Nelson County Kentucky Sheriff Ramon Pineiroa indictment

Some know him as the former president of the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 43…

Sheriff of the Year…

President of the Kentucky Sheriffs’ Association…

Or just as Coach.

But to many, Nelson County Sheriff Ramon Pineiroa is known as the “Pork Chop Cop.”

For years, Pineiroa gained popularity by hosting fundraisers for local youth — from sports clubs and school bands to senior class graduations — where pork chops are cooked up on a mobile 20-foot grill on a trailer.

In an interview with a local TV station when he first ran for office in 2018, he said the pork chop fundraisers had pulled in hundreds of thousands of dollars for local groups.

But now, the popular lawman faces a stack of criminal charges — charges that could send him to prison for decades, if convicted.

Kentucky State Police — where his son, Riley, serves as a trooper — investigated the elder Pineiroa, which led to an indictment last week of the sheriff and Chief Deputy Brandon Bryan.

The serious charges brought against Pineiroa have been a jolt to Nelson County, where the Democrat ran unopposed in 2022 — and even gathered the support of partisan Republicans.

“It’d be a Normal Rockwell painting, our current leadership,” Don Thrasher, who led the Nelson County Republican Party until 2022, told The Courier Journal. “It’s a small town, a small community, but that’s the epitome of who we would want as a sheriff, in my opinion.”

Public documents, a review of social media and interviews with sources who know Pineiroa paint a picture of a well-liked, popular law enforcement official who now faces what his attorney calls “baseless” allegations of wrongdoing.

Pineiroa, 51, grew up in south Florida before joining the U.S. Army in 1993 after he graduated from high school. He was sent to Fort Knox, about 40 miles south of Louisville, for training.

He became a sergeant, according to campaign materials, and eventually met his wife, Tania, who is from Bardstown, when he returned to Fort Knox after a deployment to Korea.

He left the Army in 2002 and joined the Nelson County Sheriff’s Office in 2006. He had no previous law enforcement experience but grew up looking up to an uncle in Florida who was a sheriff’s deputy.

After former Nelson County Sheriff Ed Mattingly announced he would not seek reelection, Pineiroa decided to run in the 2018 election.

“I had it in my mind to run, but when people started asking me why I didn’t run, why I hadn’t run, it made it a little easier to put it together,” he said in a local TV interview in 2018.

His first campaign shirts were a riff on the simple “Vote for Pedro” shirts from the 2004 cult indie comedy “Napoleon Dynamite”: They featured the words “vote for P-Ro,” a nickname for Pineiroa, underneath an outline of his face.

Later campaign merch had a more conventional design, with a logo set against a yellow backdrop advertising Pineiroa as veteran, lawman and leader.

In May 2018, he bested two Democratic Party candidates, beating his closest challenger by 9%.

The runner-up in the primary, Kaelen Matthews, was arrested the next year on a felony-level shoplifting charge while serving as a Nelson County Sheriff’s Office lieutenant under Pineiroa. Matthews is currently on pretrial diversion according to Kentucky Department of Corrections online records.

While Pineiroa won the primary handily, in Facebook posts he alleged people were spreading “lies” about him, including that he was in the United States illegally, had drug cartel connections and was profiting from the pork chop fundraisers.

“Beware of wolves in sheep’s clothing knocking on your door,” he wrote in a March 2018 post. “If you are spewing hate and lies about another candidate rather than the merits of yourself or your candidate, that says everything about You!”

Pineiroa won the November 2018 general election by a tighter margin, beating his Republican challenger, then-Louisville Metro Police officer Todd Harper, by just over 400 votes in a contest where more than 16,000 ballots were cast.

Pineiroa’s popularity extended beyond his constituents in Nelson County.

In 2023, he was named Sheriff of the Year by the Kentucky Sheriffs’ Association, the body that represents the top elected law enforcement officers from across the commonwealth’s 120 counties.

“He has earned the respect of his deputies because he is a ‘Hands On’ sheriff. They know he has their back, and they have his,” reads a post on the Kentucky Sheriffs’ Association website. “He realizes the importance of the families of the personnel who serve him. He has hosted everything from Easter Egg Hunts to Superbowl Cookouts among many other events throughout the year that involve family members of all ages. Attendance at these events has been a huge success.”

Last year, the Kentucky Sheriffs’ Association voted him to be the president of its board, and he was featured on the cover of the organization’s 2025 official publication.

And last April, on the final day of the legislative session in Frankfort, the General Assembly adopted a resolution honoring Pineiroa for being named Sheriff of the Year.

According to that resolution, which was filed by Kentucky state Sen. Jimmy Higdon, R-Lebanon, Nelson County’s fiscal court declared Sept. 14 to be “Sheriff Ramon Pineiroa Day.”

