LUMBERTON — The Robesonian has learned that two longtime deputies at the Sheriff’s Office have been suspended with pay.
They are Maj. Anthony Thompson, who runs the jail, and Darryl McPhatter, a detective with the Criminal Investigations unit.
Sheriff Burnis Wilkins said he could not comment on the suspension because they are personnel matters, but the suspensions, which took effect on Wednesday, come in the wake of Wilkins’ announcing an internal investigation into how a report of a 2016 rape was handled, a case that became linked to the kidnapping, rape and murder of 13-year-old Hania Aguilar.
Michael Ray McLellan has been charged with 10 felonies in connection to Aguilar’s murder, and has also been charged in a home invasion that occurred near Lumberton in 2016 during which a woman was raped at knifepoint. McLellan had spent about a decade in prison for a 2007 conviction for assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill, so the state had his DNA on file.
A state lab identified him as the person who likely committed the 2016 rape and forwarded that information both to the District Attorney’s Office and the Sheriff’s Office, but it was never acted on. Wilkins, who became sheriff on Dec. 3, expressed his anger about what happened in multiple interviews and launched the internal investigation.
Thompson worked most recently under Sheriff Kenneth Sealey as the chief of detectives and was named the jail administrator under Wilkins. He began his law enforcement career in 1984, and has worked for four sheriffs, Hubert Stone, Glenn Maynor, Sealey and Wilkins. He has held the ranks of detective sergeant, lieutenant, captain and chief of detectives. He served as the county’s interim sheriff on Dec. 1 and Dec. 2 after Sealey retired on Nov. 30 and before Wilkins was sworn in.
McPhatter began work at the Sheriff’s Office in 2008. He worked previously as a Lumberton police officer.