By Terry Witt – Spotlight Senior Reporter

                Two Levy County Commissioners spoke respectfully and affectionately Tuesday about the late Dave Shewey, a law officer who passed away just before Christmas, with one telling the story of how Shewey patiently babysat her young children one day while they tore up his office.

            Commissioner Lilly Rooks said she was a young mother when she traveled to the sheriff’s office to apply for a job when Sheriff Horace Moody was serving as sheriff. She didn’t have a babysitter and carried her 10-month-old son James and her young daughter Joanne to the job interview.

            Shewey, a captain, wanted her to take a test. Rooks told him she didn’t have anywhere to leave her children.

            “Mr. Shewey said, ‘I’ll watch them in my office’,” Rooks recalled.

            She returned to find her kids having a great time and the office in shambles.

            “My kids destroyed his office. He sat there not saying anything to them. I was kind of in shock,” Rooks said. “I straightened out his office. He was laughing about it.”

            She said Sheriff Moody called her about that time. He wanted to know when she could start work. She responded she could start the next day. Moody said she couldn’t start working on a Saturday. Moody asked if she had a babysitter. She didn’t have one. He said she could bring them to work with her.

            “I said you didn’t talk to Capt. Shewey?” Rooks said. “I said you better talk to him before I bring my kids to work with me.”

            Moody made a suggestion. He asked Rooks to follow him to his mother-in-law’s home. He suggested it might take a couple of days for the kids to adjust to staying with his mother-in-law while Rooks worked, but as it turned out, that wasn’t the case.

            “In about three hours they didn’t know whether I was there or not,” Rooks said. “I went back to the office. Mr. Shewey was just laughing about that. He said, ‘did you think I was going to watch your kids.’ I said I didn’t think so. He was really easy to work with.”

            Sheriff Bobby McCallum, interviewed on Wednesday, said he worked with Shewey for more than 50 years. They served together in Gainesville as Florida Highway Patrol troopers in 1970-71.

            “He was a good man, a very good man,” McCallum said.

            County Commissioner John Meeks brought up the subject of Shewey’s passing at the board meeting. He said Shewey had served on the Levy County Planning Commission from his district for six years.

            “Mr. Shewey worked for the sheriff’s office and was an all-around good guy,” Meeks said. “I know his health was declining a little. He passed away. It was heartbreaking. I think there was some COVID complications, but he was a really, really good man.”

            As a side note, this reporter spoke up at the county commission meeting about Shewey, commending him for his excellence as a law enforcement officer. This reporter worked with Shewey for more than a decade when he was chief investigator for the sheriff’s office.

            “He was excellent.”

            The family is making arrangements for a memorial service on Jan. 29 and interment with honors at Florida National Cemetery in Bushnell.

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Board of County Commission Meeting January 4, 2022; Posted January 6, 2022