Richland County Sheriff named Honorary Green Beret
January 9, 2013
COLUMBIA, SC – January 9, 2013 – Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott was named HONORARY GREEN BERET by the Special Forces Assoc. (S.C. chapter) during ceremonies at the Capitol City Club, last month.
The award recognizes Lott’s years of service to both the state of S.C. and the nation.
Lott – who has served as president of both the S.C. Law Enforcement Officers’ Association and the Association of the United States Army (Palmetto State Chapter), and who holds the rank of colonel (O-6) as provost marshal of the S.C. State Guard (the state defense force element of the S.C. Military Dept.) – was instrumental in helping stand up Iraqi security forces during the Iraq War.
Back home, Lott took his already-exacting physical-fitness and tactical-training standards even higher when, last summer, he led a team of 10 of his fittest deputies to Encinitas, California, where they underwent a brutally tough 50-hour training program taught by former U.S. Navy SEAL instructors. Known as Kokoro Camp, the program is based on the model of the SEAL’s infamous “Hell Week.”
Attending the Dec. 19 luncheon wherein Lott was named HONORARY GREEN BERET were COL Tom Mullikin and COL W. Thomas Smith Jr. (both HONORARY GREEN BERETs); MAJ John Carrington, U.S. Army Special Forces (Ret.); and 2nd LT Thomas Mullikin Jr.
“This award recognizes a truly great American,” said COL Mullikin, an environmental attorney, global expedition leader, and former U.S. Army JAG officer who also serves as deputy commander of the S.C. State Guard. “What Leon brings to the State Guard – and the state as a whole – is an extraordinarily high standard of public safety and security that frankly is talked about as either the envy or the model of the finest law enforcement agencies in the nation.”
Lott was elected Sheriff of Richland County in 1996.
