Second chances served as the backdrop for Denver Mayor Michael Hancock’s announcement Monday that Elias Diggins will serve as the next sheriff.
The move is meant to inject stability into a department plagued by scandals and one that is under a fresh microscope as demonstrators call for an overhaul of local law enforcement and equitable treatment for people of color.
While Diggins boasts a 25-year tenure at the sheriff’s department, a stint as interim sheriff and participation in national jail associations, his appointment comes with its share of controversy.
“More than ever before the new sheriff needs to be someone with deep community experience, knowledge of the department and let me simply say with great emphasis, someone who appreciates the value and power of second chances,” Hancock said during a news conference.
Diggins, the Denver Sheriff Department’s operations chief, will take over July 27. The position pays $194,476, though Denver City Council can raise that past $200,000.
In a brief address, Diggins gave thanks for the opportunity and quoted scripture to show he has turned a new leaf.
“The past is the past and I’ve had some challenges, but I’m ready to lead this department where it needs to go,” Diggins said.
Diggins later expanded his comments to The Denver Post, saying that since he served as interim sheriff he’s grown personally to embrace his faith, family and a work-life balance.
Professionally, Diggins said he learned to act as a “servant leader” which means to keep a close council, remove barriers preventing employees from doing their jobs and to check in often to ensure they have what they need to succeed. He also recently earned a master’s degree in public administration, which he said offers more tools for him to run the department and effect change.
Within his first month, Diggins said he’ll put together a leadership team that shares his philosophy that the department must be run with humanity and he’ll develop a leadership council which will document goals and actionable steps moving forward.
Pointing to the so-called “Norway model,” Diggins said he wants the jail to begin training inmates to re-enter the community the day they enter the jail. Job training and housing services are a must, he said, and they’ll require community partnerships.
“Deprivation of someone’s freedom is their punishment, the environment should not punish them further,” Diggins said.
The end goal is to restore the community’s faith in the department, Diggins said.
But those changes take time, Hancock told The Denver Post. The department is more than 150 years old.
“You’re talking about a culture that is probably as deep as the City and County Building is tall,” Hancock said.
Diggins is Hancock’s third appointment for sheriff, the city’s most difficult job to fill, he said. And each time the administration examines the department’s troubles he said there are layers upon layers of bad decisions and a lack of accountability.
But the new sheriff knows the department and the community and loves them both, Hancock said. And he’s the person who can bring about change.
“He has been part of the reform efforts from day one, he knows exactly what we need to do,” Hancock said. “It’s not going to be done overnight, but what we can do is get the sheriff’s department on the road to greater stability and a firmer legacy of excellence.”
Hancock had promised change for the sheriff’s department when he appointed Diggins as interim sheriff in July 2014 after Gary Wilson stepped down. At the time Hancock said the sheriff would expedite deputy discipline cases and review the department from top to bottom.
During Wilson’s tenure, deputies were accused of writing inaccurate reports and excessive force, including the choking of inmate Jamal Hunter, who received a $3.25 million settlement from the city. But Diggins faced accusations of covering up evidence, reports of his criminal record and the ouster of the Downtown Detention Center chief during time as interim sheriff. Diggins final straw came after a secretly recorded phone call where he criticized his bosses surfaced. Fewer than two weeks later, a new sheriff had been hired from Illinois.
In October 2015, Hancock appointed Patrick Firman, though problems continued under the new sheriff. Shortly after Firman took office, deputies killed inmate Michael Marshall, who was experiencing a psychotic episode and died after asphyxiating on his vomit while being restrained.
Firman resigned in September 2019, a culmination of years of mistrust from the department’s 1,100 employees and community activists and shortly after a former inmate sued after she gave birth alone in a jail cell. Many complained Firman didn’t have the proper experience needed for the position.
Indeed, Diggins has a history with the department — not all of it positive, said former communications director Simon Crittle. But those days and the negative reputation that followed are part of the past, he said.
“He has mended a lot of fences,” Crittle said.
While some deputies from older generations might believe in — or practiced — “cracking heads,” Crittle said, Diggins was never part of that scene. He knows the department inside and out and is capable of ensuring deputies stick to the city’s new use of force policy and bringing about even more change.
“He believes in reform even though he is from the old school,” Crittle said.
Denver City Councilwoman Jamie Torres said she’s cautiously optimistic about Diggins’ appointment. She served on the search committee to fill the vacancy and said his application was strong. Each candidate came with controversies.
In her interactions with Diggins in the past, Torres said she found him open minded and a proponent of better gender equity within the department.
“He is from within a system that has to be transformed and that is going to be difficult to do and to have the trust of the community, but I hope he can do it,” Torres said.
Diggins began working with the sheriff’s department in 1994, Daria Serna, the sheriff’s spokeswoman, said.
He has substantial experience running Denver’s large jail system, which includes two detention centers, courtroom security and an auto impound lot, and he served as the president of the American Jail Association. He remains on the group’s board of directors.
Diggins is a Denver native and an alumnus of Montbello High School. He received his bachelor’s degree in criminal justice from Metropolitan State University and his masters in public administration from the University of Colorado-Denver.
Frances Gomez, the department’s director of professional standards has served as the department’s interim sheriff since Firman’s resignation. She was the first woman to lead the department, and Hancock said she would remain employed with the city.
