The Sheriff’s Department is so big that Lake Worth is a number and those who answer the phones are too.
On Friday, a Director of my Condo and I physically went down to the Sheriff’s office in Lake Worth and went into the building. We wanted to make sure that we talked to someone in person who could advise us correctly regarding something that we felt was of extreme importance. The Clerk behind the bullet plate glass said that there were no deputies in the building. She asked that we explain to her what we wanted a Deputy for and if she considered it worthy, we could proceed further. That is not what she said, only our interpretation of the tone. When I asked where they were, she said, “on the road and it would take about 15 minutes before one could be called back to the building.” She must have liked our reasons as we were instructed to use the phone in the lobby to speak further to someone. We made the call. The person on the other end decided it was worthy, and called for a deputy to meet with us.
And sure enough, after a 15 minute wait, in walked Deputy Guzman. He then took our information and looked up the case in the computer. About ten minutes later he came back and told us that since there was a pending law suit with the City of Lake Worth by the convicted offender, there was nothing we could do. We just did not understand the reasoning behind this but told him that it was our understanding that the law suit had been dropped as of last month. I recall Karns mentioning this during his Attorney Report at a City Commission meeting. Also, the convicted offender admitted it to me. He then said that they would check with city attorney Karns and get him to forward the paperwork, notifying the Sheriff’s Office and that someone would be calling us. In about ten minutes and as we were pulling up into our parking lot, a Lt. Moss called and gave us instructions as to what to do if this person came around.
Today, following those instructions, we called the local number and were routed off to the Sheriff’s office somewhere and got connected with Badge number 7011. He would not give his name when asked. He told our director that there was nothing we could do. Our Director accused him of being a “road block” and stated that “we have rights too.” It seems, once again, the right hand does not know what the left is doing, but it is the weekend.
Tomorrow we will start the process all over again.
