Following his arraignment on multiple charges of sexual misconduct in Rutland Superior Court last Wednesday, Windsor County Sheriff Ryan Palmer addressed the media outside the courtroom: “At the end of the day, this involves my personal life.”
He stopped speaking when he noticed several more reporters shuffle out of the courtroom to catch up to him. Once the small scrum was all gathered around him, Palmer repeated himself: “This is … my personal life.”
Like his statements, the allegations against Palmer also repeat themselves.
The investigation into Palmer initially stemmed from anonymous tips last July made to Vermont State Police alleging financial misconduct in the Windsor County Sheriff’s Office. As of yet, investigators have not alleged any financial wrongdoing related to the department.
But during the investigation into the Sheriff’s Office’s finances, additional tips came in concerning Palmer and sexual misconduct.
Now, investigators allege Palmer, 39, engaged in a pattern of predatory behavior between 2024 and 2025 involving three victims, payments or offered payments for sex acts, encouragement to lie to investigators, and stalking of the victims’ homes and places of employment when they cut off contact with him, according to the affidavit in the case from State Police investigators.
In each instance, Palmer used his law enforcement work to identify the women he later would try to ply with money to watch him masturbate in person or during online video calls. In at least two of the instances outlined by investigators last week, Palmer appeared to target the women after he learned they were having financial difficulties.
Palmer faces two felony counts of obstruction of justice, two felony counts of aggravated stalking with a deadly weapon, a felony count of lewd and lascivious conduct and two misdemeanor counts of soliciting prostitution.
He pleaded not guilty in Rutland Superior Court last Wednesday.
A pattern of predation
The first victim came to the attention of investigators last September when they were approached by her lawyer, who said she had evidence of potentially criminal behavior by Palmer, according to the affidavit. The woman came forward because she was concerned that the payments Palmer made to her could be swept up in the investigation of the Sheriff Office’s finances that was made public by State Police in August.
The woman told investigators that in June 2024 she had contacted Palmer, who she’d known since high school, about “an episode” involving her son, according to the affidavit. She also confided in Palmer about financial difficulties her family was having. Subsequently, Palmer was able to help get the child placed in a treatment program “and she was grateful for it.”
Palmer continued to message the woman, ostensibly to inquire about the child, but in August 2024, the messages turned sexual, according to the affidavit. He mentioned watching online pornography, referred to himself as a “deviant” and eventually offered to pay her $100 to watch him masturbate during a FaceTime call.
He sent her $100, which she returned, according to the affidavit.
A week later, the woman received a video call from Palmer where he was already undressed and touching himself, according to the affidavit. Afterward, he sent her $50.
They continued to meet online and in person until summer 2025, during which time Palmer paid her hundreds of dollars for sex acts, according to the affidavit. The alleged stalking occurred last November, after the woman cut off contact with Palmer and she had been interviewed by investigators.
According to the affidavit, the second victim came to the attention of investigators last November. In an interview, the woman said she met Palmer around October 2024, while she was working at a hospital where Palmer brought in a patient who was in custody. Later, he began following her social media accounts and gave her his cellphone number.
Beginning Oct. 20, 2024, Palmer started sending her money, unsolicited, with messages such as, “Cheer up,” according to the affidavit. He sent seven payments between Oct. 20 and Nov. 1., and on Nov. 1, the woman met him for dinner in Woodstock.
They continued to communicate through the end of 2024, according to the affidavit. In January, Palmer began paying the woman to watch FaceTime calls where he would masturbate. This arrangement continued into last spring, and the woman estimated Palmer paid her $600-$1,000 in total, according to the affidavit.
After the woman cut off contact with Palmer around April, he continued to confront her publicly, including one incident in July when he showed up in uniform in his police vehicle at the hospital where she worked to ask why she stopped talking to him, according to the affidavit. He also drove by her house.
Another witness in the case who knew about the payments to the second victim told investigators that Palmer started sending her money online, unsolicited, according to the affidavit. The witness told investigators she thought the payments were an attempt to keep her from telling investigators what she knew.
The witness told investigators that Palmer said the lead investigator in the case was a friend and that if she and the second victim did not provide “any ammunition then he would not go any further with the investigation,” according to the affidavit.
It’s not clear which investigator Palmer was referring to. The affidavit in the case was filed by Detective Sgt. David Robillard of the Vermont State Police.
The third victim connected to the charges against Palmer sought his help last fall because of a dispute with her father-in-law after her husband had died, according to the affidavit.
Palmer failed to resolve the dispute, but similar to the other victims, after the initial interaction related to Palmer’s duties as sheriff, he began to contact the woman through her social media accounts.
During conversations online, the third woman mentioned “being broke” and would “vent about her debt,” the affidavit stated.
