Grooms, Sturch take new positions

Grooms, Sturch take new positions

Allen promotes new Chief Investigator, installs new 911 Director

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Crittenden County Sheriff’s Office has a new chief investigator and a new head of its 911 Center.

Sheriff Mike Allen officially announced the promotion of Todd Grooms to Chief Investigator and named former Quorum Court Justice Ronnie Sturch to head the 911 division.

Grooms, an 11 year veteran with CCSO, replaces Zane Boyd who retired in June.

Allen said Grooms has already been busy investigating two homicides in Earle and has experience with big cases.

“Todd is going to do a really good job,” Allen said.

“He’s already hit the ground running with those Earle homicides and has been thrown into it real quick.”

Grooms was the Internal Affairs and Jail investigator for the last five years.

Allen said Grooms led the investigation which led to the arrest of several jailers at the county lockup who were caught smuggling contraband in to the jail. He also assisted Marion Police Department in solving its investigation of a Walmart manager who killed his wife.

“I’ve worked with a lot of investigators over the years and have trained investigators, so I know when I have a good one that is going to be a great one,” Allen said.

“He is very, very thorough.

He is top notch. I’m very

proud of him.”

Grooms is also the Sheriff Department’s unofficial electronics guru.

Allen said he needed a hidden camera system on one of its vehicles to assist in undercover operations and turned to Grooms.

“He made us an amazing system and installed it,” Allen said. “I call him MacGyver. He can pretty much fix anything electronic.”

Allen said Sturch has also made an immediate impact in his new role.

The 911 Center was in danger of losing its funding for the rest of the year and Sturch quickly compiled the necessary report and even found a grant which will pay the remainder of his salary for the rest of the year resulting in a significant savings to the county.

“He’s another one who hit the ground running,” Allen said. “He comes in to my office every day with ideas and he is way above my expectations of his abilities.”

Sturch was an arson inspector for West Memphis Fire Department for 11 years before changing careers to go in to construction and real estate.

He represented District 12 for six years on the Quorum

Court.

Allen said Sturch will be visiting the Craighead County 911 Dispatch Center in Jonesboro soon to observe how it operates and to bring back ideas on how to improve the one in Crittenden County.

“I don’t think it is going to take long for him before we have a state-of-the-art 911 center,” Allen said. “I think we will see some massive upgrades under Ronnie. He is going to be a top notch manager in that position.”

By Mark Randall