A preference cascade to oust Charlotte's sheriff? (01-17-2025--Hour1)

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[00:00:28] All righty, so I saw the other day, and there were first off was the story and then came an editorial, both at the Charlotte Observer, about our old friend, Sheriff Gary, not my fault, McFadden of Mecklenburg County. And yes, I do recognize that I am here at a Crime Stoppers event, lot of law enforcement here. But I feel comfortable dragging the sheriff of Mecklenburg County once again.

[00:00:56] And now I feel like we may be approaching something that might resemble a preference cascade. A preference cascade. Remember that? It's like slowly at first and then very suddenly.

[00:01:08] It happens in business. It happens with fads. And it happens with political momentum. And I want to think, but I don't know, but I would like to think that there may be some momentum gathering to oust Mecklenburg County Sheriff Gary McFadden.

[00:01:27] So first, what's today, the 17th? So yeah, like less than a week ago, the Charlotte Observer did a very, very, very lengthy piece by Ryan Orley called Former Employees Allege Years of Abuse and Dysfunction Under Mecklenburg Sheriff McFadden.

[00:01:46] And this is not new. These allegations against McFadden are not new, at least not all of them. Some of them, I would say, are the first time I've seen some of these people. I think he did speak with others that have not heretofore gone public. But here's how the story starts.

[00:02:05] Former employees say Mecklenburg County Sheriff Gary McFadden emotionally abused and retaliated against them and put staff in danger at the jail through poor management. McFadden's former chief deputy, Kevin Canty, who I interviewed, you'll recall, before the Christmas break.

[00:02:27] Kevin Canty was in studio and he had written the resignation letter November 1st, accusing the sheriff McFadden of running the agency, quote, like a third world dictatorship.

[00:02:42] Other former employees reached by the Charlotte Observer shared similar assessments of McFadden, who was reelected in 2022 for a second term as sheriff and has been in local law enforcement for more than 40 years. Some of the descriptions that appear in this very, very, very lengthy piece. Let's see here. The biggest narcissist. I believe I called him that at one point, too.

[00:03:10] A coward. He thinks he's godlike, vindictive, paranoid, ego-driven as well. There are others. Those are just in the first half of the first page, and this thing is 10 pages long. So you get the idea of where this story is going. The people that they interviewed, I think they cited seven former employees.

[00:03:39] I think four went on the record. Yeah, four spoke on the record. Three asked not to be identified. Those three said that they were traumatized, concerned about further retaliation, or ready to move on from their time working for Sheriff Gary Not My Fault McFadden. He has blamed the state inspection process after supervision failures and deaths at the county jail.

[00:04:06] For years, he has publicly feuded with Immigration and Customs Enforcement over whether he has to cooperate with their requests to hold undocumented people in jail. In 2022, he opted to close the county's juvenile detention center, citing lack of staff, despite pleas from the state to keep it open. Now, always keep in mind with Gary McFadden, nothing is ever his fault.

[00:04:34] He deserves all the praise. He deserves all of the accolades. Anything good that the Mecklenburg Sheriff's Office accomplishes, it's because of Gary McFadden. Anything bad, that's somebody else's fault. A different picture emerges of McFadden after Kevin Canty's resignation letter, so says the Charlotte Observer. And on this, I would disagree.

[00:04:59] Because the picture of Gary McFadden, to me at least, and to a lot of others, has been very clear. All you have to do is watch him speak, listen to how he says what he says, and note how he never accepts responsibility for the authority that he has, for the control that he has, and for his lack of leadership skills. We have known this stuff for years.

[00:05:27] This is why he had two former employees run against him two years ago. Kevin Canty's resignation letter just put down into a printed form what we have all seen and heard. So it's not new. This picture of McFadden is not new. But I welcome everybody to join the preference cascade.

[00:05:53] So I applaud the Charlotte Observer for devoting this amount of time, resources, and effort to write this story and speak to all of these people and get them on the record. McFadden fired his new business director in November. We talked about this a couple months ago. She had been on the job just eight months. He hired her, and then eight months later, fired her.

