We finally got a chance to inspect the report from the raid on Mesa city buildings last year by the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office, months after we requested it. You remember this one — the nighttime raid on the city government that employed Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s law enforcement nemesis, George Gascon,…
Looks like our nativist cover-girl Shawna Forde and two others could get the death penalty for their roles in the murder of a man and his 9-year old daughter during an Arivaca home invasion earlier this year. Deputy Pima County attorney Kellie Johnson announced yesterday that she’d filed a notice…
It seems like a classic case of “if you can’t take the heat, get out of the kitchen” for Senator Pamela Gorman, who recently e-mailed a New Times reader, called him a fool, and whined about her long hours, and lousy pay. Gorman recently quit her post as house majority whip,…
As our readers know, we corrected misinformation yesterday about whether the takeover of a computer system by the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office gave Arpaio and his minions access to judge’s e-mails they aren’t allowed to have. But someone forgot to send the memo to the Arizona Republic’s editorial writers, who…
Pot is one hot commodity this year — at least, judging by the insanely large loads the U.S. Border Patrol have seized this summer. During the month of July alone, Tucson seized more than 100,000 pounds of pot — bringing the total poundage to 1,065,325 this year. That’s well above…
We have met many a character during our long tenure here at New Times, but none more memorable or valuable to our community than Mike Teodori, the longtime chief of pediatric heart surgery at Phoenix Children’s Hospital. We spent months with the good doctor, the smiling dude in the photo, reporting…
Mayor Phil Gordon is to be congratulated for the Elements of Hate panel discussion his office organized, which took place Wednesday at the newly-renovated AE England Building at Civic Space Park in Downtown Phoenix. The event coincided with the visit of the Southern Poverty Law Center’s representative Heidi Beirich. In…
The chief deputy for the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office told a judge yesterday he believed intrusion into a law enforcement computer system “was imminent,” the Arizona Republic reported this morning. Apparently, that’s the reason the chief deputy, Dave Hendershott, ordered a dozen armed deputies to take over the system on…
D-Backs ace Dan Haren will try to throw a minor monkeywrench into the Dodgers’ postseason plans tonight. Way back on April 10, we reluctantly — because it was a distasteful task — called the National League West for the Los Angeles Dodgers. Of course, it’s not a done deal yet. The Boys…
In a football preseason opener, the Arizona Cardinals lost 10-20 to the Pittsburgh Steelers, on Steeler turf last night. The Cardinals’ only touchdown in the game was fourth-string quarterback Tyler Palko’s 20-yard pass to Onrea Jones…A hiker has died in the Grand Canyon after running out of water. The hiker,…
In the 24-hour news cycle it can be difficult to keep up. We have the solution. Check back on Valley Fever every evening for highlights from each of New Times’ blogs. Today’s entries: Feathered Bastard: SPLC’s Heidi Beirich Whacks Joe Arpaio for Playing Pattycake with Nativists and Neo-Nazis Up on…
At what point do you come to the realization that your car is a “clunker,” and it might be a good idea to take advantage of the federal government’s generous “Cash for Clunkers” program? How about after you run over a bicyclist, and need to get rid of the evidence?…
Get this straight: Israel is in a constant state of turmoil, political infighting and worn-on-the-skeeve angst–and we’re not even talking about the tensions (or worse) between the Jews and the Arabs. Israel is beautiful in many ways, but it does gets downright goofy over there, as I witnessed during my recent adventure…
Despite a shift by Immigration and Customs Enforcement away from indiscriminate worksite raids nationwide, and despite the fact that Sheriff Joe Arpaio continues to thumb his nose at the feds in various ways — taping conversations between ICE and MCSO employees, refusing to cooperate with a Justice Department investigation, etc…
Two-and-a-half hours of this hearing and we’re wondering how much money taxpayers are paying for this. Remember, we’re all paying for the lawyers on both sides. On the sheriff’s side, it seems like even if this password-changing action was legitimate, it didn’t need to be done as some kind of…
2:40 p.m. Back to hearing. Sheriff’s office is turning over info to the Department of Justice that it believes shows court personnel engaged in criminal activity, says the sheriff’s lawyer, Kerry Martin. Martin does not go into detail but apparently it might have had something to do with the ICJIS…
The head of the Maricopa County ICJIS department, the one the sheriff’s office raided yesterday, just told us that databases cannot be accessed through those computers. In other words, our earlier post was mislabeled — we’ll go back and fix it in a minute. The main thing to know…
Issue: The county is seeking a restraining order against the sheriff’s office following yesterday’s raid by deputies on a building containing county computers The courtroom is packed with private lawyers, county officials, reporters and other observers. Barnett Lotstein, a top aide under Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas, came to…
Governor Jan Brewer released a statement Wednesday berating members of her own party who have vehemently refused to support sending a 1-cent sales tax increase to the ballot in November. “I trust the people of Arizona. But, I am deeply disappointed that some Members of the Arizona State Senate do…
The state legislature inflicts “direct injury” to the governor’s constitutional authority if it withholds passed bills from the governor, the Arizona Supreme Court says in an explanatory opinion released today. If you’ll recall, Governor Jan Brewer had to sue the legislature in June to force it to give her the budget it had passed. Brewer wanted to veto…
The county feud took what is perhaps its ugliest turn yesterday as deputies with the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office seized county computers with data a court already ruled the sheriff couldn’t access. UPDATE: We just found out (2:35 p.m.) that the computers seized by the sheriff’s office don’t provide access…
Newspaper articles that contain the word “may” in the nutgraph, the “what’s this article about” paragraph, should often be considered suspect from the start. It’s a J-school basic, and it makes sense. After all, the casual reader can easily turn that into an equally accurate “may not” phrase, which renders…
