At least once each year, Sheriff Tommy Allen appears before the Wadesboro Civitan Club to brief the group on what's going on in law enforcement in the county. The sheriff gave his annual talk to the Civitans at their regular weekly meeting on Friday, July 23.

A former Civitan for 22 years, Sheriff Allen provided the club members with a "Home and Personal Security Handbook" from the National Neighborhood Watch Institute, as well as a glossy magazine detailing the sheriff's office staff and duties, along with helpful information on avoiding becoming a victim of crime.

He then told the club about an upcoming program that will allow county citizens to donate used cell phones, which will then be used by senior citizens and victims of domestic violence. More details on the program, called Cell Phone Bank, will be released in the next few weeks, he said.

Sheriff Allen also briefly told the club about a recent home invasion in Wadesboro, after which several officers were stung by as many as 21 hornets while pursuing the suspect through the woods. (Further details can be found on page 1A of this issue). The suspect was eventually apprehended in Stanly County.

The sheriff also gave the Civitan Club a few statistics. "As of this morning, we had 78 inmates in the county jail," he reported. "Our capacity is about 60 so we have some inmates sleeping on the floor."

Overcrowding is an ongoing problem at the jail, he said, and most of the inmates housed there cannot make bail and are awaiting trial.

He also reported that the 911 Operations Center has received more than 13,000 calls so far in 2010. As of Friday, the Sheriff's Office had taken 5,520 of those calls, an increase over the number at the same time last year.

Sheriff Allen then went on to detail a recent murder that the Sheriff's Office investigated, although the investigation showed that the murder actually occurred in Union County, but the body was dumped and eventually found on the roadside in rural Anson County.

The suspects— Eddie Ray Maye, 22, of Ansonville and his girlfriend, Shuntia D. Cason, 22, also of Ansonville— have been arrested and charged with the murder of Ervin Polk, 38, of Charlotte, thanks to an in-depth investigation by the Sheriff's Office, in cooperation with Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police, Union County law enforcement and the SBI.

"It's a great example of police work," Allen said.