When I attended East St. Louis public schools, our security guards and teachers were respected and expected to provide a safe environment in which students could learn and thrive.
You can only imagine the disgust recently when ESL parents learned that Alvin Golliday, security guard at the Lincoln Middle School, was busted with marijuana in a drug sweep at the school and charged with possession and intent to deliver.
The sweep, conducted by the St. Clair County Sheriff’s Department and Drug Tactical and Street Crimes Unit, is the latest development in a seemingly endless exposure of a drug culture that involves “responsible members” of Metro East courts, parole office, schools and law enforcement.
In my last column, I wrote of the St. Clair County judge who dropped dead from cocaine intoxication; his buddy (also a judge) who was busted, months later, in an alleged heroin purchase; and a parole officer who, later, admitting to selling and using drugs with both men.
And, taking a page from Denzel Washington’s Oscar-winning performance as a crooked cop in the movie Training Day, ESL detective Orlando Ward now sits in federal custody for his role in an alleged conspiracy to distribute five kilos of cocaine, along with six others.
Ward’s role in the alleged drug ring was to provide protection, information and resources in exchange for $5,000 per month. At the time of his arrest, the 13-year ESL police veteran was earning $57,000 per year as a cop and served on the Greater St. Louis Major Case Squad. Talk about greed.
Then, on the heels of Ward’s arrest, the city of ESL conducted a surprise drug test for city employees, resulting in six workers (four of them ESL jailers) testing positive for either marijuana or cocaine.
Words can’t describe the level of reckless arrogance and disregard for themselves, public safety and accountability that comes with violating a position of trust, as was exposed in these latest revelations.
What makes otherwise respectable individuals casually cast aside their self-respect, credibility and reputations for a few illegal dollars escapes me.
However, the same ingenuity that they display in plotting to do illicit things can easily be used toward legitimate enterprises and activities, but somehow those sorts of endeavors aren’t as sexy as drug use, drug dealing or drug trafficking.
What I do know is that until this drug culture is rooted out and cleaned up, the public will remain skeptical of politicians, public figures and leadership, as should be the case when public servants become public serpents and hypocrisy remains the order of the day.
If you like my column, then you will love my radio show on WGNU-920am every Sunday from 4-5 pm. Email: jtingram_1960@yahoo.com; Twitter@JamesTIngram.
