Floyd Bonner Jr. looked down and his face lit up. His granddaughter reached towards him and the sheriff, clad in a gray jacket, swept her up. 

For a few moments, as the cameras got packed up and reporters walked away, Bonner was himself. He was not the Shelby County sheriff and former Bartlett resident turned Memphis homeowner and mayoral candidate. He was just grandpa. 

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For a few moments, he showed the private side of himself, the devoted family man who still gets choked up at the memory of his late mother. The presence of his 4-year-old granddaughter at the event where the Memphis Police Association and Memphis Fire Association endorsed him proved to be a chance to see family. 

“Being a grandfather is so cool. You can spoil them and then they go out of town,” Bonner said. 

Moments earlier, Bonner had shown the badge without flashing it as he stood beside the unions and said that electing him as Memphis mayor, the sheriff who did not live in Memphis this time last year would be the essential step to combatting the crime plaguing the city. 

“Our number one issue is crime ... I love our community and I cannot stand by and watch what is going on in our city …” Bonner has said throughout his yearlong campaign. 

Bonner has made himself the law-and-order candidate but declined, in an interview, to offer his opinion on how his officers have used force in the field. The sheriff’s ads emphasize his 42 years in law enforcement, but Shelby County government has not released his personnel file almost two months after it was first requested. 

Bonner has run on the promise of growing the Memphis Police Department, expanding its ranks and fighting for stricter criminal sentencing laws — policies that mimic those of the man he is trying to succeed, Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland. 

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Father’s footsteps

Bonner described himself as a good kid who had at least one brush with mischief. He grew up in Orange Mound and his neighbor, Ms. Frankie, had a fig tree. 

“I had the brilliant notion … that I was going to steal some figs off of Ms. Frankie’s tree,” Bonner said.

But Ms. Frankie was home, saw him and put a stop to the fig appropriations. The incident didn’t end there.

Ms. Frankie gave Bonner a spanking as he tells it. Then his mother did the same. Then his father came home and gave him another whooping.

“To this day, I don’t eat figs,” he said.

Bonner grew up loving science, but he didn’t choose it as a career path. Instead, after graduating from the University of Memphis, his father, a Memphis police officer, suggested he join law enforcement. 

That began Bonner’s 42-year-long career in law enforcement. The first five years of his career were spent at the Shelby County Jail, the same jail (in a different building) that he now oversees. 

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In an August interview, he recounted how he couldn’t wait for the end of his shifts. 

“We had to work the third floor in the old jail and the third floor is the maximum maximum security,” Bonner said. “And I worked that floor every night and I couldn’t wait to get off of that floor because those were the really dangerous criminals up there.” 

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As Bonner has sought the city’s highest office, the sheriff department he has led for the past half-decade has faced more scrutiny than it has for years. 

The Daily Memphian published in June that 40 people had died in Shelby County custody since Bonner became sheriff.

The October death of one inmate, Gershun Freeman, has the sheriff’s office embroiled in a civil rights lawsuit, one of several Bonner has faced since taking the job. During an interview, Bonner declined to pass judgment on the sheriff’s office personnel in the death of Freeman and he declined to say whether he thinks they had done what they should have done.

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Video shows multiple sheriff’s office personnel kicking and swinging metal implements at Freeman after he flees his cell. He flails on the ground at the feet of personnel. Throughout the incident, jail personnel use chemical agents in an attempt to subdue him. The floor is covered with it, the video shows.

After Freeman escapes jail personnel, he flees naked up an escalator where he is subdued by multiple officers. Jail personnel kneel on Freeman for several minutes and when they get off of him, he’s limp. The death was ruled a homicide by the West Tennessee Regional Forensic Center. 

Bonner disputes what the lawsuit from Freeman’s family claims — that the man was beaten and the officers involved acted unlawfully. He said they were reacting to Freeman biting their ankles. 

“I don’t think anything such as beating occurred,” Bonner said about the death of Freeman. “You saw officers trying to get him off their legs ... When it all shakes out, I think those officers they did what they thought they had to do at the time.”

The sheriff’s office is also facing the fallout of Jarveon Hudspeth’s death after a June traffic stop. The 21-year-old was stopped for unclear reasons and during a struggle between him and sheriff’s deputy, he was shot. Videos of the incident were released Thursday, Aug. 24, and offered no clarity on why the incident occurred, but added dispute the sheriff’s office narrative that the officer was dragged by the car. 

Before the video’s release, Bonner would not say whether he felt the situation was justified. 

“I’m not going to give you an answer on that,” Bonner said about the Hudspeth case. “I would be wrong to voice my opinion before the (District Attorney) because it doesn’t matter what I think.”

Juggling roles

Bonner, like his opponents Karen Camper, Michelle McKissack and Paul Young, is in public office while running for another public office. Elected and government officials are generally forbidden from using the power of one office to seek another, forcing them to balance what is part of their day job and what is part of getting elected. 

On Thursday, Aug. 24, Bonner toggled between sheriff and mayoral candidate during a meeting of the Frayser Exchange Club at Ed Rice Community Center. For half of his remarks, he wore his badge. For the other half, he took it off much to the crowd’s amusement.

At the luncheon, Bonner was more at ease than with the media or in front of a camera. He smiled more. He laughed at himself and referred to “Sheriff Bonner” in the third person. The questions from the audience — about youth intervention and neighborhood development — he fielded with ease. 

He seemed at home, like Bonner the grandfather had come out from behind the badge. As he concluded his remarks, he toggled between the office he has and the office he is seeking. 

“Imma take the sheriff badge off now. Floyd Bonner for mayor,” he said to applause.