Corrupt sheriff's office won't fix itself
Hello Gov. DeWine: Don't let the new AG keep it secret any longer. Todd Corbin should resign, or be forced out
NORWALK — In hindsight, voters should have known Todd Corbin was not ready to be sheriff. His personnel file is riddled with disciplinary reports from when he was a deputy, before he was elected, citing his many failures.
A certified, genuine war hero, Corbin was a standout as deputy for all the wrong reasons. In one instance, he failed to file a report or followup to connect a victim with a detective, leading to her rapist never being questioned or ever being brought to justice, according to one disciplinary report. As a supervisor, Corbin also failed to require deputies to file crime reports properly, according to another disciplinary record from back then.
Corbin, at the time and since, has claimed those reports were political, from his opponents. But his time since, as sheriff, bears out the warnings of those early documented instances of dangerous incompetence. My reporting since 2022 about Sheriff Corbin shows numerous instances in which records about other botched investigations—murders, rapes, suicides, drug investigations, and internal investigations—are missing, lost, destroyed, misplaced or otherwise unavailable.
Sheriff’s office personnel don’t have the skillsets needed to secure a crime scene, collect evidence, interview witnesses or safeguards for accurate documentation, reporting and record keeping, based on their histories of failures to meet basic standards of accountability. Corbin, and Huron County Prosecutor Jim Sitterly, over the years, have been oblivious to violations of the state’s Public Records Act and the Ohio Revised Code. The lack of professionalism in county offices feeds on itself.
For Amanda Dean, and for Katelynn Shepard, the consequences proved deadly.
In the beginning
