{"id":114166,"date":"2015-03-04T20:38:39","date_gmt":"2015-03-05T03:38:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/nowlin-says-hes-checking-deputys-credentials\/"},"modified":"2015-03-04T20:38:39","modified_gmt":"2015-03-05T03:38:39","slug":"nowlin-says-hes-checking-deputys-credentials","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/nowlin-says-hes-checking-deputys-credentials\/","title":{"rendered":"Nowlin says he’s checking deputy’s credentials"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Nowlin\"
Nowlin<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Montezuma County Sheriff Steve Nowlin has faced a few hurdles in his first 45 days in office.<\/p>\n

The most recent is whether a patrol deputy hired during the previous administration is indeed certified. The officer in question, Lyle Bayles is currently employed with the office, said Nowlin.<\/p>\n

Bayles was hired at the Montezuma County Sheriff\u2019s Office after he unexpectedly resigned as chief of police in Blanding, Utah, last summer. His resignation letter to Blanding officials cited a desire to spend more time with his family.<\/p>\n

However, Utah Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST) officials subsequently announced that it was investigating Bayles.<\/p>\n

Director of Utah POST Scott Stephenson said last week that the investigation was ended after Bayles relinquished his POST certification. Stephenson declined to comment about accusations leading to the investigation.<\/p>\n

For Nowlin, there\u2019s a question if Bayles is authorized to serve as an officer in Colorado.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe status of (Bayles\u2019) Colorado POST certification is under investigation,\u201d said Nowlin.<\/p>\n

Nowlin, who is collaborating with the new director at Colorado POST, said he didn\u2019t want to jump to conclusions.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs for the residents, I\u2019m working to do everything I can to make sure people are safe and protected,\u201d said Nowlin.<\/p>\n

Nowlin declined to speculate on why Bayles was initially hired by former Sheriff Dennis Spruell, and added that hiring practices at the sheriff\u2019s office were being \u201crevamped and changed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have interim policies and procedures in place,\u201d said Nowlin. \u201cI hope to have those formalized within the next 60 to 90 days.\u201d<\/p>\n

Spruell lost his bid for a second term as sheriff last year.<\/p>\n

Bayles, hired in August 2008 as police chief in Blanding, earned $98,500 annually. His law enforcement career spans almost three decades. His resignation in Blanding came nearly four months after two of his officers resigned.<\/p>\n

tbaker@cortezjournal.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Blanding police chief hired in previous administration<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":114167,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6363],"tags":[188,13,993,237],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-114166","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ds-news","tag-dolores-star","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-investigation","tag-montezuma-county-government"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114166","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=114166"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114166\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/114167"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=114166"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=114166"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=114166"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=114166"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}