Phoenix PD Used to Smell Sweet Compared to the MCSO -- Now They Both Stink

NO ANGELS

Daniel Rodriguez's mother, Elvira Fernandez, at a recent fundraiser for her benefit.

Courtesy of THe MCSO

Officer Richard Chrisman, Rodriguez's alleged killer.

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More About

• Phoenix (Arizona)
• Richard Chrisman
• Phoenix Police Department
• Immigration
• Arizona Immigration

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For a long time, at least since I moved to Phoenix several years ago, the Phoenix Police Department has benefited from comparison to the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office.

Sheriff Joe Arpaio always has been a polarizing figure, and the MCSO's bully tactics and the often-deadly conditions it maintains in Arpaio's gulag archipelago are well documented.

Moreover, Arpaio's embrace of nativism, his anti-immigrant dragnets, and his support for Arizona Senate Bill 1070 have allowed him to play the villain or the hero, depending on what side of that debate you're on.

Then, there's the rampant corruption within the MCSO itself, which scribes at this paper have been writing about since Sheriff Joe took office 17 years ago.

You might say that the current state of this corruption has been confirmed by the recent leak of MCSO Deputy Chief Frank Munnell's memo outlining alleged criminal activity and malfeasance within Arpaio's command staff.

And then there are the multiple investigations of Arpaio's office by the U.S. Department of Justice's Civil Rights Division, the FBI, the Arizona U.S. Attorney's Office, the Arizona Attorney General's Office, and, due to Arpaio's direct request, the Pinal County Sheriff's Office, which, I'll admit has about as much claim to law enforcement expertise as the fictional deputy dawgs on Reno 911!.

Indeed, the Phoenix cops I know take it as a personal insult if they are compared to Arpaio's boys in beige. This, despite the fact that Phoenix Law Enforcement Association president Mark Spencer has been an unflagging supporter of Sheriff Joe, and PLEA itself has essentially mirrored Arpaio's line on immigration enforcement and SB 1070.

Still, unlike some lefties in this city, I have never put the PPD in the same category as the MCSO. Though I've been critical of Phoenix cops in the past, I've also become aware of Phoenix police officers whose work and professionalism I hold in the highest regard.

I'm specifically thinking of the men of the PPD's Career Criminal Squad, who've been responsible for taking violent white supremacists off the streets and busting murder-for-hire rackets.

Similarly, I've always been impressed with the very different skill sets of the officers in the PPD's Community Response Squad, the unit responsible for keeping the peace at demonstrations while at the same time protecting the First Amendment rights of demonstrators. On more than one occasion, I've seen the former head of that squad, Sergeant Brian Murray, get between feuding factions ready to exchange blows, talking down both sides.

So how do I reconcile the issues that have emerged from the tragic October 5 shooting of an unarmed citizen, Daniel Rodriguez, allegedly by PPD officer Richard Chrisman, a 10-year veteran of the force, with my own knowledge of some of the proactive, positive work the PPD does?

By all accounts, Rodriguez's death was unnecessary. If we assume for the sake of argument that fellow officer Sergio Virgillo was correct that the apparently unarmed Rodriguez was no threat to the two cops, then the two should have been able to restrain the 29-year-old without killing him. See, Rodriguez was no giant — he was about the same height as Chrisman (5-foot-7) and well under Chrisman's 175 pounds.

After the shooting, demonstrators in front of the PPD's headquarters demanded justice for Rodriguez, and there were suggestions that race played a role in the killing. However, there has been no evidence that Chrisman made racially charged statements. In fact, Chrisman's live-in girlfriend is Hispanic.

Furthermore, the call Chrisman and Virgillo were responding to — from Rodriguez's mom, Elvira Fernandez — suggests that she was afraid of her son. On the 911 recording of the call, she said Rodriguez was acting violently, throwing things around, and had punched a hole in a wall in her trailer home.

"I'm just afraid he's going to come back and hurt me," she said in the call. "He's hurt me before."

But Rodriguez's apparently being no angel doesn't justify his death.

Even if Rodriguez was resisting and not complying with their commands, a pair of Phoenix cops should have been able to handle the situation without a fatality. Particularly after Rodriguez was Tased twice and pepper-sprayed, according to Chrisman's probable-cause statement.

Both Chrisman and Virgillo have incidents in their past that are eyebrow-raising.

Although Virgillo's personnel file testifies to an exemplary 14-year record with the department, KPHO recently reported that Virgillo's wife, Maria, was indicted in 2008 for her participation in a drug-smuggling ring that involved her brother. She received three years probation.

The TV station found no evidence that Virgillo, who was then a detective with PPD's drug-enforcement bureau, knew of his wife's criminal activities. But according to Channel 5, she was aware of certain department undercover operations and fed such information to her brother.

As scandalous as that may sound, the videotape of Chrisman and another officer planting drug paraphernalia on a mentally handicapped homeless woman is outright disgusting and troubling on many levels.

The video was turned over to the press when interim County Attorney Rick Romley and Phoenix Public Safety Manager (read: Police Chief) Jack Harris held a press conference announcing that a second-degree murder charge and a charge of animal cruelty (for offing the victim's dog) had been added to Chrisman's initial charge of aggravated assault.