[00:06:20] He did not explain his reasoning in firing Angelia Rigsby. Dr. Rigsby, I should say. And I say that because she did earn the title. But also, McFadden hates it. So I feel like I want to keep saying it. Dr. Rigsby. The first sign of tension came back in June.

[00:06:45] According to Rigsby, sorry, Dr. Rigsby, when she spoke to McFadden's wife, Kathy, at a sheriff's office women's conference. Okay? So picture the scene. Sheriff's office doing a women's conference. Rigsby is there being a woman and all. Kathy McFadden is there being another woman and all at a women's conference. And she's talking with her boss's wife.

[00:07:12] And McFadden's wife, according to Rigsby, McFadden's wife wanted to... Yeah, so McFadden's wife is talking to her. And Rigsby tells Kathy McFadden that she wanted to make her own mark after filling the shoes of the last business director, who had worked at the sheriff's office for decades. So this is a completely normal and appropriate thing to say. Like, wow, that person, they did, you know, 20, 30, 40 years, whatever it was. They were there for decades.

[00:07:41] And so now, you know, here I come. And maybe the conversation probably started something like, oh, you got big shoes to fill. Oh, she was there forever. And, oh, you're taking over. And how is that going? Right? Probably perfectly amicable exchange. And this is when Rigsby says, yes, you know, big shoes to fill or something. But I'm looking forward to making my own mark on this position. I want to see what I can do in this post.

[00:08:07] So McFadden's wife then offers to trade phone numbers and to mentor her on how to work with her husband. Let me give you my phone number. And so I'll tell you how to deal with Gary. No, no, no. I'm sure that's not what she said. Days later, the sheriff emails Rigsby.

[00:08:31] So at some point, Gary and his wife obviously talked about this conversation between Dr. Rigsby and McFadden's wife. And McFadden says, quote, It has come to my attention that you have some concerns regarding your current responsibilities and the responsibilities and tasks that were completed by the previous business manager. Like, what are you even talking about? Here's a great idea.

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[00:10:24] No, I mean, I got here, I was like, and I was sitting, I was in the line, and I couldn't get out of the line, and so I just pulled over, and I walked like half a mile up here. So you got to do what you got to do to get on the air, you know? The show never stops. All right, so the Charlotte Observer, big write-up on Sheriff Gary, not my fault, McFadden. And they told this story of Dr. Rigsby, who was his business manager at the sheriff's office,

[00:10:52] and she was hired by McFadden, and then eight months later, she gets fired, and she traces it to this conversation that she had had with McFadden's wife, where she said she was looking to make her own mark on filling the shoes of the previous business director. So obviously, Gary and his wife Kathy chat about this conversation, and Gary takes exception to it for some reason, probably because he's a terrible manager,

[00:11:22] and a raging narcissist, but he then sends off this email. Oh, and a micromanager as well. He sends off this email to his new hire, and he says, it's come to my attention that you have some concerns regarding your current responsibilities and the responsibilities and tasks that were completed by the previous business manager. He then says, come for a one-on-one meeting. Now, her supervisor, Kevin Canty, who was the chief deputy,

[00:11:51] who resigned and wrote that scathing letter that he then published for everybody, particularly the citizens of Mecklenburg County, to see what's been going on in their sheriff's office. So Canty should not join, said the sheriff. His chief deputy, her direct supervisor, was not invited to this one-on-one with the sheriff. Rigsby said, quote,

[00:12:19] I am not a crier, but I was in tears because he berated me, he belittled me, he insulted me. And that tracks. Yeah, that tracks from the stories I have heard. She said the sheriff mused that she might be interested only in the prestige of her new job, which is amazing considering, like, that's Sheriff McFadden. That's all him, too.

