JUSTIVE SERVED WITH JIMMY RICHARDSON (15th Circuit Solicitor) 4/27/26

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Justice served with Jimmy Richardson, the 15th Circuit Court Solicitor on the Liz Halloway show with Nick Summer on Talk 94.5.

SPEAKER_00 0:11

Here he is, the 15th Circuit Solicitor, Jimmy Richardson. You know, I spent um a full day being super angry yesterday about that dog fighting ring. Oh my gosh, getting busted up. Well, the good news You tried to you try to calm me down a little.

SPEAKER_01 0:27

Yeah. The good news is um she called you? Uh no, we were texting. I'm sorry. She does that to me too. Yeah. I I was laughing, yeah, when uh when Nick was saying you get a uh text message saying, Hey, uh I'm back in town.

SPEAKER_00 0:45

Yeah, I was away for the weekend. It was like this long, but essentially that's what it's at. It's colorful.

SPEAKER_01 0:51

But um, all right, so we had this a few years ago, and you you don't get it very often, but uh uh because a lot of times when you see dog fighting, it's um you know just on a real local level. But they are um clubs and groups that really organize this stuff.

SPEAKER_00 1:13

I found them some of them on Facebook.

SPEAKER_01 1:15

It's Twitter, I mean Twitter, TikTok, and and see, and what Liz was sharing with me, um but you you'll see, and and we kind of corresponded a little bit. The last time we had one of these, what you'll see is they will say, Look, we are not raising bulldogs to fight other bulldogs. We are raising bulldogs to fight hogs.

SPEAKER_00 1:40

Right. And they can show them hanging from the rope with by their teeth, and they're showing them how strong they are, and they're like, they're gonna get those hogs. Wink wink.

SPEAKER_01 1:49

Yeah, air quote hogs. Yeah, right. Yeah. So um that's always that's one of those things that's built into the law. I don't know why, and I know there's um there's gotta be a reason, but um with that big big thing out there, it is fine for you to release these dogs on um wild hogs, but it is not fine to release them on other dogs.

SPEAKER_02 2:16

Right.

SPEAKER_01 2:16

So as soon as the police go in and do a a fairly good job of an investigation, if they don't go a step deeper, that's their excuse, is I am training them, and and when you say training them, they've got um uh you know a whole gym set up for dogs with treadmills and all of that and and water therapy and everything else to make these dogs stronger and stronger and stronger.

SPEAKER_00 2:42

And they sell them.

SPEAKER_01 2:43

And they sell them and they sell them for a lot of money, and then um, you know, the the next guy, I guess, is proud to have a a three-time champion, you know, uh dog fighter, but they they always sell them as this is gonna be for um pig fighting or or whatever. Yeah. Uh that sort of sport. So that's what we're gonna have to deal with. And when we dig into it and see, you know, how much it doesn't seem hard.

SPEAKER_00 3:11

Uh just correct me if I'm wrong. It doesn't seem hard to figure out if there's a dog fighting ring out going on, is it? If there is a good investigation, where are these happening in your experience?

SPEAKER_01 3:24

Yeah, usually in less rural areas out toward Aynor or Green Sea or somewhere like that.

SPEAKER_00 3:30

Like in a barn or like mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_01 3:32

In a barn, yep. And it's uh really um what are the telltale signs that someone can drop a dime? Um you'll see a lot of cars. There'll be an event with a lot of people there. Um then inside of the a little assembly that's been put together, there will be, you know, stands for people to to sit in and all of that. Um, you know, having a bunch of people show up um in a field uh with you know a lot of cars, neighbors.

SPEAKER_00 4:04

Has there ever been a raid when one is actually happening?

SPEAKER_01 4:07

Yeah, and usually um those are obviously the best cases. If you could get somebody on the inside and and get video of it, um that takes away all of that other stuff. But uh most of the time you're gonna have like these really, really good people that um I say really smart people that are into the business, they will have a whole website and then they'll come at you and say, Look, we're doing this. Um we've never advertised for dog fighting, you know. Um think of it, you know, back in the day when we had synthetic marijuana and they said this is bath salts. Now, why you would ever want to get in a tub with something to make you smell like cat pee, I I don't know. But that was the bath salt thing. Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_00 4:58

You know, and so I always wondered what that reference was. Yeah, because I have bath salts.

SPEAKER_01 5:02

Yeah, but these are these are bath salts that you know get you high and you you uh ingest them and it just smells horribly. But um they would say, Well, look, we put it on the bottle. Please don't light this up under a torch and smoke it. Uh don't do that. Uh it could cause uh lung damage. And you know that's what's going on. It's the same type of trickery. It's like, I didn't know, you know, we were we're selling this stuff, and um, you know, like um you you see it a good bit with all of these drugs that that they come up with. But it it's the same thing.

