In many states, especially those that have large expanses of unincorporated lands which are county lands, not city lands, county sheriffs and their departments have an active role in law enforcement. While local law enforcement departments have their jurisdictions ending at the town line, the sheriff departments in those states patrol, pursue, and arrest more broadly.
Many of these places have big, masculine, compensation pick-up trucks, sheriffs who sport cowboy hats and a swagger to their walk, have an obvious presence around town, and can make raids on places scaring the bejeebus out of all those in attendance just to arrest one person or hopefully find someone in there to arrest.
These sheriffs are the old Western sheriffs come alive, but modified to meet the current era. They are many people’s idea of machismo in equipment, activity, and appearance.
In Massachusetts, by comparison, the sheriff’s job is to run a jail.
That’s it.
They do not routinely patrol, pursue, or arrest.
They maintain the jail and get inmates to and from court. All they need are vans, and cowboy hats just don’t fit in unless a sheriff wants to present an image the locals know is empty, and a little comical.
A sheriff in Massachusetts knows when taking the job that it is mainly an administrative post.
So, imagine what it must be like to attend sheriffs’ conventions and hear how tough and John Wayne-ish the sheriffs are in other places. You just know they must feel like the slight kid in a school locker room.
They can’t boast of high speed chases, gang raids, bar raids, dragnets, arresting the tough guy, or riding through rough terrain in macho trucks or community neighborhoods in cars and vans, so insecurity has to eat at them like a termite on wood.
I know of one such sheriff who wears his insecurity based jealous on his sleeve where it is more than obvious.
He wants to get in the big pick-up truck with the “guys”.
He talks tough about keeping the community safe from undocumented individuals although he really only deals with them if they have been arrested for some crime by local law enforcement. He wants to work with ICE and loves that he can be part of an action by an agency that has big boy pants. He avails himself of every opportunity to get to the White House to get into a picture with the president and talk about how tough his job is and how great he is at keeping people safe by being tough on crime.
A poor an example of his keeping the community safe was the time, while attending a local Festa, the largest Portuguese festa in the country, he was enjoying a glass of Mediera wine while in his uniform, standing in a shoulder to shoulder crowd with his gun hanging on his hip, and his ongoing example is how poorly he runs his jail so that whether they enter his facility with a bad attitude toward law enforcement and societies laws, they leave with one
He doesn’t seem to see the job he has as the job he should have, so he takes every opportunity to be seen on television and the local newspapers, and to be heard on the radio where he once substituted for a conservative radio host when he was on the county’s dime, so people can hear him talk tough.
He once bought a boat to patrol the shoreline, but was shot down by the Coast Guard which does not need his help, and once bought a mobile command center vehicle and was informed that those agencies that use them already had them.
He is like that kid who keeps running up to the bigger kids, jumping up and down pointing to himself and pleading to get included in whatever it is they are doing, only to be ignored.
But he has found at least one way to bolster his importance and toughness, even if it is only for his own self-esteem.
He signed a contract with ICE, so he can be part of its activities. With ICE he is not hampered by the laws of the state and can expand his duties. He can be seen being tough.
His mother told his older brother to let him play with the big kids, and now he has an excuse to strut and tell the other left out kids that he can play with the guys.
Trump delayed the secret ICE raids he had announced, and has announced that the secret raids will be taking place the day after Independence Day instead.
So July 5 is a big day for the Bristol County sheriff if the two cities in the county with their large immigrant populations are on the list. He has to be all excited and anticipating a sleepless Christmas Eve-like night knowing that if it happens, he can strut around at the next sheriffs’ gathering telling tales of his machismo.