Sheriff’s office responds to request for interview with Maketa

The El Paso County Sheriff’s Office released a statement Tuesday explaining why the sheriff has not publicly addressed the accusations against him.

KRDO NewsChannel 13 wanted to know why the sheriff recorded a video for sheriff’s office employees, but has not yet told his side of the story to the public.

Below is the response we received:

“Sheriff Terry Maketa fully intends to address the public about these recent events once the independent investigation is complete. Sheriff Maketa feels it’s inappropriate to “play the case out” through the media as it would undermine the investigation and the efforts of the County Commissioners in getting the investigation in place. This approach is also consistent with EEOC guidelines which prescribe a level of confidentiality be adhered to in these cases. The fact that others have chosen to disregard those EEOC confidentiality guidelines is unfortunate.

The commanders were placed on leave due to several policy violations; those violations are not tied, nor related to the EEOC complaint. The first steps to place them on leave preceded the filing of their EEOC complaint.”