A clear question, not a proven violation
During a May 2, 2016 Calaveras County Board of Supervisors interview, Gary Redman, then an Amador County sheriff's captain, said he would not personally issue a traffic citation to one of his off-duty deputies and referred to other means of discipline. The Sheriff's Office's later-published ethics standards prohibit letting friendships affect decisions while also allowing warnings or no citation when the circumstances justify discretion.
The documents do not establish whether Redman's statement represented an operational policy, how he handled any specific incident, or whether an employee actually received preferential treatment. They also do not establish that the May 2026 manual was in force in 2016.
The documented 2016 statement
Recorded public statement During his May 2, 2016 interview for appointment as Calaveras County sheriff, a Board member asked Redman whether he would issue a citation if, while on duty, he witnessed a clear traffic violation by one of his off-duty deputy sheriffs. Redman responded:
“The answer is no. I'm not going to issue one of my deputies a traffic citation. There are other avenues for me to discipline that deputy.”
He continued that he could not recall his last traffic ticket, estimated it had been more than five years, and said traffic-ticket writing was not really a function of the Sheriff's Office. The quotation is taken from the archive's working transcript, which is not a certified verbatim transcript; viewers should consult the original recording at approximately 1:07:31.
The department's ethics field-training guide
Agency-released record County Counsel identified a seven-page Field Training Program Guide – Volume 2, Section 3: Ethics, marked January 29, 2015, as responsive to the request. Section 3.1.06 (page 5) asks trainees to identify problems associated with unethical decision-making, including “Non-enforcement of specific laws by personal choice” and disproportionate enforcement targeting groups by personal choice.
Section 3.2.03 (page 7) also asks trainees to identify appropriate decisions in simulated encounters. Its alternatives include an arrest, citation and release, verbal warning, referral, and no action. Thus, the training material recognizes discretion but cautions against certain reasons for exercising it. Sections 3.1.04–3.1.05 (pages 4–5) address unlawful or unethical actions by fellow officers. This blank training guide does not demonstrate that any identified employee received or completed the instruction.
Download released seven-page ethics guide (DOCX).
What the May 2026 policy manual says
Code of Ethics · Policy 104.3, page 19
Official policy text The published code requires officers not to allow “personal feelings, prejudices, animosities or friendships” to influence decisions, and commits them to enforce the law “without fear or favor.” These statements are unusually relevant to a public remark about how a sheriff would treat his own deputies. They express an agency ethical standard, not a finding that Redman violated it.
Standards of Conduct · Policy 320, pages 180–185
Policy 320.2 says on-duty and off-duty conduct may be cause for discipline. Policy 320.3.2 identifies potential discipline for supervisors who fail to report known misconduct or acquiesce in violations. Policy 320.4 requires members to comply with applicable law whether on or off duty. Policy 320.5.9(a) includes prompt reporting of certain law-enforcement contacts involving department members. The policy describes a separate administrative framework; it does not declare disciplinary action a substitute for enforcement of criminal law.
Traffic discretion · Policy 500.3, pages 419–420
Countervailing policy context Policy 500.3.1 directs deputies to consider warnings or nonpunitive responses when circumstances warrant, especially inadvertent violations. Policy 500.3.2 makes citations discretionary. This means a decision not to cite is not inherently misconduct. The unanswered question is whether a deputy's employment status, rather than the circumstances, would drive the decision.
Off-duty action · Policy 340, pages 255–256
Policy 340 concerns a different situation: an off-duty deputy deciding whether to initiate law-enforcement action. It does not specifically authorize a supervisor to give preferential enforcement treatment to an off-duty employee who is the suspected violator. The 2015 field-training guide references Policy 340, but that reference should not be mistaken for an employee-traffic-citation exception.
The records request and County response
- September 30, 2026: A CPRA request sought current written rules and training about traffic violations by employees, professional courtesy, impartial treatment, supervisory obligations and employee-specific enforcement discretion. The requester expressly excluded individual personnel and disciplinary files.
- October 16, 2026: County Counsel Greg Gillott stated that a reasonably diligent search located responsive records consisting of the Sheriff's Office Policy Manual and one attached ethics training guide. No separate employee-specific traffic-citation policy was identified in the response.
That response does not definitively establish that no unwritten practice exists or that every relevant rule was included. It describes the records the agency reported finding in the scope of this request. Read the request and response archive.
Analysis: A question of consistent standards
Archive analysis Ordinary traffic enforcement discretion is widely recognized and expressly contemplated by ACSO Policy 500. A lawful warning to a deputy can be as appropriate as a warning to any other motorist. By contrast, a categorical approach under which the identity of the violator as a colleague determines the outcome would raise a separate concern under the ethics principles in Policy 104.
The interview can be interpreted more than one way: as an expression of supervisory discipline rather than citation-writing, as an indication that Redman rarely issues traffic tickets to anyone, or as a proposed employee-specific exception. The available record does not resolve which interpretation best describes actual practice.
Questions remaining
- Did the Sheriff's Office maintain a written or unwritten practice specifically about warnings or citations for fellow employees?
- Were Redman's remarks intended to describe his own citation practices, or a rule applying to deputies more generally?
- What records or procedures document how an ordinary traffic violation by an off-duty employee would be handled and referred to supervisors?
- What policy versions were in effect on May 2, 2016, and which provisions changed before the May 2026 publication?
Source archive and methodology
The May 2, 2016 video is a contemporaneous public meeting recording; the archive's transcript is a working derivative. The 2015 guide is a training template provided in a 2026 CPRA response. The manual is a May 28, 2026 publication, not evidence of the precise policy wording in 2016. Email source texts below omit internet routing metadata but retain substantive message bodies. Page references use printed manual page numbers, which match the PDF's page positions.
September 30 request transcription · October 16 response transcription · Open source manifest.