New sheriff in Clear Creek County after former sheriff retires amid Christian Glass scandal in Colorado
Matthew Harris stood in front of the Clear Creek County Commissioners Tuesday morning and accepted the responsibility and title of Clear Creek County Sheriff in front of his new staff and county leaders. He spoke directly about taking over for former Sheriff Rick Albers, whom he gave credit for a lifetime of service.
He also spoke plainly about the work needed to be done to bring Clear Creek County Sheriff's Office and its deputies into the modern age and to prevent incidents like that of the killing of Christian Glass about a year and a half ago.
"We need to serve the community; we need to serve them better and build those relationships and rebuild trust," Sheriff Matthew Harris said, after taking the oath of office.
Harris described himself as someone looking to increase transparency within the department, bringing 27 years of law enforcement history (most recently as assistant inspector general for investigation with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.) He was praised by the board of county commissioners as someone who makes data-driven decisions and has the intent to make serious changes within the office of the sheriff.
Some of that serious change was immediate, like the reliving of duties of the Undersheriff John Stein, who had just signed over the power of sheriff to Harris that same morning. Some of those promised changes are more ethereal and cultural, depending on what Harris finds with his employees, but he said he's not afraid of a challenge.
"You can either run away from your problems or you can face them head-on. This was a challenging situation, but it is something I look forward to, I've inherited challenging situations in the past. not as challenging as this, but that excites me and to be able to have an impact and leave a place better than you found it, that is my goal."
A huge factor in this whole change-up is the new way the sheriff's office will deal with the Glass family, still grieving the loss of their son at the hands of a former deputy, whose case is still running through the courts. Harris said it's time to set things right.
"(I'm) Going to meet his parents, absolutely, that is on the top of my list," Harris said. "We need to learn from mistakes, but not dwell on them, and make sure that our folks on patrol...our training is stronger, we are using best practices in law enforcement."
Part of that will be focused on de-escalation of calls coming into the sheriff's office. Harris explained some employees in law enforcement look at every call as a chance of attack.
"Traditional law enforcement, 30-40 years ago was like that, but we are seeing that change, seeing a lot of de-escalation training, a lot more they call it verbal judo, how to speak to people and how to better speak with people," Harris said. As for what happened that night almost a year and a half ago with Glass, he said he expects to see a clearer picture now that he has access to all the video and files, but that he can tell one thing already.
"Time is your friend, as far as that is concerned, from what I saw they ran out of patience," Harris said. "They decided to take action, unfortunately."
While his appointment can not be untangled from the current cloud that hangs over the sheriff's office in the wake of the shooting of Christian Glass, Harris has his sights on doing more than just atoning for past mistakes of the office.
"I don't want to spend my time dwelling on the past, I want to make sure some of that never happens again, we do that with training, with accountability, and professionalism, and that is how we get that done."
