Ex-Minuteman and anti-immigrant vigilante Chris Simcox declined to speak on his own behalf during his sentencing today in a Phoenix courtroom. “I have nothing to say, Your Honor,” the former kindergarten teacher said, as he stood before Judge Jose Padilla. He was dressed in stripes with his wrists handcuffed in…
Whether online or in person, an angry mob bent on vengeance is not easily placated. Particularly when dead pets are involved. So it goes for some in the Twitterverse, who erupted in rage at Thursday’s news that Gilbert resident Todd Hughes and his mother, MaLeisa Hughes, had copped a plea…
How much does it cost to stage an Islam-bashing festival for law enforcement, tick off the local Muslim community, and engender widespread condemnation from the press, the general public, and civil rights groups like the ACLU and the ADL? About the price of a brand-spankin’-new BMW 328i. Which is to…
A Phoenix driver who allegedly killed three men, including popular local rapper José “Low Key” Hernandez, in an auto crash last year, may wind up serving no more than a month in jail if he’s convicted, despite having admitted to drinking the night of the accident and to running a…
According to one local Republican official, it’s time for the Donald Trump camp to dole out some mob-style justice. This past Saturday, during a radio show broadcast from the Old Pueblo, Bruce Ash, a Tucson businessman who is one of Arizona’s two elected Republican National Committeemen, suggested that three political…
First they try to frame you, then they don’t want to give your property back. So it goes in the Kafkaesque saga of Leslie Merritt Jr., the guy the Arizona Department of Public Safety tried to paint as “the I-10 shooter” after he was arrested last September 18 for four…
Visit sunny Arizona, stay for seven to ten, behind bars. That could be the Arizona Chamber of Commerce’s new slogan for the state, based on a recent analysis by the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law, which shows that from 2006 to 2014, Arizona’s incarceration…
In the wake of a gunman’s attack on a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, that left 50 dead, including the shooter, and 53 injured, condemnations of the killer, Omar Mateen, who in a 911 call to authorities reportedly swore allegiance to the terrorist group ISIS, have poured in from across…
Wacko Tempe wacko preacher Steven Anderson never misses an opportunity to spew hate and homophobia, so it’s hardly a surprise that he’s capitalizing on the recent massacre at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, where a gunman killed 50 and wounded 53 more early Sunday morning in the worst act of…
U.S. Representative Paul Gosar, Tea Party Republican and professional tooth puller, is using the largesse of big government to assure his constituents that he’s, um, fighting big government. Granted, it’s a hard trick to pull off, but ol’ Doc Gosar is nothing if not baldfaced about it. He has been…
Ex-border vigilante Chris Simcox’s name now can be added to the list of infamous criminals to emerge from the Minuteman movement. On Wednesday, after deliberating for a day and a half, a Phoenix jury found the onetime anti-immigrant firebrand guilty on two counts of child molestation and one count of…
Monday morning, during the last day of ex-border vigilante Chris Simcox’s trial in Phoenix on six felony counts related to child molestation and exposing minors to porn, a video of one of his alleged victims dealt serious damage to Simcox’s cause when the prosecution played it in court. Simcox, who…
Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich today announced the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate Secretary of State Michele Reagan’s failure to send out hundreds of thousands of “publicity pamphlets” to voters regarding a recent statewide special election as required by law. In a letter to Reagan dated June 2,…
Taking the stand Thursday, during day 12 of his trial in Phoenix for child molestation, former Minuteman and onetime Fox News regular Chris Simcox attempted to undermine the credibility of his accusers, calling one child “extremely precocious” with a penchant for foul language, and another, his grown daughter Linsey Randich,…
Outside Phoenix’s Sandra Day O’Connor U.S. Courthouse on Tuesday, opponents of Sheriff Joe Arpaio serenaded passersby with live mariachi music, chanted “Arrest Arpaio, not the people,” and unveiled a giant balloon depicting their nemesis in handcuffs and stripes. But inside the courthouse, by the the end of a five-hour session,…
Today, in a preview of a high-stakes hearing on Tuesday, May 31, in the contempt case of Sheriff Joe Arpaio and three of his subordinates, the ACLU filed a memorandum asking U.S. District Judge G. Murray Snow to make a referral to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, asking for an investigation…
A Louisiana man’s life ended Wednesday after a swarm of bees attacked him and a companion in Usery Mountain Regional Park, just northwest of Apache Junction. Maricopa County sheriff’s deputies say 23-year-old Alex Bestler and a friend were hiking Merkle Trail when the swarm attacked unprovoked. The friend made it…
Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich waded into the nation’s tumultuous transgender-bathroom fray, announcing Wednesday that Arizona is one of 11 states with public officials suing the Obama administration regarding recent guidelines on how public schools should treat transgender students. The lawsuit, brought in U.S. District Court in Texas, claims the…
For years, I and other critics of Joe Arpaio have borne witness to the Maricopa County Sheriff’s trashing of people’s constitutional rights, his violations of the law, his general megalomania. And we all want one thing: justice. That has been difficult to obtain, even as Arpaio’s support has eroded, as…
Former border vigilante Chris Simcox probably won’t be getting any Father’s Day cards in jail, judging from the testimony of three of his daughters on Monday, during the Minuteman Project co-founder’s ongoing trial on six counts of child molestation and furnishing pornography to minors. Two of the daughters who took the…
Shitcanned. A local TV news outlet has fired one of its top reporters after he was arrested for public defecation. CBS 5 (KPHO) news director Dan Wilson confirmed to New Times via e-mail today that reporter Jonathan Lowe “no longer works for the station.” When New Times wrote about the bizarre incident,…
Former border vigilante Chris Simcox came face to face with one of his accusers in a Phoenix court on Wednesday, May 18: a pretty, 8-year-old girl with long brown hair, who likes to read and used to play with Simcox’s two daughters, who are about her age. She testified about…
