Steven Seagal Bailing on Joe Arpaio's "Training" Session, Says Something "Important" Came Up

Steven Seagal actually won't be taking part in the latest episode of Sheriff Joe Arpaio's months-long exploitation of the school-shooting tragedy in Newtown, Connecticut.

Seagal, putting out a statement through the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office -- which, honestly, doesn't even sound strange at all at this point -- says he has something "very important" he has to do, forbidding him from attending Arpaio's publicity event.

See also:
-Joe Arpaio Not Done Exploiting Newtown; Seagal to Lead More "Training"
-Joe Arpaio's Posse Doing a School-Shooting Simulation, Seagal's Supervising
-New Times Rolls With Joe Arpaio's School-Patrol Posse; Nobody Dies
-Joe Arpaio Releases List of Posse-Patrolled Schools, Talks Publicity Stunts
-Joe Arpaio's Posse: The COPS Episode (Kind of)
-Joe Arpaio's School-Patrolling Posse Not POST Certified; I.E., They Ain't Cops

Gee, Arpaio told the media this was a totally-serious exercise in protecting schoolchildren from being shot by madmen. What could possibly be more "important" than that?

It was just a couple months ago that Seagal supposedly led "all-day training exercises on various aspects on shooting scene management including room entry tactics and hand to hand tactics," as if Seagal's ninja kicks and neck-snappings are going to stop a madman from shooting children.

Oh well, Arpaio's exploitation stunt is foiled.

In case you missed Arpaio's shameless self-promotion reasoning behind the latest stunt, check it out below:

Since the Sandy Hook disaster, the Sheriff's Office has made three separate arrests of student suspects in three different schools for threats to fellow students, including two involving weapons, during a six week period. On December 20, 2012, Arpaio announced the arrest of a 16-year-old female student at Red Mountain High School in Mesa after uncovering a plot to gun down schoolmates and then kill herself. On January 23, 2013, a fifth-grade student at Frank Elementary in Guadalupe was arrested for making threats to stab another student and was found to have a knife in his backpack while on school grounds. On February 6, 2013, a 16-yr-old male student was arrested by Sheriff's Deputies for carrying a loaded weapon on a school bus and campus and for allegedly making threats against a fellow student at Dysart High School in Youngtown.

"This training is essential for the posse protection plan that will involve schools throughout the county," said Sheriff Arpaio. "As previous arrests in school related threats show, the safety of our school children is not to be taken lightly or with inadequate measures."

This past February a vacated and non-use school in Fountain Hills served as the working backdrop for the first time simulation paces of the School Protection Posse. Sheriff Arpaio developed the posse to act as a deterrent to potential threats to school children, teachers and administrators in the wake of the mass shooting in Newtown, Conn., which tragically took the lives of many young students and adults in Sandy Hook Elementary in early December 2012.