[00:12:48] That's what he's all about. He refers to himself in the third person, which is not a sign of a healthy mind, by the way, or a self-awareness that's healthy. So this is what bad managers do, though. They tear their employees down. They rule by fear and intimidation. They do that against their employees. And I speak from experience. No, not here at WBT. And no, not up in Asheville either. There was a job.

[00:13:18] I'm not going to say any more about it, but there was a job where the employers would berate the staff. And they did that in order to keep the staff believing that they were terrible. And so they would never go look for other work someplace else because the employers knew that they were severely underpaying their staff and abusing them by forcing them to work 70, 80 hours a week and six days a week minimum, that kind of stuff,

[00:13:46] not paying them correctly, getting them in trouble with the IRS, that kind of stuff. And so they didn't never want these employees to leave, as McFadden might call it, quote, the plantation. That's the word he has used. And so the plantation mentality. So you keep the employees scared and thinking that they aren't any good at their job. And so maybe if they could just get good enough, maybe then they would leave. And eventually somebody does leave.

[00:14:14] And when that one person leaves, then the preference cascade kicks in and everybody else is like, oh, wait a minute, I can do that too. And they leave. Several former employees have told the observer that they heard the sheriff make similar comments. He routinely tells people that they are not special or even competent and therefore cannot be trusted to do their jobs properly. To which I would ask, why are they still working there then, Sheriff? Why have you not fired incompetent staff?

[00:14:43] They shouldn't be on the payroll. You should fire them and hire competent staff. Kevin Canty, the now former chief deputy, remembered Sheriff Not My Fault McFadden becoming angry when employees called Dr. Rigsby Dr. Rigsby. McFadden apparently refused to use her honorific, calling her only Ms. Rigsby. Canty says, quote, quote,

[00:15:13] the guy's insecure. And Rigsby believes that her firing was retaliatory. Once again, I find it interesting that the man who demands, or the man who refers to himself as sheriff all the time in the third person doesn't want to use the term doctor to a person who actually earned her doctorate. So, but that is what raging malignant narcissists do. So it tracks. All right.

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[00:16:41] Conveniently located in Mint Hill, right off I-485, and online at createavideo.com. All right. So the Charlotte Observer does their very lengthy, very, very lengthy piece on Sheriff Gary, not my fault, McFadden. They talked to seven people, four on the record, three anonymously. And they kind of put together in one 10-page article here, well, when printed with 18-point font, Garamond,

[00:17:11] but when you print it out, it's like 10 pages. It's a very lengthy piece, all in one place. And then they follow that up, as they usually do, with an editorial. Right? When you do a big piece like this, you put out an editorial, because now the editor's like, oh my gosh, I can't believe this story exists. Yes, we just read about it in the paper. So like, what do we think about it? And then they write their editorial. And the headline on the editorial is that the Mecklenburg Sheriff

[00:17:40] is no longer fit for the role. Since Mecklenburg County Sheriff Gary McFadden took office in 2018, his office has been the subject of bad headlines, state investigations, and lawsuits that have raised serious questions about his ability to lead. Answers to those questions have emerged in a new report from the Charlotte Observer, in which former employees detail years of abuse and dysfunction at the sheriff's office,

[00:18:09] including poor management that has created unsafe conditions for staff and inmates alike. Among the allegations, McFadden is verbally cruel and vindictive, he engages in unfair finger-pointing, and he publicly criticizes detention officers in front of inmates, putting them in danger. The report, while damning and disturbing, is not shocking.

[00:18:38] It's an affirmation of what we already know, that the sheriff's office, and by extension the jail, has been plagued by dysfunction during McFadden's tenure. So I'm glad they're calling for his ouster. That's good. He's not fit for the role. And, well, I'll get to that part in a second. The next part they go over is that the dysfunction is about more than just working conditions.

[00:19:05] Deaths at the jail have doubled under McFadden. And the Observer reported last year that Mecklenburg County jails faced 11 out of 15 death investigations, or they failed, rather, 11 out of 15 death investigations that were conducted by the state since 2019. So that's under McFadden. 11 out of 15 death investigations. Our jail has failed.

