Small Town Alabama Police Force Disbanded Amidst Corruption and Arrests
By Rick McCann
Blue RAM Media/Gulf Coast News
February 27, 2026
HANCEVILLE, Ala. There is one less police agency now in Alabama, after the mayor terminated the entire Hanceville police force.
The small-town police department, located in Cullman County, has been rocked with scandals, corruption and the arrests of some of their police officers including the police chief.
The city of Hanceville with about 3000 people, on Thursday appointed a new mayor and officially dissolved its police department and municipal court system after a history of bad actors and frequent “corruption.”
Newly appointed Mayor Nolan Bradford said the decision to abolish the police department would allow the city to “cut it off clean and rebuild it from scratch.”
In the meantime, the Cullman County Sheriff’s Office will patrol the community and answer any calls for service.
“To make things legal, we must get rid of everything that represents a police force, the mayor said. It must be transferred over to the sheriff department or some other law enforcement entity, and we need to transfer our evidence and other department property to the Cullman County Sheriff’s Office.
After the Aug. 23, 2024, drug overdose death of a dispatcher in the Hanceville police office, the State Bureau of Investigation stepped in.
A Cullman County grand jury said the police department operated under “a rampant culture of corruption,” which included on-duty drug injections, misuse of criminal databases and distribution of controlled substances to each other and to others, according to court documents.
In February 2025, after several arrests, the remaining employees of the Hanceville Police Department were placed on administrative leave.
The city has been in turmoil for several years which included indictments of former Chief Jason Marlin and Officers Cody Alan Kelso, Drew Shelnut, Jason Wilbanks and Eric Michael Kelso.
The Hanceville City Council voted unanimously to hire a new police chief and rebuild their police department but in January, former Mayor Paul Campbell resigned after his wife’s death. The position was temporarily filled by Bradford, who has now been officially appointed as mayor.
At this point, rebuilding the police department depends on the city’s insurance and budget allowance, said Bradford.
Right now, we need to let the sheriff’s office be the police in our city right now and maybe sometime in the future we can start our police force over, Bradford said.
“We’re just going to have to see what we can work out with the county in the interim.”
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