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Warden returns to Cuyahoga County Jail after 20-year absence
The new warden hired in August to help oversee the Cuyahoga County Jail has not worked in corrections in over 20 years.
Alfred Wilcox joined the jail staff to share warden responsibilities with Michelle Henry. Both wardens report directly to acting chief of corrections, Nestor Rivera, according to a county spokesperson. Wilcox’s yearly salary is almost $147,000.
Cuyahoga County Executive Chris Ronayne approved Wilcox’s hiring without his communications office issuing a public announcement, a practice commonly used under past administrations. Ronayne’s staff also took several weeks to provide Wilcox’s work history and resume after the records were requested by The Marshall Project - Cleveland.
During the hiring process, Wilcox was not required to submit an application, a county spokesperson said. Instead, he provided the county with his resume.
The resume shows Wilcox began working at the jail in 1981 as a corrections officer and rose to the rank of associate warden before leaving in 2002. He spent the past 22 years serving as a part-time police officer, and in security roles at area schools and federal courthouses.
Wilcox worked as a special deputy with U.S. marshals, providing security at federal courthouses in Cleveland. He also worked as a part-time police officer for Cleveland State University and the Regional Transit Authority from 2003-2014. His resume also lists a two-year stint as the head of security for the Cleveland Metropolitan School District.
Personnel records from his previous tenure at the jail are no longer available due to the county’s retention policies. The county was able to provide his past salary sheet history, which helped fill some gaps in his resume.
Wilcox replaces Jeremy Everett, who was forced to resign a year ago, six weeks after he was hired. Sheriff Harold Pretel has never explained his decision to force Everett out.
– Brittany Hailer and Mark Puente
State also finds private attorneys lacked qualifications to take serious cases in Cuyahoga County Juvenile Court
The Marshall Project - Cleveland has spent this year digging into questions about the Cuyahoga County Juvenile Court’s system of assigning private practice attorneys for children accused of crimes and unable to pay for their own defense.
We’ve looked at how the court’s process for selecting private attorneys appears to ignore state and local rules, with a handful of favored lawyers getting assigned to the majority of cases. We also examined how often the court failed to ensure attorneys met state qualifications required to be paid for the work.
Juvenile court officials have pushed back on the state rules for reimbursement, but also have steadily increased case assignments to the county public defender’s office.
Earlier this month, the Ohio Public Defender’s Commission, which oversees the process across the state, signaled that the issues and compliance concerns raised in Cuyahoga County might prompt a statewide review of the rules.
At the commission meeting in Columbus, Ohio, Public Defender Elizabeth Miller said her staff found 30 open cases involving children accused of crimes were assigned to 14 private attorneys who still lacked state qualifications. The court will contact attorneys who lack qualifications and won’t seek state reimbursement for assignments to unqualified defense counsel, absorbing the cost instead, Judge Nicholas Celebrezze told the commission.
The state review also found 32 recent cases where judges approved payments to private attorneys who didn’t meet state qualifications to defend children facing a transfer to adult court, a process known as bindover.
Miller said Cuyahoga County's failures made it an outlier. Franklin, Montgomery, Hamilton and Lorain counties do in-depth reviews of attorney qualifications and require proof of compliance. Cuyahoga County only began reviewing qualifications earlier this year, Miller said.
– Rachel Dissell and Doug Livingston
Federal monitors fail to publicly post bill for police reforms
The Washington, D.C., law firm being paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to help reform the Cleveland Division of Police admitted it failed to publicly share details of a recent invoice.
The failure comes after the Hogan Lovells law firm told The Marshall Project - Cleveland in March that it would post invoices online “within 15 business days upon receiving payment.”
It didn’t post a recent payment until The Marshall Project - Cleveland inquired.
“Thank you for pointing out our failure to post one of our invoices,” spokesperson Ritchenya Dodd wrote in a late August statement. “We went back and reviewed and, indeed, January had not yet been posted. With thanks to your diligence, we have now uploaded January to our website.”
The firm posts its invoices online for the public to review.
The firm also remains months behind in sending invoices to the city, federal court records show. U.S. District Judge Solomon Oliver Jr. — the federal court judge overseeing the consent decree — approved the firm’s request last month for $130,271 for services performed in February, records show. The firm has yet to post that invoice on its website.
The consent decree between the City of Cleveland and the U.S. Department of Justice was reached in 2015 to create a blueprint to repair community relationships and overhaul the use of force by officers.
– Mark Puente
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Around the 216
- Dwayne Browder, who was imprisoned for nearly 35 years, is suing the City of Cleveland in federal court alleging police officers withheld evidence that led to him being wrongfully convicted. Ideastream
- Portage County Sheriff Bruce Zuchowski, whose social media commentary on immigration and Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential bid sparked nationwide outrage, says his posts have been “a little misinterpreted.” WKYC 3News
- An Ohio Supreme Court task force examining how to help people after their release from prison or jail issued its final report with multiple recommendations, including expanding reentry courts and other services. The Ohio Newsroom
