Public Safety Nominee

Senators prepare to hear from Keel

Committee plans to hold confirmation hearings during week of May 19

By RICK BRUNDRETT - rbrundrett@thestate.com

Confirmation hearings for Gov. Mark Sanford’s nominee to lead the embattled Department of Public Safety likely will be held the week of May 19, the Senate Judiciary Committee chairman said Thursday.

Sen. Glenn McConnell, R-Charleston, directed staffers working with a special subcommittee investigating the department to present Mark Keel with issues he could be questioned about during the hearings.

“I want this to be a positive experience and help DPS,” McConnell said during a meeting of the five-member subcommittee. “I don’t want an ambush.”

McConnell said the confirmation hearings will be held before the full Judiciary committee and likely will take more than a day. The entire Senate has the final say on confirmation.

“This is the most important issue facing the people of South Carolina — public safety — that I’ve encountered even in my law enforcement career,” said Sen. Jake Knotts, R-Lexington, a subcommittee member and a former Columbia police officer.

Keel, who didn’t attend Thursday’s meeting, said afterward he was “ready to try to answer questions they have ready for me and look forward to the process.”

Sanford on April 16 nominated Keel — currently one of two assistant chiefs at the State Law Enforcement Division, where he has worked for nearly 29 years — to replace James Schweitzer, who was appointed in 2004.

Contacted Thursday, Sanford spokesman Joel Sawyer said the governor’s “expectation is that Major Keel will look at the agency top to bottom after he’s confirmed.”

But he added that Keel, who has never worked for the Department of Public Safety, might not be able to answer certain specific questions, “not having the benefit of having dug into the agency’s operations yet.”

On Feb. 29, Sanford ousted Schweitzer and Highway Patrol commander Col. Russell Roark, contending they should have fired a white trooper who used a racial slur while threatening to kill a fleeing black suspect during a 2004 Greenwood County traffic stop.

Since then, The State newspaper has obtained more than two dozen dashboard videos of incidents involving troopers — some of which raise questions about whether excessive force was used against motorists. Members of the Legislative Black Caucus have complained that some troopers accused of serious misconduct received light punishments.

SLED, the FBI, the U.S. attorney for South Carolina and the U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division are investigating whether the troopers committed any crimes.

During Thursday’s subcommittee meeting, Senate Judiciary attorney J.J. Gentry outlined department documents and trooper videos that staff members have reviewed in recent weeks. The State earlier obtained the same records under the S.C. Freedom of Information Act.

Sens. Knotts and Vincent Sheheen, D-Kershaw, raised a separate issue of whether troopers should be used as security at home and away college football games, or for other nontraffic purposes. Knotts pointed out the department used its own SWAT team during Sanford’s inauguration as governor.

“That’s not the scope of the Highway Patrol,” Knotts said. “Their duty is to patrol the highways and make the highways safe.”

Department of Public Safety spokesman Sid Gaulden said Thursday that troopers have been used at college football games for years, though he added, “You’re not talking about 10 guys protecting a coach.”

He also said Schweitzer disbanded the “sniper” squad after Knotts complained following the governor’s inauguration.

Reach Brundrett at (803) 771-8484.