A North Carolina prosecutor last week filed felony charges against Brindell Wilkins, the sheriff of Granville County, N.C. According to the indictment, a former deputy had recorded Sheriff Wilkins making racist comments and threatened to make them public. To protect his reputation, Sheriff Wilkins allegedly tried to hire a hit man to kill the deputy. This plan was concealed for years until recorded phone calls emerged between Sheriff Wilkins and the would-be killer.

Perhaps the most surprising part was the subsequent emergency meeting of the Granville Board of County Commissioners. The commissioners said North Carolina law tied their hands. While state law does provide for the removal of sheriff for reasons like “willful misconduct” and “intoxication,” the county commissioners were stymied by the lack of precedent and clarity. The law does not allow the commissioners to act unilaterally and since sheriff removals are so rare, they didn’t know how to proceed in such an unusual instance. (This week, Sheriff Wilkins agreed to a suspension after the Grandville County prosecutor filed a petition.)

Brindell Wilkins isn’t the only badly behaved sheriff. The Los Angeles County sheriff, Alex Villanueva has been in a protracted battle with the county board of supervisors over hiring people accused of assault, protecting a deputy who faked a shooting and permitting detectives to lie under oath. Last year, The Sacramento Bee reported that the sheriff of Trinity County, Calif., Bruce Haney had moved out of state and largely stopped working, yet was still receiving his taxpayer-funded salary . He retired shortly after that became public.

But in each of these cases, local officials stood by helplessly. Why is it so hard to remove a sheriff from office, even when that person is clearly ineffective or even criminal?