SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - The Latest on an investigation into allegations at a rural Utah jail (all times local):
2:45 p.m.
Officials in a rural Utah county are defending a sheriff who resigned Sunday as state officials investigate whether inmates were mistreated at the county jail.
The Daggett County Sheriff’s Office said Monday afternoon that Jerry Jorgensen stepped down because he believed a new sheriff would be “a clean break” for the county. Officials say Jorgensen asked for a state investigation after recognizing allegations of mistreatment were serious.
State and local officials have not described the nature of the allegations. Sheriff’s spokeswoman Susie Potter says the initial allegations that the sheriff learned of in January did not involve drugs or sex and inmates were not believed to be in danger. Potter says she does not know what additional allegations state investigators have learned.
She says county officials will pick an interim sheriff Tuesday.
Jorgensen could not be reached for comment.
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9:25 a.m.
The sheriff of a rural Utah county jail under investigation for allegations mistreating inmates has resigned.
Daggett County Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Susie Potter said in a statement Monday that Jerry Jorgensen resigned Sunday after six years as sheriff.
The move comes a week after two jail employees were fired and a jail commander resigned.
When asked if Jorgensen resigned because of the investigation, Potter said, “not specifically” and declined to comment further until speaking with the county’s attorney.
Jorgensen could not be reached for comment.
Utah’s Corrections Department has turned over its investigation into “serious, criminal allegations” of inmate mistreatment at the jail to the state Attorney General’s Office, which is reviewing the findings and considering criminal charges.
The state also transferred 80 inmates from Daggett County to other locations.
Officials have declined to release details about the allegations.
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