SALINE CO.—The challenger emerging from this year’s Primary in Saline County for the office of sheriff is, like a handful of other candidates from around the area, hoping for a return to a more “Mayberry” style of law enforcement.
However, Mike Gribble, on Saline’s Republican ballot, realizes that establishing such a thing is certainly easier said than done, especially in a county the size of Saline, and with the problems Saline has consistently had for a number of years, both in terms of crime as well as corruption.
But Gribble says he’s ready to try, and his inspiration comes in the form of sheriffs and others for whom or with whom he’s worked in the past.
Gribble, 67, lives in the Pankeyville area outside of Harrisburg with his wife of 47 years, and got his start in law enforcement in December 1978 when, after a stint with the Navy from 1966 to 1971, he was hired to work as a deputy under then-sheriff George Henley upon Henley’s 1978 election.
“I went to Police Training Institute in early 1979,” Gribble said, noting he was grateful to another former sheriff, Ed Miller, who was the one who had introduced him to Henley prior to Henley’s election. At that time, Gribble said, he and his father were working with Miller in construction.
And Gribble found that he really liked law enforcement.
“There weren’t a lot of city officers (in Harrisburg) at the time,” Gribble described the status of law enforcement when he entered it, “but Illinois State Police were still around. In fact, I still have some warning tickets that Thurman Yates and Jack Nolen had issued to me back then,” he laughed.
History in law enforcement
Outlining the structure of the department at the time, Gribble said that Norman Wilson was chief deputy at the time; Greg Mugge (who ended up being with ISP) was full time, Jim Wheatcroft was the next deputy hired, and Jim Dunn was also on.
“That’s all there was,” Gribble said. “That’s all we had. I was there from 1978 to 1983, and stayed on after that when they were shorthanded.”
Gribble said they “didn’t have a quittin time.
“We had a shift of 4 p.m. to midnight, but if we had a call, we had to get up and go to it,” he said. “We were non-union back then. If we had a female prisoner, we had a matron, and she would also come in and cook for the prisoners. We had a jailer, a dispatcher, then there would be one deputy on, and that was about the size of the crew.”
Gribble said he believed that the growth the county has experienced since that time, both in terms of population and in the size of the sheriff’s department, is a “good thing, but we didn’t have the problems back then that we have now. There was no meth; me and Greg (Mugge) actually found the county’s first marijuana plant. But now, we have meth, heroin, cocaine. And I’ve actually seen only one operating meth lab,” he admitted, noting that they of course don’t always look like “labs” with coils and test tubes and vials, but can be something as simple as a liter soda bottle with a hose coming out of it.
Gribble recalled how during his time as deputy, the county did a somewhat experimental allowance of each deputy driving his squad for personal use if need be.
“For one month, we could drive the squad anywhere we wanted to, but we had to do beginning and ending mileage, and if there was something going on where we had to go to assist,” he said, noting the convenience of the latter. “The county board saw that the amount of gas used was reasonable, but most of all, it was good for on-call.”
Ongoing contact with public and the sheriff’s department
Gribble said that he left the sheriff’s department on good terms and went immediately into working for the Department of Transportation, from which he ultimately retired after 20 years. The last five years he was there, he made it into a lead position, and worked in Saline, Gallatin and Hardin counties to take care of snow removal and keep up the equipment.
He recalled working with a former notorious Saline County deputy, Todd Fort, who had been tasked with calling IDOT on one occasion where there was an obstruction in the road, “but Fort wasn’t very helpful with describing what was ‘down,’ whether it was a tree, a limb, whatever. I tried to explain to him that he needed to tell me as closely as possible what it was so that I could get the right equipment out there to remove it. I still didn’t get much out of him.”
Addressing questions as to whether Fort was working with Gribble in some capacity on his campaign, Gribble said unequivocally that this wasn’t the case; and further, if elected, Gribble said that Fort wouldn’t be “part of anything” during his administration, which also had been rumored in the months leading up to the election.
The issues
Gribble acknowledged that there are aspects of recent changes to Illinois law that sheriffs are having to deal with and that he’s ready for: Concealed carry weapons, medical marijuana and the paramilitarization of police.
About concealed carry, Gribble said he’s a staunch supporter of the Second Amendment and he believes “everyone should have a gun if they want it.
“Now, if one of us on the department is aware that there’s a ‘character’ out there who probably shouldn’t be carrying concealed, we might take a closer look at issuing that person a CC card,” he admitted, but stated that he likes the way the law is structured to allow those who can carry concealed to do so.
On the issue of medical marijuana, Gribble was straightforward: “Nobody seems to care much about marijuana anymore,” explaining that with the advent of significant drugs that make a person not only impaired, but violent and uncontrollable, marijuana has sort of taken a back seat. “Impairment is a problem,” Gribble acknowledged, “and there’s no way to test that impairment that’s comparable to a breathalyzer for alcohol, but medical marijuana is a good thing for people who need it for their medical condition. Those who really need it will use it right; it’s controlling the fringe that’s the problem.”
Gribble was a little less forthcoming with his feelings on paramilitarization of police, an issue that many in the readership area consider a problem, as rural southern Illinois rarely sees the actual need for a Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) team under even the most trying of circumstances. Gribble, however, sees such a thing as a good one, noting the training he’s been through with such an outfit (he was the “target”) and the fact that a little over a year ago, the takedown of Brian Potts was accomplished by such a team pretty much right across the road from his house, and he believes they did a good job.
“They train vigorously,” Gribble said about the venture.
Common sense approach
Gribble’s campaign slogan is “A common-sense approach to law enforcement,” and his theories on how to run the office of sheriff reflect that.
“I see how the sheriff’s department has the potential to be a money-maker for the county,” he said, “but I don’t view it as a ‘money-maker that also happens to be law enforcement.’ This is law enforcement. If, at the end of the year, we have ‘money left over,’ well, it’s stupid if you spend money when you don’t need to.”
He understands that his opponent, Keith Brown, is a more administrative type of sheriff, but that’s not what Gribble wants to do.
“I want to be the hands-on sheriff,” he said. “We have a great sheriff’s department, as good as any around. I want to be part of it. I’ve sat up there with the second-shift guys; I’d sit up with the midnight people, too.”
Gribble also addressed rumors of who he would place in the chief deputy’s position, should he be elected.
“The chief deputy will come from inside the current deputy staff,” Gribble said, declining to give a name. “We’re not going to bring in someone off the street. There are a lot of qualified people up there. I want someone who has a lot of experience, someone I trust. The chief deputy will know the ins and outs, and can keep me up to speed on everything.”
He further noted that as sheriff, he believes that officer should sit down and talk to his people, “jailers, dispatchers, deputies. It’s one big department; they need to be cohesive.”
What drives Gribble the most in his quest for the office of top law enforcement officer in the county is that he’s a “firm believer in the Constitution and it’s being torn all to pieces.
“It’s not Mayberry here. I know that. But I think we can approach it that way,” Gribble said.