Headley speaks out on addiction, future outside law enforcement
By Carole Robinson
crobinson@williamsonherald.com
Since his arrest on Jan. 31, 2007, for possession of prescription drugs, much has been reported about former Williamson County Sheriff Ricky Headley.
Information in the reports came from the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, various law enforcement agencies, two district attorney’s offices and Headley’s lawyer, but for 14 months, other than approved written statements, Headley has said nothing.
Now, on probation for 11 months and 29 days and just a week after his final visit to court where Senior Circuit Court Judge Kerry Blackwood denied a request for judicial diversion, a frustrated Headley is finally speaking out, in his own words, about his addiction to painkillers and the case that, to Headley, spiraled out of control.
“I take full responsibility for what I’ve done,” Headley said. “I became addicted to pain pills. I take responsibility for walking into a pharmacy and getting pills without a prescription, but I don’t take responsibility for 20 plus felonies. I take full responsibility, but I want people to know how mistreated I was. I take full responsibility for my actions, but other people need to take responsibility for their actions and the way they handled themselves.”
Headley’s problems began when he was given a prescription for Hydrocodone/Lortab, a narcotic pain reliever, for his chronic back pain.
“I went to the Franklin Medical Clinic for allergies,” he said. He walked out with a prescription for back pain.
At the clinic he met Dr. Winston Grinder, who was the former medical director at Riverbend Prison. In conversation, Grinder mentioned he was a pain management specialist, Headley mentioned his chronic back pain. After an examination in which the doctor concurred with a prior diagnosis that recommended surgery in the future, Grinder gave Headley a prescription to ease the pain.
“I wasn’t even taking as many as the prescription called for for a while,” he said. “As time rocked on I noticed one wouldn’t help and I had to take two, then they would only last a couple hours and I needed more – the addiction kicked in.
“People have a bad conception of addiction. It’s not about having to feel good, you feel bad but you feel worse if you don’t take (the pills),” he said. “You get to the point where you take them just to feel normal – not experience some euphoric feeling.”
Around the time Headley found himself running out of pills before his monthly doctor’s visit where he could get a new prescription, Dr. Grinder moved his practice to Nashville and he was introduced to Glenn Brooks of Brooks Pharmacy.
Brooks, a Brentwood resident, agreed to support Headley in the upcoming sheriff’s election and offered him a program he provided law enforcement officers.
“He said, ‘By the way, If I can do anything for your prescriptions, for law enforcement officers I only charge the insurance company – they don’t pay the co-pay,’” Headley explained.
After visiting the doctor, Headley said he would drop by Brooks’ Pharmacy to fill his prescription. It wasn’t too long before he was running out of pills after three weeks so he would drop by the pharmacy for an advance on his prescription.
“After awhile of doing that I fell further and further behind,” Headley said. “I was getting a legitimate prescription from the doctor, but there were times I would run out and he would just fill it without a valid prescription.”
That went on until August 2006 when the sheriff realized he had a problem. He drove himself to St. Thomas Hospital’s emergency room where he admitted to an ER doctor he had a problem with pain pills.
“He told me to wean myself from them,” he said. “I tried to. I ended up taking more.”
On Jan. 23, 2007, Headley finally told his wife Melissa the whole story.
“I told her I’ve got to do something, I’ve got to quit. I learned this year that when you become addicted, two things have to happen before you can get off. Either something terrible happens or you have the desire. On Jan. 23 my desire became so great I said I would rather die trying to quit than die taking the pills.”
Headley stayed home and went through detox on his own with Melissa by his side.
After four days, he was back at work dealing with depression but off the pills and proud of his accomplishment.
Four days later his world came crashing down around him.
“I hadn’t taken any pills,” he said.
He was arrested by the TBI before he went into a meeting of the Tennessee Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs.
“The TBI report said they arrested me coming out of the pharmacy with a pocketful of pills. They didn’t want to admit it was planned humiliation.”
And it worked.
After almost eight hours in a TBI conference room, Headley was charged with one misdemeanor and one felony.
“I knew at the time I was not guilty of any the felony.”
The next day, Feb. 1, the lawman was admitted to the Bradford Health Services in Alabama. That very same day, he said the vultures started circling and the political wheel began turning.
“It was an unfortunate situation. I was arrested on Jan. 31. On Feb. 1 – the next day — Tommy Campsey was at the sheriff’s office calling a meeting of the staff asking them for their support for sheriff – taking advantage of my misfortune.”
According to Headley, three members of the Fraternal Order of Police told him Campsey, Adrian Breedlove and an unidentified Franklin Police officer approached Assistant District Attorney Derek Smith in September on behalf of the FOP encouraging him to indict Headley in Williamson County after Headley had been assured by District Attorney Ron Davis that the Williamson County DA’s office would not intervene in the case because it occurred in Davidson County.
“The main reason was they had to get me out of office. They wanted Tommy Campsey to be sheriff,” Headley said.
In October, Headley was once again humiliated when Smith left a message for Headley to come by his office. When he arrived, the TBI took him into custody in front of the Judicial Center on four counts of official misconduct.
“I was baffled as to why they had to trick me to get me to the DA’s office to arrest me. All they had to do was call – I would have driven there.”
After sitting in the conference room in the DA’s office for two hours, “they put me in handcuffs and took me to my own jail. Not only did they trick me, they called every TV station in the state to be there to humiliate me.
“At this point it had nothing to do with the addiction, it had nothing to do with any crime – it was all about politics,” Headley said. “They were bound and determined to get me out of there. Just last week another sheriff was arrested on criminal misconduct – they walked into his office and gave him a summons. They put me in my own jail and made me post $5,000 bail.”
That was five days after an employee in Davis’ office was arrested for fabricating evidence – a felony. He was booked, signed his own bond, was taken to the courthouse, pled to misconduct and the case was resolved all in the same day, Headley said he was hit with 33 indictments – about 20 of them felonies.
“In 30 years of law enforcement I never saw anyone charged with 30 something counts - 20 something felonies. You can believe if I was guilty of 20 something felonies they wouldn’t have all been dismissed.
“Anybody else in the same situation – if they had been charged with anything, it would have been simple possession. A first time offense, they would get treatment and 11 months and 29 days probation and their record expunged. It happens every day. The most I was guilty of was simple possession for walking out of the drug store with pills I didn’t have a prescription for.”
With the latest ruling, at 44, Headley is moving on. He has discovered a new passion and a new career and he is dealing with his pain without pills.
“What I discovered this past year is that law enforcement is the only profession that does not have a place for anyone with an addiction, an intervention program, a chance for them to get back to where they were before the addiction.” Tennessee Missions Foundation is Headley’s new passion. With a Website – www.tnMissions.org — and beginning May 1, a law enforcement crisis hotline, law enforcement officers in Williamson County who are suffering some kind of addiction can get help, from one who has been there.
Headley is finishing up an album due to be available in a couple months and a single, “Praying Mothers,” that will be released in time for Mother’s Day.
”I believe with all my heart that 10 years from now I’ll look back and I will see all that happened prepared me for where I am. For a long time God has been calling me into the ministry of music and I wouldn’t listen. God picked up a two-by-four and hit me in the head – forced me out of my comfort zone. Now I’m on the path he intended all along.”
Posted on: 4/3/2008
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