April 8, 2008 - (Burlington
Free Press) - "Chief
deputy suspended during improper relationship probe" -
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Chief deputy suspended during improper
relationship probe
The Associated Press
April 8, 2008
NEWFANE — Windham County’s top sheriff’s deputy has been suspended while
the state police investigate charges she had an improper relationship
with a 17-year-old Brattleboro Union High School student, said Sheriff
Keith Clark.
Sheriff Capt. Heidi Nelson, 42, who teaches law enforcement classes and
serves as the school’s resource officer, was suspended on Friday with
pay.
“I think it’s vital to ensure that the student, the student’s family,
the career center, the members of the department, the public and Captain
Nelson can trust that I am doing everything possible to protect everyone
concerned as these investigations move forward, the facts are determined
and the truth of the situation becomes known,” Clark said during a
Monday news conference.
Clark was joined at the news conference by Brattleboro School
Superintendent Ron Stahley, and David Coughlin, the acting director of
the Windham Regional Career Center, which is based at the high school.
Efforts to reach Nelson on Tuesday were unsuccessful.
Neither Clark nor Stahley would say much about the alleged relationship,
whether it was a consensual, whether it was with a male or female
student or how it came to the attention of authorities.
Nelson, of Westminster, was a 17-year veteran of the Vermont State
Police before she left to run a private gym in Bellows Falls. She was
first hired by the sheriff’s department by former Sheriff Sheila Prue.
When Clark became sheriff last year he promoted Nelson to be his second
in command.
Clark asked the state police to investigate. Vermont State Police Col.
James Baker said an investigator from a different part of the state had
already been assigned to the Nelson case.
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