SPEAKER_00 5:42

And and these dogs can't be re-rehabilitated uh in many cases. Oh my gracious, they're so vicious.

SPEAKER_01 5:48

If you are unfortunate enough to go to the pound, I don't even think they'll sell them, but you get one of these dogs. If they slip through, but normally they don't normally they don't make it through.

SPEAKER_00 5:59

But I always, you know, I always hear of dogs mauling people and children. It's har horrible. But it never seems to happen at these dog fighting rings, and these are the most vicious dogs ever. These these people that run these things are awful human beings. I mean, they just are. So um I it's okay, moving on, because I don't want to take a bully time. What are some of the things you wanted to talk about today?

SPEAKER_01 6:23

Liz is getting madder and madder.

SPEAKER_00 6:25

I know, I start to get I know. I was on my way to the doctor too, and I was like, Oh, I was afraid she was gonna take my blood pressure. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:32

Oh gosh. Yeah. Um, well, we had um we just got out of court. We're not in court this week, we'll but we'll be back, and we had quite a few. Um this thing, Liz, uh, if if anybody ever wants, it's the 15th Judicial Circuit Solicitor's Office, and it's on Facebook. But that's how I keep track of you. Yeah, but last month um we and it grows exponentially, but um last month we had like two million views. That's way more than you know there would be people in Ory County. Wow. But um the funniest uh, and some of them are really ugly comments, but um, I've really rattled a bunch of people. The funniest one I saw is um somebody had put Jimmy's around here passing out um tens and twenties like he's at a strip club.

SPEAKER_00 7:27

10 and 20 years is what's so funny.

SPEAKER_01 7:31

But um, but like uh this this uh young man, 22, uh Diaz, Alejandro Diaz, he got um 15 years, it looks like uh yeah, for a home invasion. He had several other people with him. They went in, and when you read the article, all they stole was a little bit of money, some jewelry, some clothing. It's crazy what they're into and give the rest of their life for. But um now, you know, he's 22. He's gonna be uh almost 40 when he gets out of jail. So hopefully some of those other co-defendants, um, because now this young man was born in Conway and um and been around here, but some of the other ones have been deported. Um, so um, you know, some of them were illegals that were as part of that.

SPEAKER_00 8:22

When they were released on board um on bond, they get deported.

SPEAKER_01 8:26

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 8:27

And then how do they get held accountable for what they did here?

SPEAKER_01 8:31

They won't. So what we have to do is if it's uh Diaz or one of the main players, they will let us know. Like I got a call, I get a call about every week, but I've got this guy in Atlanta, here are the charges. Uh we're we're trying to deport him. Do you want him back? And if it's something like um rape, of course we want him back. Don't send him or I can never go forward with this case. If this was Diaz with home invasion, but he's not um illegal.

SPEAKER_02 9:02

Right.

SPEAKER_01 9:02

But um if it was him, I would say, yeah, don't send him. But if it's um a property crime thing, or if it's um something with without a victim, then we may very well say, yeah, get him deported um to keep us because not only do they deport them, but they also hold discharge over their head if they were to try to come back into the country there immediately.

SPEAKER_03 9:25

We get that question a lot on the budget blinds text line. Is that if you work with ICE or agents thereof that in that vicinity of people that do those types of things, when you arrest somebody and you find out they aren't illegal, what steps do you take? And you just answer that question.

SPEAKER_01 9:38

Well, the default is to deport them. Um but we can um and we have at times reached in and said, Look, um, break that whole default thing. I need this guy back um because I really got plans for his next 30 or 40 years. Don't um don't send him away. And so, you know, a lot of people would say send him anyway, but those lot of people aren't the victims um that are trying to put and they deserve justice too. Now, if it's again, if it's a property crime or something, and the worst penalty could be just get out of our country and never come back um I'm down with that. But I can't do that if it's been a murder or if it's been a rape or something like that.

SPEAKER_00 10:22

I have I have a question to ask you before we run out of time. We're speaking with 15 Circus solicitor Jimmy Richardson. If you have a question or comment on the budget blinds text line, 843-798-8255. I was wondering, um, there's been a lot of talk about combining the Sheriff's Department and the Ori County Police Department, the Ori County Sheriff's with the Ori County Police. I I I think I heard that the Sheriff's Department wants that.

SPEAKER_01 10:51

I think so. Um I think our sheriff would want that. There are 46 counties in South Carolina, 45 of them. Uh the sheriff would be the top cop in that jurisdiction. In Ory County, uh we have a sheriff and we have county police.

