Alpena County Sheriff’s Office

News Release
Date

Title

On June 24th, I, along with the Chairman of the Personnel Committee and the County’s Executive Manager, met with
former Undersheriff Terry King and his attorneys. The meeting was a result of King’s numerous concerning actions that
prompted a formal investigation.

A FOIA request was made yesterday by True North Radio for the Letter that was provided to Terry King and a copy was
provided to True North redacted pursuant to Section 1A which involves information of a personal nature if public disclosure
of the information would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of an individual’s privacy and Section 1B which involves
investigating records compiled for law enforcement purposes.

It has always been a practice of my Office to be transparent to the public as well as to protect the privacy of personnel
records of law enforcement agencies. I have to weigh the public interest in disclosure and the public interest in
non-disclosure in every instance before I can invoke the FOIA exception in 1(s), but Terry King's press release regarding
his view of the reasons he is no longer the Undersheriff made the public’s interest in knowing the contents of the letter
stronger than the interests in withholding that document and it was released in redacted form. I am releasing the same
copy of the letter that was provided to True North to others so all will have the correct information at the same time.
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A CHIG
L ALPENA COUNTY SHERIFF’S OFFICE
Sheriff Steven J. Kieliszewski • Undersheriff Terry W. King
320 Johnson Street • Alpena, Michigan 49707
Phone: (989) 354-9830 • Fax: (989) 354-9867
June 24, 2019

Undersheriff Terry W. King

Alpena County Sheriffs Office
320 Johnson Street
Alpena, Ml 49707

RE: Job Performance

Terry,

On January 1st, 2005, 1 appointed you as my undersheriff pursuant to MCL 51.71 and you hold that
position "during the pleasure of such sheriff." The position of Undersheriff is critical to the operation of
the Alpena County Sheriffs Office and you are an at will employee of Alpena County and the Alpena
County Sheriff. We have had a number of meetings over the last year and one half where I have
expressed my concern regarding the manner in which you are carrying out your duties as Undersheriff
and your ability to accurately report your actions and your judgement.

You wrote a letter to on June 5th, 2018 about a local business who places court ordered
tethers on individuals. In that letter you write, "A couple of the individuals whom ( sic ) have come back
to jail on other violations, have stated that the common knowledge between the inmate population that
charges a bit more than the Sheriffs Office, but they are not being monitored under
, as no violations are occurring and they are not being notified by anyone for violations, and
no perimeters are being set. One inmate has stated that he has on several occasions put tin foil around
his tether from and drove down state to pick up drugs, and he was not violated, and
nobody contacted him for any violations that may have occurred." When I spoke with you regarding
this, I asked you if you, personally, spoke with these inmates. You informed me that you had not. I
asked you where you got your information from, you informed me, . works for
the competitor of . Because of your actions, I received a letter from the attorney
representing and had to write a letter of apology to the owner. Your comments in your
letter placed the county in a liable situation and my letter of apology prevented any litigation against the
county.

In November of 2018 a snowstorm hit the Alpena Area and you informed me that you were with the
dispatchers at central dispatch monitoring the radio traffic because of the number of crashes that were
taking place. It was at that time that you heard talk on the radio to where he
let know the location of a county plow truck. You knew that wasn't certified as a
police officer and shouldn't have the radio in his vehicle. You informed me that you then went into the
911 Director's office and told him that the radio had to be removed. I spoke with about this and his
recollection about this does not match yours.

On December 28, 2018, 1 told you that I had chosen to fill the vacant sergeant's
position at the Office. It was at this time that you informed me about an anonymous person stopping by
your house and informing you that was telling state troopers to arrest you for drunk driving. I did
Letter to Undersheriff King
June 24th, 2019
Page 2

an extensive investigation into this and found the allegations to be without merit. While you completed
a report for me explaining your side of things, to this day, that report did not fully support your actions
and position.

A further major incident concerns your involvement in the Ella White School Complaint. On March 23,
2018, 1 spoke with you in my office regarding allegations that were made against you about the Ella
White School complaint. I told you that you were being accused of sending a text to
advising him that should not take a polygraph as requested by APD. I told you that, if the
allegations were true, it would be a very serious matter to me, and I would terminate your employment
with the Sheriffs Office. You told me that you wouldn't blame me for doing so, that if you were in the
same position that I was, you would do the same thing. You denied sending a text to with that
message in it.

On March 11th, 2019, 1 met with Alpena City Police Chief, Joel Jett, who informed me that they had done
an interview with an employee at the office who had a conversation with
. According to Chief Jett, was in the office placing tethers on individuals who were
either on . During the conversation, had been talking about the Ella White
School incident and how , was involved. was making derogatory comments about
APD's investigation into the matter and how they wanted to take a polygraph, but "TK" told
them not to. The employee asked him who "TK" was and stated, "Terry King."

On March 26, 2019 I reviewed the video of the

interview and found this information to be most concerning and knew that an internal investigation
needed to be completed regarding your actions and placed you on paid administrative leave on April 5,
2019 pending the outcome of that investigation. This investigation also included your handling of duties
involving the Alpena CRTC Security Contract and employee background investigations.

A review of the base security invoices showed that during the years of 2014, 2015, and 2016 your name
was listed on several occasions where you charged the state for administrative duties while still
employed with the Sheriffs Office. Those charges were for 8-hour days some of which were for a week
at a time. I also noticed that charges to the state were also made while you were off on PTO at the
.
Sheriff' s Office Concerned about this, I informed the State of Michigan on June 5th, 2019 of these
.
charges. The State is now looking into the legality of this

On June 5th, 2019, the Michigan Commission on Law Enforcement Standards ( MCOLES) conducted an
audit of our background investigations and, while improvements can be made, they found no,
significant, violations.

As the Undersheriff you represent me to the public and I need to have absolute faith in your judgement
.
at all times The incidents described in this letter may not rise to the level of misconduct, but do not
reflect the public image of the Alpena County Sheriffs Office that is necessary for the Office to carry out
its functions and raise serious issues with your judgment. As a result, I have reached the
Letter to Undersheriff King
June 24th, 2019
Page 3

conclusion that I no longer believe that you can be trusted to carry out the duties of Undersheriff in the
manner that I consider appropriate and have determined that your service as Alpena County
Undersheriff will end on June 24, 2019. While there may be some arguments that can be made that
would potentially cast your actions in a better light, the fact of the matter is that my decision is not
based on any one incident but rather a general lack of trust in your judgment that has been growing
over the last year and a half. On June 20th, 2019, 1 met with the Alpena County Personnel Committee
and Alpena County Executive Manager where I presented information regarding
your performance to them and advised them that I believed termination of your at- will employment was
appropriate. Although that decision is mine to make, the Personnel Committee supported my decision
regarding termination of your employment with the County of Alpena.

As previously indicated, I no longer have faith in your decision-making ability and am no longer willing to
allow you to act as Alpena County Undersheriff. As a long term employee of the Alpena County Sheriff's
Office, I am willing to allow you to voluntarily resign from the Office in lieu of discharge, but if your
resignation is not received by the close of business today your employment with Alpena County is
terminated as of 5:00 pm today. Please make arrangements to promptly return all Office issued
equipment and badges.

By Order of;

Steven J. Kieliszewski
Sheriff

Cc: File