Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio won’t say whether one of his deputy chiefs, Paul Chagolla, deserves to be investigated for allegedly threatening an Arizona Republic reporter two years ago. Arpaio would only tell us yesterday that “it’s not over” — a reference to the still-unfolding scandal of mismanagement and allegedly…
A nativist nutcase sticks Corky Gonzales quotes into the cheap blender of her brain and makes mush of it allIt’s always amazing to me the way ignorance spreads like a vicious rash through the Internet. One idiot spouts some bull that the confirms the prejudices of the far right, it…
Will I miss having state Senate President Russell Pearce to kick around once he’s been recalled, his career ended in disgrace?Yes and no. Of course, I want to see this menace to humanity flattened (metaphorically) like a Looney Toons character crushed by a cartoon anvil. But, I must admit that…
As I type this, Maricopa County Supervisor Mary Rose Wilcox and a number of local activist groups are having a press conference calling on Sheriff Joe Arpaio to resign and for the feds to take the sheriff’s office and the jails into receivership.Of course, I support that call, but I…
Since our prior post about the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office’s “ass-beating” detective/reality TV star Detective Deb Moyer, we’ve got some new information about a recent domestic-violence situation between her and her husband. First: Moyer’s husband also is one of Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s boys in beige. In fact, he’s…
A new Arizona law that limits the ability of labor unions to harass employers with picketing and defamation has drawn a federal complaint by two local unions. The United Food and Commerical Workers Local 99 and the Local Union No. 469 of the United Association of Journeymen and Apprentices of the Plumbing and Pipefitting…
We’re thrilled sad to report that Deb Moyer, a Maricopa County sheriff’s deputy who starred (abused power) in the TLC network reality TV show Police Women of Maricopa County is in some trouble. Moyer was arrested over the weekend in connection with a domestic-violence incident with her husband Peoria police…
Los Lobos was never officially part of the Sound Strike, the musicians’ boycott of Arizona over Senate Bill 1070, Sand Land’s notorious breathing-while-brown law. But when the old-school Chicano rock band announced the cancellation of a gig at Scottsdale’s Talking Stick Resort in June of 2010, they earned plaudits from many in…
The scriptures advise us that a gentle answer turneth away wrath. Apparently it has the effect of disarming Tea Baggers as well.That proverb was put to the test last Sunday at Phoenix’s Margaret T. Hance Park where a couple of hundred people gathered to celebrate International Workers’ Day, otherwise known…
Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio ought to tell his deputies not to play with Steve Ellman. The Valley developer and former Phoenix Coyotes owner has clearly been a bad influence on the sheriff’s men. * Ellman is a major figure in the SCA campaign finance scandal, and is Arpaio’s…
You can add attempted bribery to the list of misconduct committed by former Deputy Chief Larry Black, one of Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s closest aides, the Munnell Memo investigative report shows. A few years ago, the report states, Black offered a sheriff’s lieutenant in his agency season tickets to the Phoenix Coyotes…
Sheriff Arpaio’s disgraced chief deputy, Dave Hendershott, once told us that a stuffed rattlesnake he kept in his office was named after former Maricopa County Attorney Rick Romley. Maybe that’s what he told visitors, but we figured the forked-tongue serpent was his personal totem. Every new page released from…
Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s media sluttiness knows no bounds and now includes exploiting abused horses in an apparent attempt to repair his image. As the walls are caving in around his corrupt command staff following the (partial) release of a report from the Pinal County Sheriff’s Office regarding misconduct…
Police in full riot gear, some tech-ed out SWAT-style with pepper-spray guns. A cop chopper overhead. Protesters locking arms to prevent police vehicles from moving. A 69 year-old activist on crutches arrested and cited, along with six others. Cops flinging demonstrators around like rag dolls.In other words, not your average…
Dave Hendershott, the former top aide for Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, s apparently was worried enough about being charged with crimes that he hired a legal firm to help him. That wouldn’t be a problem — except he may have gotten the county to pay the bills. It looks like…
Yesterday, Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu announced that after his office’s investigation into misconduct by top deputies in the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office, he’s determined that Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio knew nothing of the misconduct.Babeu claims that Arpaio became so insulated by now-fired Chief Deputy Dave Hendershott that the…
The long-awaited report on the investigation into allegations against Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s command staff didn’t get released today, after all. True, a 1,022-page summary report was released. But about one-third of it was blacked out, and the three separate reports containing the conclusions of the investigation haven’t…
Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu said today that he’s convinced his Maricopa counterpart, Joe Arpaio, knew absolutely nothing about the misconduct of his top deputies. Babeu, speaking at a news conference at the state Capitol, said the investigation his office conducted on Arpaio’s commanders proved numerous, serious instances of misconduct and…
Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio said today that he “made mistakes” in dealing with his top aide, former Chief Deputy Dave Hendershott. In an intentionally brief news conference today, Arpaio read from a prepared statement and took questions from reporters. But he didn’t really say much. Arpaio refused to…
Ethnic studies student Angelica Penaran takes a TUSD board member to the woodshedThe fight against the effort to slowly kill the Tucson Unified School District’s embattled Mexican-American ethnic studies program continues today with a TUSD board of governor’s meeting scheduled for 5:30 p.m. Last week, a TUSD vote on a proposal…
We’re down here at the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office headquarters, checking on the latest release of documents related to the Munnell Memo investigation. The docs we received last week, we found out today, weren’t part of the 1,022-page summary report that’s been sort of advertised by officials with the…
In the wake of President Barack Obama’s announcement that terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden has been killed by American forces during a firefight in Pakistan, I have a few predictions.The first is a given: traitorous right-wing nutjobs will not grant the Obama administration any credit for the kill. They also will…
