Lloyd makes no apologies

If Reggie Lloyd's management style is brusque, the SLED director makes no bones about it.

"I didn't come over (to the State Law Enforcement Division) to baby-sit a bunch of people just so they can sit on the tax rolls and I have something to do every morning," he said.

On Friday, Lloyd broke four days of silence to The Post and Courier following the newspaper's repeated requests for an interview. Lloyd maintained he did not intend to be intimidating or defensive in how he treated a reporter during a Monday request for detailed budget information. The bottom line is that the reporter simply didn't know what to ask for, he said.

The newspaper requested detailed budget records under the state's open-records law that show specifically how taxpayer money has been used. The S.C. Press Association said last week that the information should be readily available to the public without a formal request.

Lloyd spoke Friday night in an even, if sometimes impassioned, tone in contrast to the Monday interview that quickly became combative. At one point in that interview, which was recorded for accuracy, he asks the reporter to give examples of the financial details she is looking for, then abruptly talks over her.

"Here's where I think we're missing each other," he said Friday, describing how unit-by-unit spending details aren't part of the SLED budget. "Expenditures and the budget are different things."

The newspaper has since filed several subsequent Freedom of Information Act requests for itemized expenditures and other specific documents.

The Monday interview launched a week of controversy exacerbated by a Tuesday news release approved by Lloyd that said in part: "SLED will not tolerate blatant lies and other disparaging remarks."

Lloyd on Friday said he considered the newspaper's reporting on efforts to get the information "a personal attack."

On Friday, he did not directly respond to concerns over his behavior during the interview Monday that has been characterized by state Sen. Dave Thomas, R-Fountain Inn, as seeming to be an "emotional blowup."

Lloyd said he took over as director to improve the crime-fighting efficiency of an agency operating with antiquated computer equipment and whose performance lags behind its counterparts in neighboring states. "We've taken enough slings and arrows about that," he said.

For instance, he said, when he was the U.S. attorney for South Carolina, his staff told him SLED didn't aggressively pursue white-collar crimes and narcotics rings. "Our own guys were telling us (SLED) had pretty much gotten out of the narcotics (investigation) business," he said "We need to take a step forward as an agency."

In the Monday interview, Lloyd called the agency's past budgeting process "a joke." But the prior SLED chief, Robert Stewart, said that when public dollars are involved, "every penny of it has to be recorded," and he said that's what he did.

SLED before Lloyd

Stewart ran the agency for 20 years until his retirement in November 2007. Gov. Mark Sanford appointed Lloyd in 2008 to take over. Reached by phone Saturday, Stewart highlighted achievements under his tenure.

The agency was continually accredited by the Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies since the early 1990s, Stewart said. To earn that designation, SLED was subject to a rigorous independent examination of its policies and procedures every three years by its law enforcement peers nationwide. Stewart said it was a "very high honor" to be recognized by the commission as a flagship agency at the end of his tenure.

The SLED Forensic Laboratory also was accredited under his watch, earning the same designation as the FBI laboratory in Virginia, Stewart said.

Another important ranking came from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which had placed SLED in the top 5 percent of law enforcement agencies in the nation at the end of Stewart's time in charge, he said. Stewart also highlighted an award from the International Association of Chiefs of Police, favorable responses from South Carolina law enforcement agencies on annual SLED surveys and regular clean audit reports.

"Anybody new coming in would normally make some changes. I did," Stewart said. "(Former SLED) Chief J.P. Strom did a great job, and I tried to build on that. Fortunately, a number of good people gave many years serving at SLED with positive results while I was chief."

Stewart pointed toward several computer-based crime-fighting tools instituted by SLED under his leadership, although Stewart noted that computer technology constantly changes and a system needs regular upgrades and replacements.

Under Stewart, SLED developed a terrorism response center with federal grant money that also helps mine data from across the state and nation to help solve crimes. That technology helped catch Jerry "Buck" Inman in Tennessee after he raped and strangled a Clemson University student in May 2006.

Stewart also said the agency always has been active in pursuing white-collar crime. One example was the case that SLED agents under Stewart helped build against former state Treasurer Thomas Ravenel for his cocaine habit, Stewart said.

Narcotics enforcement is at the core of a lot of crimes, Stewart said. While enforcement of drug laws varied from one budget year to the next, Stewart said his agents were stationed in several counties to prosecute cases, and the agency worked closely with local law enforcement and the federal grand jury.

'Pull back the covers'

When Lloyd took over, he brought in his own set of managers, who didn't have SLED experience, and he shook up an experienced staff.

"I brought in my team to go forward. What place would you go into and not bring your own team?" he said.

His deputy director, Neal Dolan, has local and federal law enforcement experience and was a Secret Service special agent in charge of South Carolina.

His assistant director, Tim James, hired when he was a hospital security chief, was a Lexington County deputy sheriff and has been to the FBI's national training academy.

"How are those credentials any more questionable than our own guys? Are (people) disgruntled about it? Are they unhappy about it? I'm sure they are. But that doesn't change the reality," Lloyd said. "People sniped because we changed the way we did business."

Lloyd carries a gun without being a certified law enforcement officer, but he said the gun makes sense "by virtue of my position" and that he completed a Class 3 firearms qualification.

Thomas, the Greenville-area senator, said Friday a Senate committee might delve into SLED's expenditures, and a Legislative Audit Council audit might make sense if the agency is unable to produce budget documents because its computers and accounting aren't up to the task. Lloyd said he has nothing to hide.

"I'm willing to pull back the covers and sheets on our agency," Lloyd said.

"I'll go them one better," he said. Lloyd said he's already considering having audits conducted by the Southern Police Institute, a private accounting firm, or the FBI's national training academy.

"There's no effort to hide anything."

Reach Bo Petersen at bpetersen@postandcourier.com or 937-5744. Reach Yvonne Wenger at 803-799-9051 or ywenger@postandcourier.com.