Wiles re-elected El Paso Sheriff

EL PASO, Texas -- There were four Democratic candidates running for El Paso County Sheriff on Tuesday, but ABC-7 projected incumbent Sheriff Richard Wiles won that race by a large margin.

He defeated El Paso Police Sgt. Ron Martin, Canutillo ISD Police Chief Carlos Carrillo and Raul Mendiola, who works in security for the Ysleta school district.

There were no Republicans on the primary ballot, so as the winner of the Democratic race, Sheriff Wiles retains his office.

Wiles, who joined the El Paso Police Department in 1982 and later became sheriff in 2009, offered an explanation as to why he thinks he earned well over 50% of the vote on Tuesday night.

"The Sheriff's Office is a very large organization, with almost a thousand employees, a budget over $100 million, and quite frankly, this is serious business to run an organization this big and you really have to have the education, training and, most importantly, the experience to run an organization that big," he said,"and I'm the only one who has that. My opponents, while they certainly have their work experience, come nowhere close to running a large organization like I've been doing successfully these last years."

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