Cousins Refutes Anketell's Last Minute Claims

With just five days until the election, candidate for Sheriff Damian Anketell continues to point the finger at Sheriff Frank Cousins.

On Tuesday, Anketell filed a complaint with the State Ethics Commission and Attorney General's office alleging Cousins violated state law when he disclosed personnel and workers' compensation information to the Salem News. In his one-page letter, Anketell didn't specifically cite which law was broken.

He submitted with the letter, a copy of a Salem News article and a copy of a document outlining the payments that Anketell, a Democrat, said Cousins, a Republican, released to the newspaper.

"It was misleading in a lot of ways," Anketell said about statements Cousins made about the payments.

But spokesperson for Cousins, Paul Fleming, said Wednesday that no laws were broken and Anketell was given the choice to come back to work.

"No laws were broken at all, at any time," Fleming said. "We were contacted by an area paper requesting payroll information and we released that to the area newspaper after they made a Freedom of Information Act request."

Anketell claims he suffered neck and shoulder injuries in a 2002 inmate attack that required two surgeries. He is now back to normal and Anketell said the campaign is about more than his injury.

Responding to allegations, Cousins released information regarding Anketell's injuries, Fleming said. "At no time was there ever any mention or discussion of anything having to do with Mr. Anketell's physical condition."

Fleming went on to say Anketell was given the option, after going out on leave, to come back to work.

"He was given the opportunity to come back to work under the light duty provision that exists at the Essex County Sheriff's Department," Fleming said. "Mr. Anketell chose, on his own accord, not to come back and to separate himself from the Essex County Sheriff's Department. That was Mr. Anketell's decision alone."

Anketell has a copy of "an agreement for voluntary participation in the light duty work program" that he signed along with union representative Lt. Jerry Enos and Superintendent Michael Marks on Sept. 29, 2003. Anketell said he was offered to participate in the program in a letter from the jail's director of human resources, Willie Smith, on Sept. 16, 2003.

Anketell said he only left the jail after his position was eliminated.

Anketell said his pif elected, wouldn't go as far as the information that was released about him. Instead, he woudl let people know the total amount of money being spent annually on workers' compensation payments.

Despite Anketell's complaints mailed to state officials on Monday, he says his injury is a distraction from his campaign.

"It's a distraction from the actual reason I am running for sheriff," he said.

One reason Anketell, whose campaign to unseat Cousins had been mostly quiet until last week, is running for office is that Cousins' budget went up by $6 million to more than $50 million, over the course of a year from 2008 to 2009, said Anketell. 

"The governor had to come in and stop the spending," he said, pointing to what's known as 9C cuts referring to the section of state law that allows the cuts to be made unilaterally by the governor.

However, Fleming said the budget was, in fact, cut by approximately $5 million. 

"The Essex County Sheriff's budget was cut approximately 12 to 15 percent over the last 18 months," Fleming said. "Sheriff Cousins has worked excruciatingly hard to make sure no one has been laid off. Sheriff Cousins is proud of the hard work all the employees have done to continue to maintain a nationally accredited facility."