Sheriff Candidate Reveals Drug Test Results, Sheriff Bruce Responds

Taylor County Sheriff candidate Art Casarez submitted a hair sample for a drug test last week, and on Wednesday announced the results of that test.

Now Casarez says an ominous cloud surrounding the race for Taylor County Sheriff has gotten darker.

"Today there are more questions than answers. It's even worse than it was," Casarez says.

Last week before submitting a sample of his hair for a drug test, Casarez called on the Sheriff to do the same as he and other candidate Ricky Bishop have done.
 
Today as his results were made public he stepped up his  call to action

"In my 43 years of law enforcement experience, at the city, county, state, federal level and probation, I have found that in the majority of cases there are only two reasons people refuse to take a drug test: number one: they are dirty. Number two: they are dirty."

Sheriff Les Bruce issued the following statement:

I can somewhat appreciate an individual's need to take a drug test and prove to this community that they're not involved in those types of activities. I have never been posed with those needs in my entire 30-year career....My office is under purview of the county commissioners, and if these gentlemen believed there was reasonable suspicion to ask me to submit to drug testing, then I would.

"As the Sheriff right now has to be dealing with other issues of jail escapes, jail deaths and pay issues, this is the distraction," Casarez says.

Sheriff Bruce in his statement also says other issues are more important like qualifications of the candidates.

Casarez's drug test came back negative.