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A Claiborne County Sheriff’s Office lieutenant, Ted Brindle, has resigned in lieu of termination after being investigated by the Peace Officer Standards and Training Commission. Brindle is accused of falsifying some training records.

Kevin Krieb with POST investigated the incident and presented his findings on April 17 to the state’s POST commission.

During his presentation, Krieb said he made an unannounced visit to the sheriff’s office and spoke with Brindle, who had missed the 2024 deadline to submit CCSO’s firearms roster and lesson plan, as well as his 2023 firearms roster.

“Lt. Brindle stated, ‘I don’t have my laptop with me. I keep my firearms and everything on my laptop,’” Krieb’s report said

Krieb said after another four days of asking for the records and multiple phone calls with Brindle, the lieutenant finally emailed the records, but something was off.

“It looked like the morning he submitted the document to me, it was altered and imported in,” the investigator said in his presentation. “There was a question of ‘was this just created that day?’”

From there, the audit turned into an investigation, Krieb said.

“I told Lt. Brindle that now was the time to inform us if he changed the documents,” the report said. “Lt. Brindle stated, ‘I didn’t have all my stuff saved. I couldn’t find it.’”

Brindle went on to apologize to Krieb, the investigative report said, but the fact he had submitted fake documents meant it was too late not to submit the report.

“He then went on to tell me he was sorry, and he thought he had the paper scores and roster,” the report said. “He said he caved to the internal pressure from his Chief Deputy. He then stated, ‘I am beyond embarrassed, and I am so sorry.’”

Krieb, during his presentation, said training had actually been completed and recorded on time. Brindle had just lost track of the documents.

“The sad part is, I was able to get the paper copies from Chief Deputy Hayes,” Krieb said, referring to Ron Hayes.

Hayes himself was at the presentation. He said the office had changed operations, putting someone else in charge of recording documentation. He told the POST commission that Brindle had been with the sheriff’s office for more than 20 years, and this was a surprise to him and the sheriff.

“The training duties were given to the person [who] we thought was competent to be able to handle it,” said Hayes.

Brindle resigned in lieu of termination. Hayes told the POST the department now has a designated officer who will oversee training duties.

POST members said there will be no action against the Claiborne County Sheriff’s Office. But the lieutenant will go to an informal hearing and could possibly be de-certified.