Former police chief gets jail time on drug charge

Stephanie Porter-Nichols
Smyth County News: News > Washington County News: News >
Tue May 13, 2008 – 01:19 PM

By DAN KEGLEY/Staff
Former Chilhowie Police Chief Dwayne Sheffield was sentenced May 1 in Washington County Circuit Court to one year in jail on a charge of distributing methamphetamine.
Under a plea agreement, a second distribution charge, two charges of child abuse or neglect, and a charge of conspiracy to distribute were not prosecuted, court papers showed.
Judge Birg E. Sergent suspended 11 years and six months of the sentence, leaving one year to run concurrent with a sentence imposed in Smyth County Circuit Court, documents showed.
Upon release Sheffield will serve five years of supervised probation on the charge. “As a special condition of probation, the defendant shall pick up trash and litter in a designated area of Washington County as assigned by his/her probation officer and/or the litter control officer,” court papers said.
In early November in Smyth County, Sheffield took an Alford plea to a charge of object sexual penetration in a deal to avoid prosecution on four other related charges that stemmed from a haunted house sponsored by the Chilhowie Police Department.
Under an Alford plea, a defendant maintains he is innocent while admitting the prosecution has evidence sufficient for a conviction.
Judge William N. Alexander II sentenced Sheffield to 10 years’ imprisonment with six years and 10 months suspended. That left three years and two months with credit for time served since his arrest in May 2007, including house arrest.
After his sentence is complete, Sheffield is also to have no contact with the victim or her family and is required to register as a sex offender.
The plea allowed Sheffield to avoid prosecution on charges of rape, contributing to the delinquency of a minor, sexual battery and child endangerment.

If this had been someone other than an official do you think they would have gotten a slap on the wrist. It seems that some are above the law and free to do as they please while others have to answer for there crimes even tho we all know this creep in the end will get whats coming to him this article only goes to show how our justice system fails us. I hope that some higher ups in the government read this and take some action against this judge and the D.A that prosecuted this case. I’m ashamed to live in this country with these kind of people running it. I would hope when it comes time to vote again for this idiot who calls himself a judge that no-one would vote for him I believe the federal government needs to get off their asses and do their jobs and take this man off the bench and any other like him. This is not the only case here there have been others. But tell me what can we do to stop such travesties from happening again? I cant tell you the answer because its us against the government. But how long will this government last before we as the people begin to realise that they are not for us but against us? Open your eyes my friends and see that if your not in their little circle you are nothing to them but pawns in their games. How much longer do you want to be controlled by these people?
Nyte