COLUMBUS, Ga. – A day after four-year veteran Muscogee County Sheriff Deputy Marcus Kennedy was arrested for violating oath of office and sexual assault of someone in custody, News 3 sat down with Muscogee County Sheriff John Darr to speak more about the incident.

Sheriff Darr says the inmate came to Muscogee County Jail officials speaking about the sexual acts between her and Kennedy. A preliminary investigation was done about those allegations and the sheriff’s office believed there was validity to her claims. Kennedy was later brought in and he refused to cooperate with the investigation. Shortly after, the sheriff’s office determined they would fire Kennedy and continued to investigate the allegations up to the point where Kennedy was fired Monday. Sheriff Darr said photos relating to the investigation were pulled from Kennedy’s phone. The contents of those photos are still under investigation.

Sheriff Darr said that Kennedy was on laundry detail in the jail and his charge of violating oath of office is a misdemeanor and sexual assault of someone in custody is a felony.

Sheriff Darr said that he holds his employees to a higher standard and his firing does not absolve the fact the incident happened. “When you have someone who doesn’t live up to that standard, it’s disappointing, you get upset,” Sheriff Darr said. “There’s a lot of things that go through you. I’m glad we don’t have somebody like that who is not living up to the public oath he has taken. He’s the one who chose to violate that public oath and the oath as a deputy sheriff. It’s really kind of bothersome to me, but I’m glad he’s no longer with us. We didn’t need anybody like that in the Muscogee County Sheriff’s Office.”

Sheriff Darr added that it is upsetting to him and those who work in the Muscogee County Sheriff’s Office. The sheriff says he has not seen something of this magnitude since he has been sheriff. He says this is not indicative of the sheriff’s department and adds that it comes back to the individual. “At the end of the day what you have is this individual that has violated the oath he has taken,” Sheriff Darr said. “We’re talking about the individual now. He’s the one who failed to live up to the standards that’s expected of people in this line of work. We will continue to look at how we conduct business to make sure it was not something that could lend itself to happening again.”

Kennedy is set to appear in Municipal Court on Thursday.