Sheriff Bryant gives update to Kiwanis

Sheriff Eric Bryant appeared before Kiwanis on July 19th, giving an address on the State of Sumter County Georgia. “We have a community full of public safety men and women that dedicate their lives to ensure that we have a safe community to live in.”

He addressed the concerns that many have when thinking about crimes that could threaten public and personal safety. “You could be anywhere and either A, witness an incident, or become a victim of a crime, but because of the dedicated men and women we have here in our community, response, reaction, pro activity, things that we do to prevent those things from happening is what make me able to stand here today, proud to say that we live in a safe community, and we’re excited about that.”

He shared stats. “Thankfully, we had no homicides in the county. And when I say within the County understand that I only represent law enforcement services outside of the municipalities that don’t have their own police department, to include Leslie, Plains, and here Americus.”

Bryant did mention that property crime had increased, though burglaries were low. “One of the things that we’ve seen an increase in however is the number of arrests that involve someone that’s suffering from either mental health or substance abuse issues. They’re overflowing jails not only here in your community, but throughout the State, and what we are doing is trying to work very closely with our State and our medical partners to come up with alternatives verses putting an individual that’s really sick from a substance abuse or a mental health issue into the jail facility.”

Bryant gave numbers. “This morning there was 184 inmates in the Sumter County Jail, out of 184 inmates, 93 of them are on some type of mental health medication.”

He addressed larceny, which is theft of services such as getting into someone’s account or mail box. “Unfortunately, that rate has increased for calendar year 2023.”

He talked about how scammers preyed in victim’s sense of responsibility. “Sometimes we get a little too gullible. But at the same time, sometimes we are about taking care of business.”

Bryant mentioned jury duty scams had increased, where scammers claim citizens had fines due for missing court dates. He stressed the importance of calling law enforcement if citizens were unsure if something was valid.

He gave an example of a scammer who had been caught. “Last year, we had an incident with a jury duty scam. And we were able to back track the phone number to the individual that called. Because he was on a rampage. It was something about Sumter County, but he was calling everybody. We were able to track him down, and we were able to take him into custody, from his jail cell.”

Bryant talked about how technology and access to phones had enabled scammers. “He’s sitting in jail, with an account that’s probably bigger than mine.”

One Kiwanian asked if reports of mold in the jail were valid, and if so, what steps the Sheriff’s department were taking to combat it. Bryant responded: “Maintaining the County Jail is solely my responsibility. And what happens is, inmates that are in jail, unfortunately, the cable is not working or they can’t get Netflix or the Game Station is not working, so what do they do? Complain about everything else.” Bryant noted that every complaint was investigated. “We investigate every single complaint if there is a complaint about jail conditions, food not good, medical services not rendered, and what we do is not only make sure that that’s not happening, if it is, get is corrected, but we’re documenting that as well.”

Another Kiwanian asked about the speeding cameras in the school zone on Bumphead road. “If it’s within the designated school zone time, on Bumphead road. . .one mile over the 25, I can send you a citation. Outside of the school zone time, say if it’s four in the afternoon, there’s still activity out there, so I set that camera to send that citation if they are fifteen miles over the limit.” He mentioned on Highway 27, the camera is set by the Department of Transportation, and 10 miles over the limit at any time would result in a citation.

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