[00:19:33] That's because the state is racist, by the way. According to McFadden, that's the reason why. The state is failing him, and the state is dinging them on all of these infractions and protocols and failures at the jail that the state is just cracking down on him because he's a black sheriff. And the state inspectors who are employed under Democrat governors

[00:20:02] are apparently all racist against him. Anyway, McFadden isn't just responsible for allowing those problems to fester. He is apparently the source of at least some of them. A fact he seems unwilling to admit. Well, of course he's not going to admit that, McClatchy editorial board. Why would he? His name is Gary Not My Fault McFadden. Why would he admit fault in something? McFadden's response

[00:20:32] has been to deflect blame. Oh yeah, that sounds like Gary. Okay. Later on, Observer says what is clear is that he is an awful manager. True. In a role that's critical to public safety. Also true. He's inappropriate with employees and he appears to wield his internal affairs division as a weapon against them. Morale is low. Staffers feel overworked

[00:21:01] and denigrated. The consequences? Top employees resigning, lawsuits that point fingers directly at him, and a poorly run jail where too many inmates die. They conclude this editorial, and I'm just giving you the highlights here, but they conclude by saying that calling on McFadden to resign is likely a fruitless ask given his habit of deflecting blame in the face of public scrutiny.

[00:21:31] Yes. Gary McFadden is not going to resign. That would indicate that there's some fault that he bears, and again, Gary, not my fault, McFadden, bears no blame for any of the problems that have been occurring under his now six years of leadership at the jail. It's all someone else's fault. It was the previous sheriff, it was the previous deputies, it was the current deputies, it's the state, it's the media, it's always somebody else that's stopping Gary from doing the things that

[00:22:02] the people elected him to do, and he is called by God. Remember, this is a man who equated himself to Jesus in an interview that he gave with WBT's Brett Jensen a couple months ago. If he has to be the sacrificial lamb, remember that? Like Jesus, that's what he said about himself. Still, it's become clear, according to the McClatchy editorial board, that he is unfit for the office

[00:22:32] he holds in a way that has placed both his employees and inmates at risk. It's a dereliction of the duty he promised voters he would fulfill. Now, what the observer does not maybe know, or at the very least does not communicate, is that there is in fact a way to remove a sheriff in the state Carolina. I have gone over this multiple times. Maybe they don't listen to the program, which is so very hurtful, but that's

[00:23:01] possible. People have things to do. I understand they could get the podcast, though, but they probably haven't heard the show where I have gone over the state law. So if anybody listening knows anybody at the Charlotte Observer, maybe you could forward this along to them. It is state law 128-16. 128-16. And the title of this article to

[00:23:31] law is officers subject to removal.

[00:24:05] removal. chief judge of the Superior Court. There is a way to do it. For what? All right, if you're listening to this show, you know I try to keep up with all sorts of current events, and I know you do too, and you've probably heard me say, get your news from multiple sources. Why? Well, because it's how you detect media bias, which is why I've been so impressed with Ground News. It's an app, and it's a website, and it combines news from around the world in one place, so you can compare coverage and verify information. You can

[00:24:35] check it out at check.ground.news slash Pete. I put the link in the podcast description too. I started using Ground News a few months ago, and more recently chose to work with them as an affiliate because it lets me see clearly how stories get covered and by whom. The Blind Spot feature shows you which stories get ignored by the left and the right. See for yourself, check.ground.news slash Pete. Subscribe through that link, and you'll get 15% off any subscription.

[00:25:05] I use the Vantage plan to get unlimited access to every feature. Your subscription then not only helps my podcast, but it also supports Ground News as they make the media landscape more transparent. All right, that'll do it for this episode. Thank you so much for listening. I could not do the show without your support and the support of the businesses that advertise on the podcast. So if you'd like, please support them too and tell them you heard it here. You can also become a patron at my Patreon page or go to thepcalendorshow.com. Again, thank you so much for listening

[00:25:35] and don't break anything while I'm gone.