Sheriff Caught in Shirt Dispute

Eagle County (Colo.) Sheriff Joe Hoy was on the defensive Thursday after disclosures that his employees wanted to order T-shirts with a stick figure of a hangman on the front pocket and comments about Kobe Bryant’s rape case on the back.

“I told my officers I did not expect them to wear them in public because of the eyebrows it would raise,” he said. “To me, what [the T-shirt] said is not anti-Kobe.”

The shirts, sold on a Web site, have Bryant’s No. 8 on the back with the words, “I’m not a rapist; I’m just a cheater.”

Bryant is charged with sexually assaulting a woman June 30 at a mountain resort. The Laker guard, who is married, says he and his accuser had consensual sex.

Legal analysts were appalled by the seeming lack of sensitivity of Eagle County law enforcement. T-shirts were ordered by employees in the district attorney’s office as well as the sheriff’s department.

“It clearly goes to the bias and the perceptions of the police department,” said Lisa Wayne, a Denver defense attorney and an African American.

“There is an overriding tone of racism. The inference of a hangman to many of us who grew up hearing about it is that it goes back to lynching. Period.

“I would think the police department would be sensitive to those issues in a case where a black man is accused of a crime against a white woman.”

The shirts were offered for sale to sheriff’s officials outside the courtroom during Bryant’s preliminary hearing Oct. 9.

About a week later, an order for 76 shirts was made via e-mail by an employee of the sheriff’s department. The order was withdrawn when, Hoy said, the manufacturer would not agree to give the proceeds to a battered women’s shelter.

“It was a novelty thing, a souvenir,” Hoy said. “I told my people, ‘If you want to do this, it’s obviously not part of your uniform, not even as an undershirt.’ ”

Hoy said Dist. Atty. Mark Hurlbert phoned him Thursday and said he does not believe the T-shirts violate the gag order imposed by Judge Terry Ruckriegle.

Nevertheless, experts said the episode not only is embarrassing to Eagle County but could influence potential jurors.

“For the law enforcement officers who gathered the evidence against Kobe Bryant to want these T-shirts is such a low-grade, kindergarten-level response that it will leave a bad taste in the mouth of Eagle County citizens who might sit in judgment,” Denver attorney Larry Pozner said.