ATLANTA — A middle Georgia sheriff’s sharp criticism of Gov. Nathan Deal’s criminal justice reform initiatives was publicly condemned this week at the state capitol.

The lawman who made those statements was Putnam County Sheriff Howard Sills, known for speaking his mind on many topics.

“Never, never in this state’s history has the criminal justice element been coddled and fostered as it has been over the last seven years,” Sills wrote in an email to other sheriffs across the state who are members of the Georgia Sheriffs’ Association.

Sills said Friday that his message, which was published earlier this week by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, was in response to the association’s request for feedback on Deal’s latest reform proposals. A copy of Sills’ email was obtained Friday by The Union-Recorder in Milledgeville.

“This governor has done more for those who perpetrate crime than Lucifer and his demons combined, and every piece of his criminal justice reform that has been passed into law has complicated or burdened our duties and/or endangered the citizenry of our state,” Sills said in his email.

Sills said Friday that he stands behind his criticism of the governor’s criminal justice policies.

“While I make no apologies, I regret using a reference to Lucifer,” Sills said in a telephone interview. “Perhaps that was poor language.”

Sills said he didn’t intend to compare the governor to Lucifer.

“The sentence reads: That nobody has done more for criminals than Lucifer and the demons combined. That’s not really a comparison. That’s an example, and hell, I’ll admit using the devil and his demons as an example (to the governor). I regret that,” Sills said.

Sills’ comments came after Deal’s office announced the final criminal justice reform bills that the outgoing Republican governor plans to pursue during his last year in office.

The veteran sheriff, who serves as second vice president of the sheriffs’ association, noted that he didn’t need to read anything past the point of “first time felons to get 12 months probation” to know that he stood in firm opposition to the bill.

“In the year 2018 it appears we stand alone with our duty to protect the lives, persons, property, health, and morals of the people, as we answer to the people and are not beholding to a tyrant who is apparently hell bent to accomplish the antithesis of our duty,” Sills wrote in his original email. “Our wise forefathers placed the office we hold in the protective bosom of our constitution just as we could speak out against those who endanger the public we endeavor to protect.”

The measure Sills was referring to would also change the misdemeanor bail process and would allow judges more flexibility to convert fees and fines into community service for low-income defendants, among other changes.

Sills explained that the email he sent to members of the sheriffs’ association was never sent by him to any media outlet.

“I have not contacted anybody in the news media — not one soul,” Sills said. “I’ve gone about my everyday duties as I always do. I sent that email to the sheriffs. It was addressed to the sheriffs, as I frequently do.”

He said somebody else sent the email to the AJC. When he was contacted by the newspaper, Sills said he simply acknowledged that he sent the email to the association.

“And now once again, I did it,” Sills said to a Union-Recorder reporter. “Again, I’m not apologizing. I’d do it again today, and do it again tomorrow. I’m not a timid individual. And this is America. This is not North Korea, and I have a right to do that and I feel I have a duty to do [that].”

Deal’s proposals would build on his administration’s criminal justice reform initiatives, such as the accountability courts that give non-violent offenders an alternative to prison.

Several state lawmakers issued blistering criticism of Sills’ comments. House Speaker David Ralston, R-Blue Ridge, urged other sheriffs across the state to condemn Sills’ comments as “sick talk.”

Ralston said when he read those comments Thursday morning that he got sick to his stomach.

“Few things in my public career have I found as disgusting and deplorable as that statement made by a man who wears a badge,” Ralston said.

When informed of the statements Ralston made, Sills said this: “Let me say this: He (Ralston) has a perfect right, a perfect and absolute Constitutional right, to say what he wishes, and by God, I do, too.”

Rep. Al Williams, D-Midway, who took office in 2003, said that Sills’ comments amounted to “bullying.”

“I came to this House when the answer to everything was to lock them up and throw the key away,” Williams said. “And then we got to where we couldn’t even afford to buy keys, and finally realized that minor infractions did not deserve three strikes, you’re out. Life in prison.”

Rep. John Meadows, R-Calhoun, said Sills’ comments were “totally out of line” and that his colleagues should censure him.

“The statement that we stand alone to protect the lives, persons, property and health, and laws of the people is an insult to me, and you should be insulted,” Meadows told colleagues Thursday. “You don’t have that duty? That’s a bunch of crap.”