When The Courier Journal reached out to Higdon for comment, a Senate majority communications staffer responded to say the senator, who represents Nelson County, would not be commenting on the resolution or situation facing the sheriff’s office.

The sheriff is also well-known in the community as a coach.

Pineiroa was hired as a football coach in 2014 at Nelson County High before becoming sheriff, and later served as a volunteer for the team.

In the reference letters contained in Pineiroa's school personnel file, former Nelson County football coach Jamie Egli wrote: "He is a guy that puts kids first. He builds relationships with young people and understands how we should treat kids and how to hold them accountable."

Pinieroa also coaches a youth girl's basketball team with Chief Deputy Bryan.

Pineiroa is known for his office’s work on the Crystal Rogers case. The 35-year-old Bardstown mother of five went missing in September 2015, before Pineiroa was the department’s sheriff. A month later, the sheriff’s office named her boyfriend, Brooks Houcks, as a suspect. He was later charged with murder and tampering with evidence in connection with Rogers’ disappearance.

The FBI took over the case in 2020, conducting multiple searches in and near Bardstown for Rogers’ body or other evidence, including most recently a multiday search in September 2024.

Jerry Wagner, the executive director of the Kentucky Sheriffs’ Association, told The Courier Journal that Pineiroa took a leave of absence from the organization last week, but said he has confidence in the Nelson County lawman.

“I worked with him for many years, and he’s a top-notch individual,” he said. “I don’t really know all the details of what the issues are down there, but I’m sure it will all come forth. I’ve spoken to him. I’m confident between them and the State Police they’ll get it all figured out. And I’m confident in him.”

Pineiroa’s indictment is the second time in recent months a Kentucky sheriff has been in the spotlight for alleged misdeeds. In September, then-Letcher County Sheriff Shawn "Mickey" Stines was charged with gunning down District Judge Kevin Mullins in his chambers.

“I can tell anybody: You should trust your sheriff. And the reason you should trust your sheriff is because the people in that county have trust and elected that person,” Wagner said. “That person is not appointed, they’re elected by the people in the county, which tells me, yes, they do trust them, and they should trust them.”

A whistleblower suit — which alleges improper vehicle sales by Pineiroa and Chief Deputy Brandon Bryan — landed in Nelson Circuit Court last month.

Ian Justice and Will Purdom, two Nelson County Sheriff’s Narcotics Detectives who were also assigned to the Greater Hardin County Narcotics Task Force, brought the suit forward.

According to the lawsuit, Justice attempted to report that Bryan was improperly selling vehicles seized by the Sheriff’s Office to an individual at “far less than fair market value,” instead of putting them up for auction.

The suit alleges Pineiroa retaliated against Justice for reporting “what they perceived to be theft and official misconduct” by removing him from a DEA Task Force, which was a significant amount of Justice’s income.

Last week, Bryan and Pineiroa were indicted in Nelson Circuit Court on charges of retaliating against Justice and Purdom, as well as improperly selling seized vehicles.

The charges against Pineiroa involve three felonies, including two counts of theft by deception and one count of abuse of public trust greater than $10,000 but less than $100,000. Each count carries a five- to 10-year sentence.

Pineiroa was also charged with three misdemeanors, including one count of official misconduct and two counts of violating a state law involving public employees. Each of those counts carries a sentence of 12 months.

The indictment appears to stem from the sale of vehicles seized by the Nelson County Sheriff's Office to a private buyer.

To represent him, Pineiroa has hired Steven Romines, the high-powered attorney who represented the world’s No. 1 golfer, Scottie Scheffler, after his arrest by LMPD last May, as well as Breonna Taylor’s boyfriend, who shot an LMPD officer in the leg during a fatal 2020 raid on Taylor’s home.

“The evidence is clear that Sheriff Pineiroa followed all processes appropriately and every dollar can be traced to the benefit of the citizens of Nelson County. We look forward to a quick trial in order to put an end to these baseless allegations,” Romines in statement.

He declined to comment further.

In a statement on behalf of Bryan, attorney Michael Niemietz said: “The evidence in this case will show that Chief Deputy Bryan has always upheld his duties to the Nelson County Sheriff’s Department and the citizens of Nelson County. He looks forward to the public learning the motivation behind these charges and proving that the allegations are baseless.”

Josh Wood is an investigative reporter who focuses on public safety and government. He can be reached [email protected] or on X at @JWoodJourno.

Stephanie Kuzydym is an enterprise and investigative sports reporter, with a focus on the health and safety of athletes. She can be reached [email protected]. Follow her for updates at@stephkuzy.