SPEAKER_00 11:10

And they have distinct separate duties.

SPEAKER_01 11:12

Yes. And uh our sheriff uh runs the jail and he also does uh security around the courthouse um and does quite a few things uh but the actual person that goes out and you would call in the unincorporated areas would be the county police. So this is unique to South Carolina. It is not unique in other places across the country.

SPEAKER_00 11:41

Now it used to be together, yes, but then they separated it. What was the reason for that?

SPEAKER_01 11:45

I think that um I was told corruption. You'll hear corruption from um the sheriff at that time, which would have been the late 50s. Um so they pulled it away from them. You'll hear, you know, all kinds of stuff. You know, obviously I went around uh for that, but you do see uh county police and sheriffs in other parts, uh metro areas, uh in other uh states like Virginia and you know, most states have South Carolina is the sheriff, Georgia is the sheriff, uh, but a lot of states do have multiple places. It's not really a duplication of services like you'll hear a lot of times, because our our sheriff, um, I've called him, they can go out and um you know make arrests. They are class A officers, but they really work not to duplicate services. So um ours have learned to live in this uh world that we've got for Ory County.

SPEAKER_00 12:52

Would it make your job any different or um just who you deal with or it would who we deal with would be you know would be different. Would it is it something that you support in in light of what your experience has been?

SPEAKER_01 13:07

I've never known anything but county and sheriff. Um but now in Georgetown it's just the sheriff.

SPEAKER_00 13:13

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 13:14

So there's good, um, good and bad of it. Carter Weaver's uh terrific, sheriff uh Thompson's terrific. You see, you know, I I I know I I would wish I could give a just straight answer, yes or no. And and but this is a very good thing.

SPEAKER_00 13:30

Well we've just seen a lot of resignations lately with the Scott Spivey case and the sisters, a former former uh, you know, Scott Spivey's sister, she's been calling for it. She's a former Ory County police officer. Then we had the other sex scandal thing. I don't even know what happened with that. So a lot of people are like, what's going on over there?

SPEAKER_01 13:50

Well uh what people need to understand is um it would change the structure. It would change who is accountable. The really good point in my eyes of having it under the sheriff is that if you get mad with the sheriff, you get to unelect him every four years. Um on the flip side, you've got uh a a situation where if right now you would go to your county council and say I'm I'm not happy with the response time or or whatever, and those the county council um hires uh an administrator uh and they would jump on his behind and then he would have to go and you know dig into it. So it's a different structure. Okay. But it's um there's no all right, so in different parts of the state, in um Spartanburg, their sheriff got indicted, in Williamsburg, um, you know, theirs have been indicted. Wow. So there's no full proof there's no full proof plan. Um and it's you know, it's there's a lot to be said for if 45 other count counties are doing it, then why don't we do it that way? There, you know, it's it's just whatever your taste is for. And this has worked. There's been a lot of um scandals and a lot of upheaval upheaval lately. Uh, but this is this has been what we've lived with since I think 1959. So, you know, it's I don't know that there is a 100% correct answer.

SPEAKER_00 15:31

Nick, is there anything? Uh there was just a quick question.

SPEAKER_03 15:34

Apparently, this individual lives by you and there's an issue with uh drones out in that area scoping out different things. Do you know anything about it? And can there any be anything done? Seems like they're invading privacy of people.

SPEAKER_01 15:48

Um yeah, that is uh usually a federal type thing because F FTA. But um I'm glad that a neighbor's looking out for me because I'm I'm hoping that drone ain't um picked up on my marijuana patch in the backyard.

unknown 16:02

What?

SPEAKER_01 16:03

No. Say stuff like that. You know it's gonna be the headlines tomorrow. Oh, I know. Um that's just playing.

SPEAKER_00 16:10

Just for the record, are there any laws about taking down someone else's drone that's over your property looking at you?

SPEAKER_01 16:18

Um no, I think it would be it would come out to be a civil type thing. The person would sue you for shooting their drone and it would work out that way. I don't think there's anything um, you know, criminal about uh drones, but you know, I would certainly, if there was a drone hovering over my place, I would call the police uh and let them deal with it, even though they may have to go to the federal agencies. But that's a good place to start.

SPEAKER_00 16:46

Okay. All right. Sounds good. Well, thank you so much. I appreciate it. We'll follow you in on Facebook, see what you're up to. 15th Circuit Solicitor Jimmy Richardson. We'll talk to you in a couple of weeks.

SPEAKER_01 16:57

Thanks, guys.

SPEAKER_00 16:58

Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 16:58

This is the Liz Callaway Show with next summer.