Similar to the previous incidents, Palmer began sending the woman money, unsolicited, along with requests to accept his FaceTime calls or send nude images of herself, according to the affidavit.
The last time the woman interacted online with Palmer was on Nov. 18, according to the affidavit. Two days later, on Nov. 20, she was contacted by State Police about their investigation and blocked Palmer on all her social media accounts.
A track record of misconduct
Palmer has faced claims of misconduct before. In fact, such allegations have affected his law enforcement career multiple times.
Palmer’s attorney, Daniel Sedon, declined to comment on the case and past allegations when reached by phone on Friday. A voicemail left for Palmer himself was not returned by deadline.
At 19, Palmer, a Windsor native, joined the Claremont Police Department. Claremont Police Chief Brent Wilmot did not immediately respond to phone and email requests for information about complaints regarding Palmer during his time there.
After leaving Claremont, Palmer went on to work for the Canaan Police Department. He began his field training there in April 2008.
In May, then-Chief of Police Samuel Frank II conducted an internal investigation into Palmer related to Palmer making inappropriate comments to three juveniles after responding to an underage drinking party, according to Canaan Police Department records.
Frank issued a reprimand letter to Palmer and no further action was to be taken if no other incidents occurred in the following six months. But in July 2008, Palmer was terminated for “lack of improvement in (his) job performance.”
The termination letter stated he failed “to meet the department standards.”
A few years later, another underage drinking incident led to his suspension from the Windsor Police Department.
In November 2012, the late Windsor Police Chief Stephen Soares stated he was “about to suspend a full-time officer for 30 days (without pay) for violating not only department policy but, violating state statute … Alcohol beverages … (enabling consumption by minors),” according to an email obtained by the Valley News.
Palmer was identified as the officer who allegedly held a party at his home with his 19-year-old girlfriend and her friends, whom the chief stated were also underage for alcohol consumption, according to the email.
“Long story made short: Officer Palmer (off-duty) … did nothing to prevent the furtherance of the underage drinking,” the email stated.
In August 2014, Palmer’s application to become the Windsor school resource officer was rejected, according to an email to Soares obtained by the Valley News. The name of the sender of the message was redacted.
Palmer’s “(h)istorical boundary issues, particularly with social media, result in some skepticism around his filling this post,” the email stated. “That said, we were willing to proceed with a probationary period to see if Officer Palmer was able to keep boundaries in check.”
However, the email stated, there had been “two recent incidents involving our assistant principal that demonstrate very unprofessional boundary issues on Officer Palmer’s part.”
When reached for comment on Friday, David Baker, then-Windsor superintendent and current superintendent of Orleans Southwest Supervisory Union, stated by email: “Yes, Ryan did not get the job as School Resource Officer. We simply had a better candidate. That is all I remember.”
In February 2016, while still employed by Windsor, Palmer called Hartford Dispatch while off-duty and requested they run the license plate of a vehicle, which turned out to be registered to a Lebanon police officer, according to a Windsor Police Department report documenting the incident obtained by the Valley News.
According to the report, the officer the car was registered to was dating Palmer’s ex-girlfriend. Additionally, Palmer is alleged to have made numerous comments to coworkers that he hated said officer for dating his ex-girlfriend and called him “the (homophobic slur) that drives a Prius.”
In that incident, Palmer was found by the Windsor Police Department to have violated two department policies: “Officers are prohibited from using information gained through their position as a law enforcement officer to advance financial or private interest of themselves or others,” and “Officers shall not use their police powers to resolve personal grievances.”
No further investigation or action was taken, the report stated, as Palmer resigned from the Windsor Police Department in June 2016, the morning he was scheduled to be interviewed about the incident.
Not first time as defendant
In 2014, while working for Windsor, Palmer was involved in a botched sting operation in which he shot and wounded a man. He faced charges of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and reckless endangerment in a 2017 trial at which he was ultimately acquitted.
Sedon, who is defending Palmer on the charges of sexual misconduct, also served as his counsel in 2017.
Following the trial, Palmer moved to Louisville, Ky., where he spent 18 months working in private security. In January 2018, the Windsor Selectboard unanimously voted to pay the $62,000 in legal fees Palmer incurred as a defendant because he had been found not guilty.
He later returned to the Upper Valley and police work, hired in 2018 as a police officer in Ludlow, Vt.
Efforts to reach the Ludlow Police Department for information about any complaints against Palmer during his time there were not successful.
Windsor County voters first elected Palmer to the office of sheriff for a four-year term in 2022. If he wants another term, he’ll have to run for reelection in November. Palmer said last week he would step back from day-to-day operations at the Sheriff’s Office, but has no intention of resigning.
Capt. Claude Weyant is now in charge of the Windsor County Sheriff’s Department “until things get straightened out through the legal system,” Weyant said in a phone interview.