Chuck Carlson stands in front of Calvary Community Church holding the sort of sign you’d expect to see at confrontations outside abortion clinics. “PRO-LIFE,” the placard reads in bold red and blue letters on a white background. Carlson appears hopelessly out of place. He’s picketing a church that is home…
School district officials and consultants have a warning for the young families buying up houses in the new developments ringing the Valley: Don’t expect a neighborhood school for your kids. Double sessions, packed classrooms and long bus rides will be a reality in the not-so-distant future if laws for finding…
The cynicism oozing from some members of the legal community about how juries really work was palpable at the Arizona Supreme Court on January 31. The occasion was a meeting of the effusively titled “Arizona Supreme Court Committee on the More Effective Use of Juries,” which first convened in 2001…
A few days before a Maricopa County jury deliberated the fate of Ahwatukee salesman Brian Eftenoff in March 2001, he had this to say for himself: “I can’t see how they can find me guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of anything, because I didn’t do anything.” The panel, however, begged…
The Spike was a good kid this week. The Spike didn’t drive drunk. Didn’t steal anything. Didn’t urinate in public. The Spike didn’t even kill anyone. Although The Spike certainly thought about it when the very slick press kit from the State of Arizona’s new CounterActs campaign arrived in its…
A woman in her 60s answers the knock at the door. I ask for Paul Marcinkus. She says he can’t talk. She says he is recovering from hip surgery. I give her my card. Please have him give me a call, I say. She says it is unlikely that he…
Behavior Problem Deeply disturbed: As I’m sure you would expect, I was very disturbed after reading the “Very Bad Thoughts” article (Susy Buchanan, February 6). First of all, it sickens me that people like this exist in our society, and second, we do nothing about it? This guy has admitted…
Derek doesn’t like to let his mind wander he’s been fighting his thoughts for nearly two decades yet it wanders every day. Usually he can hold off his reflections until he’s safely alone in his room with the door shut. That’s when the darkness seeps in, sexual arousal triumphs over…
The Spike is in love. Batty, crazy, deeply in love. With speed. No, not the kind of speed that comes in a little white pill, but the kind that comes in a well-oiled, fine-tuned machine made for going as fast as possible in the fewest number of seconds. Yes, The…
It all started back in ’96 when Michael Lacey called me at the L.A. Times and asked me to meet him at a bar a block away. After more than a few cocktails, he asked me to leave what I thought was the high-and-mighty daily and help him start a…
I turned on the TV sometime after 11 a.m. Saturday. From the disjointed blurbs of the videotape, I first thought Wolf Blitzer and Lou Dobbs had been killed. There’d been a crash. In Texas. A video image of what looked like a meteorite didn’t help. The somber tone of the…
Environmental activists say two Valley billboard companies rejected their advertisement because it is critical of Salt River Project’s plans to build a massive coal mine that threatens to destroy the Zuni Salt Lake in western New Mexico. SRP does extensive business with Clear Channel Outdoor and Viacom. Both billboard companies…
It Bites Not Are you sure you’re not getting paid?: Funny shtick (“Madcap Moses,” Bite Me, Marnye Oppenheim, January 23)! A refreshing commentary with a little spunk (yeah, and I’m not even getting paid to say this). Kinda cool, kinda different, definitely amusing and entertaining. Definitely worth the time goofing…
Prosecutors at the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office say Justin Gregg raped Jennifer McAllister in June 2001, while the pair were patients at a county psychiatric hospital. At the same time, lawyers for Maricopa County say McAllister is making the whole thing up. Those attorneys are vigorously defending a lawsuit McAllister…
They didn’t put Fife Symington in a Plexiglas box, but the scene still reminded me of the Adolf Eichmann trial. There the fidgeting former governor sat, front-row of the Arizona House of Representatives, face-to-face with his accuser, new governor Janet Napolitano, as she delicately alluded in her State of the…
Last April, the doctors gave James Manak some painkillers and sent him home to die. After months of unexplained chest pain and difficulty breathing, Manak was diagnosed with a rare, untreatable form of cancer called mesothelioma. At 81, he wasn’t so shocked by the death sentence, but he was surprised…
Last September 22, veteran mental-health advocate Jack Harvey looked at a visitor from his hospital bed and got to the point. “There’s so much to do still,” Harvey said, “and I’ve just been one guy trying my best to help things along. I think folks ought to know that, if…
Judge Not Jurist prudence: As a lawyer and longtime student of his opinions, I read your article on Stanley Feldman with interest (“Judging Stanley,” Amy Silverman, January 23). Any honest person who is familiar with his opinions should at least admit that Judge Feldman was very bright, but was a…
For the past 20 years, a liberal Jew from Tucson has had as much impact on life in Arizona as anyone. While Republican governors were being impeached and indicted, while conservative legislators were whining about gay bowel disease and creating the alternative-fuels budget disaster, Arizona Supreme Court Justice Stanley Feldman…
First off, The Spike wants to thank all of you who were truly moved by the plight of the five baby desert tortoises in the path of the new Arizona Cardinals stadium, as reported last week in “Super Bowl V,” a story by freelance contributor Rubén Oman. The story, which…
If new information in an inmate-beating case is any indication – and if there’s any justice in this world – Sheriff Joe Arpaio should someday get sized for a pair of pink underwear of his own. A little background: In late December, I wrote about the strange case of a…
Ruffled FeathersA man after our own heart: I had to twice check the date on the front page while reading about the supposed effort by Arizona Cardinals owner Bill Bidwill to circumvent laws prohibiting the removal of desert tortoises from their natural habitat (“Super Bowl V,” Rubén Oman, January 16)…
