The embattled sheriff in Grundy County, Tennessee, contends he never intentionally misled a state police training commission when giving updates on his department as he looks ahead to a civil hearing where he could lose his law enforcement certification.
When newly elected Sheriff Heath Gunter walked into the Grundy County Sheriff’s Office on Sept. 1, 2022, the three deputies on duty had already worked a 12-hour shift, the sheriff said. He teamed up with them to patrol the next shift amid a staff shortage Gunter has tried to address throughout his first two years in office.
Since that day, Gunter has been the subject of an ongoing Tennessee Peace Officer Standards and Training Commission probe. An investigator for the commission found an uncertified deputy working as a school resource officer in an elementary school, other officers patrolling alone without proper certification and a long list of record-keeping and employee training issues.
Gunter now faces allegations of failing to meet the commission’s expectations contained in a nine-page notice of hearing and civil charges filed by the panel in September to be heard on Jan. 16 in Nashville. An original Oct. 17 hearing date was reset Wednesday after a motion for a continuance was granted.
“When I took over, I had 23 to quit,” Gunter said in a phone interview of his arrival at the Grundy County Sheriff’s Office at midnight his first day. “When I walked in, I had three deputies that had remained, and they had worked from noon that day till midnight. So when I took office, I had three others come in with me.”