Former chief sheriff’s detective Bruce Jordan, who was demoted three ranks in September for violating the department’s standards of conduct, said he retired Monday because he was “tired of waiting at home” for the sheriff to conduct the appeal hearing on his demotion.

“I sat at my house for two months waiting for the sheriff to call me,” Jordan said, noting that he was on paid suspension the entire time. Jordan said he only heard from Sheriff Johnson once, when he was informed he would be assigned to the warrants division.

“But I was told I couldn’t come back to work yet,” Jordan said.

Also playing into Jordan’s decision, he said, was a wish to be out of the public eye.

“Some of the things that were said in the paper, it was wearing on my family,” Jordan said. “It was time to leave public life.”

Jordan said he was suspended because two detectives were reimbursed travel expenses out of the department’s drug seizure funds after they attended a baseball tournament in Tennessee as security for a county baseball team. Jordan’s son played on the team and he previously has said the security was justified in light of the threats made against the team by the coach of another team that was also playing in that tournament.

Jordan said he was also suspended for only taking one vacation day instead of three when he attended the tournament, but he said a sheriff’s official later informed him that they discovered he had indeed requested for three days of vacation.

Jordan said he was on paid administrative leave the entire time. He declined to say whether or not he will consider filing a lawsuit.

Jordan appealed the demotion and suspension, but Johnson said Monday that he had not yet held the appeals hearing Jordan had requested in light of the demotion. Jordan had retained criminal defense attorney Lee Sexton to represent him in the matter, and Sexton indicated weeks ago that a lawsuit might be in the offing depending on what the sheriff’s actions were.

Jordan has steadfastly denied any wrongdoing and previously said he initially was under the impression that the baseball association running the tournament would reimburse the sheriff’s office for the security expenses. When he learned that wouldn’t happen, Jordan said he repaid the sheriff’s office for those funds.

Jordan said he does not yet have another job lined up.

Johnson declined to get into details about why Jordan was demoted, citing advice from his attorney in light of a potential lawsuit.

“We found nothing criminal,” during the internal investigation, Johnson said.

Johnson also confirmed that at least two separate agencies are looking into Jordan’s conduct with possible criminal charges in the offing. “As for us, we didn’t see anything really criminal but that’s for them to decide,” Johnson said of the outside investigations.

Although Johnson initially said in September that Jordan’s demotion was for violations of department policy, he also noted that in Jordan’s new assignment he “would not have access or control in any manner over any asset forfeiture funds.”

Johnson, when asked about the long tenure of his and Jordan’s service together, said he was bothered by the whole situation.

“I hate it, I really do,” Johnson said. “I hate that it had to happen like it did. It’s just something you had to do, that’s it.”

District Attorney Gray Conger from Columbus has been appointed to determine if criminal charges should be pursued in the case. Fayette County District Attorney Scott Ballard has said he asked the state’s attorney general to find another prosecutor so no one would question whether his office was impartial enough to process results of the criminal probe.

Johnson also said Monday that Lt. Tracey Carroll, one of the top detectives serving under Jordan, has been transferred from the investigations division to the jail. Johnson said the move was “lateral” and did not involve a demotion.

“It was just, in the situation I guess, we all figured it would be for the best for her to be out of that division,” Johnson said.

Carroll’s transfer was made effective Nov. 16, Johnson said.

Capt. Mike Hattaway remains in charge of the sheriff’s investigative unit. Hattaway was promoted to the position immediately in the wake of Jordan’s reassignment to the sheriff’s department’s warrants division.

Johnson said he hopes the changes will allow “everything to smooth out,” combined with the pending change in elected officials at the Fayette County Commission who seem willing to resolve issues with the sheriff’s office that have been the subject of legal battles between the current commission and the sheriff.

Johnson lamented that the commission’s legal tussle with his department has wasted two and a half years.

“The only thing they proved was that they spent a lot of money,” Johnson said, noting that none of the sheriff’s office monies were found to be missing.

Jordan was that rarity among active law enforcement ranks: a published author of two true-crime books.

Jordan published “Death Unexpected: The Violent Deaths of Fayette” in 1997, and followed that local success up with a regional bestseller, “Murder in the Peach State,” published in 2000.

Jordan also authored a series of vignettes about men and women who played large roles in Fayette County’s history. They were published in The Citizen after his second book.