees, many of whom are political appointees with guns, is like naming Dr. Strangelove as the secretary of defense - sure, wonderful comedic relief, but stark terror, too.

To date, Henderson's years as sheriff have been marked by a disciplinary double-standard: one for pals and political minions and quite another for simple working stiffs merely trying to make a living.

Gracious, if Ted Kaczynski had been a major political contributor to Henderson's campaigns, the sheriff would have put him in charge of the bomb unit.

But if one had the misfortune to simply be a grunt in the sheriff's trenches, life could be more miserable than the ``bring out your dead'' scene in ``Monty Python and the Holy Grail.''

It's A Living

Which obviously brings us to the sad case of Stan Rosenberg, a former corrections officer less than a year away from retirement who was fired by Henderson from his job for taking bereavement leave to attend his daughter-in-law's father's funeral, a relationship not covered by the department official grief policy.

Fired - loss of income, loss of pension.

But the very same high sheriff of Hillsborougharia, while dropping the hammer on a 63-year-old jail guard who attended a funeral, could be a downright angel of mercy when it came to other members of his crack staff who stumbled.

It was during the Henderson years, when the sheriff's department more often resembled ``Animal House'' meets ``Police Academy III,'' deputies could get soused and total their squad cars, evidence would get suppressed and crimes covered up, and Henderson would do - NOTHING.

Deputies could beat up wives and girlfriends, threaten to kill co-workers, lie under oath and at worst face a wrist-slapping suspension from Cal Henderson.

What would you call this? A zero tolerance policy for reality?

There's more, much more. But this is only a column, not a Stephen King novel about the Cal Henderson years.

In the end, the coup de yahoo to Henderson's imploding reputation certainly had to be his ham-handed aiding and abetting of the bogus investigation into Steve and Marlene Aisenberg, who were indicted in connection with the disappearance of their daughter, Sabrina, based on a pyramid scheme of lies and trumped- up evidence concocted by his office.

Henderson vouched for the veracity of false accusations against the couple, as usual did nothing to discipline the detectives responsible, and hid from public scrutiny once the charges were laughed out of court.

If Henderson was possessed of an iota of common decency he would have fired himself for conduct unbecoming an officer.

Instead, he's going to keep his jowls in the public trough until 2004 and walk away from the detritus of his administration with a cozy pension.

Crime might not pay, but you can still make a pretty good living as duplicitous, calculating political hack with a badge.

Columnist Daniel Ruth can be reached at (813) 259-7599.

This story can be found at: http://www.tampatrib.com/MGAUC9QBKAD.html