Ceremony to be presided over by the Chief Justice of the S.C. Supreme Court and the SCDNR director<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n
By W. Thomas Smith Jr.<\/i><\/p>\n
Five law enforcement officers with the S.C. Department of Natural Resources (SCDNR) will receive promotions during a formal rank-advancing and swearing-in ceremony at the University of South Carolina’s Joseph F. Rice School of Law in Columbia, Thursday, June 4 at 4:00 p.m.<\/p>\n
According to a statement released earlier this week by SCDNR, the promotion ceremony is slated to by presided over by the Honorable John W. Kittredge, Chief Justice of the South Carolina Supreme Court, and Dr. Tom Mullikin, director of SCDNR.<\/p>\n
The promotions will recognize the leadership, service, and newly advanced ranks of SCDNR law enforcement officers (senior game wardens) including Capt. Thomas Buckhannon (from staff sergeant to captain), Maj. Erik Martin (captain to major), Lt. Col. Matt McCaskill (major to lieutenant colonel), Lt. Col. Michael Paul Thomas (major to lieutenant colonel), and Col. Jamie Landrum (lieutenant colonel to colonel).<\/p>\n
“With these promotions, SCDNR is doing much more than recognizing achievement,” said Capt. Charlotte Mahugh, statewide media liaison for SCDNR law enforcement and the department’s education and outreach lead. “We are strengthening the future of our agency and the conservation mission we serve. As these officers assume increasing greater responsibility, we look to the future with confidence, knowing it is in highly capable hands.”<\/p>\n
SCDNR Director Tom Mullikin says that’s “exactly correct” and to the point.<\/p>\n
“These five promotions speak to exceptional careers,” said Mullikin, a world-renowned global expedition leader and former first chair of the S.C. Floodwater Commission, who has served as SCDNR director since Feb. 2025. “These promotions also recognize new assignments, new missions, and new initiatives designed to meet the increased pressure on natural resources due to extreme weather and unprecedented growth of our state. This is key.”<\/p>\n
Among the new SCDNR initiatives are an Integrated Training Section, a Natural Resources Protection Unit (a sub-department within the department), a Center for Natural Resource and Conservation Law Enforcement Excellence, as well as an Office of Future Operations.<\/p>\n
“That final initiative is designed not merely to respond to changing conditions, but to anticipate them,” says Mullikin. “And within these, we need the strongest leadership possible.”
According to the SCDNR statement: “Family members, colleagues, and agency leadership will gather to recognize their [the law enforcement officers’] accomplishments and continued commitment to protecting South Carolina’s natural resources and serving the citizens of the state.”<\/p>\n
– For more information about SCDNR, please visit SCDNR<\/a><\/i><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Ceremony to be presided over by the Chief Justice of the S.C. Supreme Court and the SCDNR director By W. Thomas Smith Jr. Five law enforcement officers with the S.C. Department of Natural Resources (SCDNR) will receive promotions during a formal rank-advancing and swearing-in ceremony at the University of SouthContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8565,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[44],"tags":[361],"class_list":["entry","author-john-griggs","post-8564","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-public-safety","tag-scdnr"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/gpstrianglenews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/SCDNR-LOGO_2026_630x350.jpg?fit=630%2C350&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gpstrianglenews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gpstrianglenews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gpstrianglenews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gpstrianglenews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gpstrianglenews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8564"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gpstrianglenews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8564\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gpstrianglenews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gpstrianglenews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gpstrianglenews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gpstrianglenews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}