POLITICS AS (UN)USUAL

Sheriff Of Pink Walls Leaves Limelight

The Pepto-Bismol pink jail cells were mildly amusing and so were the
black-striped jail uniforms that Davidson County's new sheriff ordered
when he took office in 1994. But soon he wasn't so funny anymore.

The showboating sheriff with a tough-on-crime image painted a spider
web on his sheriff's car - code language, and perhaps designed to
offend or to scare. Deputies' uniforms were fashioned in paramilitary
style. Gerald Hege decorated his office to look like a bunker. Then
these style issues merged into more substantive complaints.

In 2002, four of Hege's deputies pleaded guilty to charges related to
drug-ring operations. Charges of extortion and conspiring to
distribute cocaine, marijuana, Ecstasy and steroids were on the
original indictment.

Last April, an investigation of Hege's office began looking into
suspected inmate beatings, racial profiling and misuse of county
money. By September, the sheriff was indicted on 15 felony charges.

On Monday, he resigned and had his day in court. Hege pleaded guilty
but will not wear the striped uniforms he himself selected, or see
those pink walls up close. He received probation in a plea deal, and
will wear an ankle bracelet on house arrest.

A Davidson County commissioner says Hege's ego got in the way. That's
a diplomatic way to describe a man who, from now on, has a new role to
play.