Will Lewis hasn’t given up his taxpayer-funded office (yet) … but he hasn’t exactly been turning in stellar attendance since the scandal that’s enveloping his administration broke wide open earlier this month.
Deputies with the Greenville County, South Carolina sheriff’s office tell us the embattled law enforcement official has been staying away from the office as calls for his resignation mount.
Lewis has also declined to directly address the allegations with his deputies, instead dispatching his subordinates to meet with them away from police headquarters.
“Lewis is making his captains do his dirty work and go around and talk to all the platoons,” one source familiar with the situation told us. “He won’t show his face.”
Lewis, 42, is at the center of a S.C. State Law Enforcement Division (SLED) investigation and a civil lawsuit stemming from allegations made by Savannah Nabors, a 23-year-old former employee of the Greenville County sheriff’s office.
Nabors claims Lewis drugged and raped her during a March 7 business trip to Charlotte, North Carolina – and that she was forced to give up her job after making it clear she would not sleep with him consensually. Lewis has denied those allegations. According to him, he and Nabors – both of whom are married – engaged in a consensual extramarital affair.
News of both the investigation and the lawsuit broke exclusively on this news site – as did the underlying allegations against Lewis.
This news site led the charge for Lewis step down, not due to the as-yet-unproven rape allegations – but because it’s clear from evidence submitted by Nabors in conjunction with her lawsuit that Lewis attempted to expend taxpayer resources to advance an affair with his young female employee.
At an emergency meeting of Greenville County council convened earlier this week, members unanimously approved a resolution calling for Lewis’ resignation – which he has not heeded.
In fact, he’s lawyering up … which is probably a good thing seeing as five of his deputies (Ty Miller, Ryan Flood, Marcus Davenport, Scott Belue and Chad Ayers) have been subpoenaed by Nabors’ attorneys in connection with the case.
In addition to making himself scarce at headquarters, Lewis has recently moved patrol “roll call” meetings to off-site locations – and encouraged deputies to communicate with each other regarding these meetings “over text, not county email.”
These meetings – which typically only last fifteen minutes – were extended to one hour earlier this week so deputies could hear the spin from Lewis’ loyalists within the department.
“The county attorney said that this was not a distraction to the sheriff’s office,” one source familiar with the situation told us. “Well I would beg to differ.”
We would too …
As we said a week ago, Lewis needs to go. In addition to his documented efforts to defraud Greenville taxpayers (and plans to cover up this malfeasance), this scandal is clearing compromising his ability to run his office.
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