After 38 years with the Laramie County Sheriff's Office, Undersheriff Rich Hillegas is hanging up his badge effective tomorrow, Nov. 6.

"Many of you know, a lot won't, what we walked into in the office almost 18 years ago," Sheriff Danny Glick said Wednesday during a retirement ceremony for Hillegas. "Rich turned around everything and the great thing about it ... he made me look good while he was doing it."

Glick, who has been the sitting sheriff since winning his first term in 2002, joked that Hillegas was bailing on him.

"We've been together a long time," said Glick. "Rich hired on just before me in 1981. He was a corporal, he was a sergeant, he's run pretty much every operational division until Pat Barrett came into office and that's when he took over as captain of detention."

Hillegas, who started to cry after thanking the agency and his wife, Lorie, said, "It's hard to leave, but I think you're going to be in really good hands."

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