In Arizona, sheriff turns county meetings into an exercise in fascism
By David Neiwert Wednesday Dec 24, 2008 10:00am
I'm spending my Christmas vacation in lovely Maricopa County, AZ, this week with my in-laws. And I have to tell you that, thanks to Sheriff Joe Arpaio and his gang of thugs deputies, I'll be somewhat relieved when I leave.
After all, how would you like to live in a place where law enforcement actually arrests you for applauding briefly at a public county council meeting? Where they threaten and intimidate you just for showing up in the first place?
That's what's been happening here.
It all has to do with an anti-Arpaio group called Maricopa Citizens for Safety Accountability, which formed last spring in response to investigative reports and studies demonstrating that Arpaio's insane obsession with illegal immigrants was destroying his office's ability to actually deal with real law enforcement work.
MCSA's members have been turning up at meetings of the county Board of Supervisors and trying to speak, but the board refuses to let MCSA do so except for brief comment periods at the end of its meetings. Moreover, the board meetings are now patrolled by a huge contingent of deputies who treat the citizens who attend like criminals.
Last week, they went even further:
The Board of Supervisors' meetings also have undergone a number of changes since the Maricopa Citizens group began attending.
The supervisors cut the amount of time each member of the public is allowed to speak during the public comment portions of the public meetings. The board permits each speaker two minutes. Previously, the board gave every speaker three minutes.
Generally, eight or nine sheriff's office deputies and county security officers station themselves around the perimeter of the small auditorium where the board holds its meetings. Also, as many as 20 deputies and officers are stationed out-of-view in hallways around the edges of the auditorium and another 20 or so patrol a plaza outside the auditorium's front doors.
In the pre-Maricopa Citizens era, usually a few deputies worked the metal detectors in the auditorium's lobby and a few others remained inside the auditorium.
Most noticeably, deputies and security officers restrict movement within the auditorium, directing spectators to take seats and remain in their seats while the meetings are in session.
Previously, Board of Supervisors meetings were conducted like virtually every other public meeting, at which spectators routinely stand in the aisles and occasionally walk about to confer with other spectators.
In that regard, crowds at most public meetings more closely resemble spectators at a baseball game rather than audience members at a movie theater.
And, of course, deputies and security agents at the Board of Supervisors meetings have begun to arrest spectators. That development came Wednesday.
During the meeting, Board of Supervisors chairman Andy Kunasek warned spectators that they were being disruptive by applauding speakers, but deputies neither dismissed nor arrested spectators who applauded an animal advocate or a public transportation advocate who sang a birthday song for Kunasek.
The scene was different when about 15 spectators stood and clapped for 20 seconds after a Maricopa Citizens group member spoke critically of Arpaio during her turn at the lectern.
Deputies arrested Joel Nelson, Jason Odhner, Monica Sandschafer and Kristy Theilen on allegations of disorderly conduct and trespassing.
Odhner is a member of the Maricopa Citizens. Nelson, Sandschafer and Theilen are members of ACORN. ACORN has been closely aligned with the Maricopa Citizens during the anti-Arpaio campaign.
Odhner is black. The other three are white. Early Friday morning, three deputies appeared at Terán's home to give her a disorderly conduct citation linked to her role at Wednesday's meeting. Terán is Hispanic.
Deputies made the arrests in a clear attempt to intimidate people associated with Maricopa Citizens, said Carlos Calindo, who attended the meeting.
"It is incredible the way they behaved," said Calindo, who is not a member of the citizens organization. "You come in there and the atmosphere is incredibly oppressive. They yell at you. They scold you. They try to intimidate you. It is improper."
I have been to literally hundreds if not thousands of public meetings (city and county councils, school board sessions, so on) over the years and have never witnessed anything like this. I bet most Americans haven't either.
I guess it's OK in Arizona. Which is why I'm looking forward to leaving.
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Have y'all seen American fascist's stomachs
Especially in Arizona?
Most don't look like they've exercised in years
If at all.
...because Arpaio protects America by "any means necessary"...fuck the Constitution.
That man needs to be arrested himself!
When the bullies have a badge and a uniform - and tasers and guns,
what do you do next when they go fascist?
this group, MCSA, should attend one of these meetings
with one or two national news agencies, with people from
the agencies who are unknown to this council and witness
what happens.
Asshole-Sheriff Joe Arpaio is obviously a criminal
of self-importance much like a steaming turd in the snow.
What civil rights?
If the sheriff is actually in a council meeting acting that way, the council should immediately place him under arrest. I doubt what he's doing is allowed under open-meeting laws.
Sounds to me like someone needs a little sunshine up their skirt. Maybe a call to the ACLU, and a visit from the local TV news crews? Definitely time to organize a recall election.
has called out "Nickle Bag Joe" as well as the ACLU.
He doesn't care and most of the officials in PHX are xtian Repignicans.
Sounds like the authority is all inner-bred, like Boss Hogg's territory, and no "Dukes" to expose them. These "Boss Hogg Thugs" just need to be "Duked-out". You know, mischief and mayhem. Sounds like a Happy New Year could be on the way if people "Duke em'" right. It really messes up a redneck...Just don't get caught. In an "illegal society", breaking the law is ok....just don't get caught. Yee Ha! Just mischief and mayhem sheriff. Just havin' a little fun...that's all. Maricopa just needs to be imaginative! It works!
Luke Duke
should keep the little "law-and-order" types scurrying from place to place, putting out fires, so to speak.
Happy New Year Phoenix--hope something rises...
What the sheriff's secretly into:
http://img.thesun.co.uk/multimedia/archive/00...
I'm imagining a boot, crushing a human face . . forever.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49c-_YOkmMU
The old bigoted retirees think Arpaio and his Thugs are the best thing since sliced bread so they all keep voting for him, but the rest of us hate his guts and want him gone.
Yeah Arizona went for McCain in the last election, but it was damn close, and I know it would have gone for Obama if McCain hadn't been from here - I talked to a bunch of people that voted for McCain simply because he's from here.
Arpaio and his dirty pool have been the subject of numerous investigative reports and lawsuits. We're just waiting for enough old 'Greatest Generation' bigots to die so we can finally vote him out.
the "Meskins" in their place.
Not unlike another famously bullying sheriff in another place and time ("Bull" Conner, Birmingham, AL), Arpaio does what they hire him to do.
the fascist fucker, with a 56% majority.
Most of Maricopa County, and actually a LOT of the rest of Arizona (outside Sedona, some of Tucson, and Coconino County in and around Flagstaff), is really really really "red." I dunno how Janet Napolitano ever got elected, except for the "cosa nostra" thing (the Five Families)...
That's who runs Arizona, and a whole lot of Sedona is red, too (highest percentage of millionaires in the US, per capita.) They just pretend to be New Age because it's cool there. Newage-rhymes-with-sewage. And there are so many newage hacks there because it's cool and that's where the money is.
I'm glad we moved back to Texas (from Cottonwood, near Sedona.) At least the rednecks here are for real. And I'd rather have real rednecks than fake spiritual types.
Imma Texan, and been a Witch for more decades than I care to admit too.
do you have anything attaching you to Wiesbaden, Germany?
has the feeling of an inside joke, and--since there's no such thing as an outside joke--i got curious...
Nien.
Although I have German Counts as distant ancestors.
...got some interesting similarities.
I can also include distant French Barons, a Scottish Baron who's last name we have, an Anglican archbishop (bishop with 'tude), the Plantagenets, George Washington through his wife Martha, Helen Keller, a couple of Royal Governors, Henry Clay and William Seward...
Here's a picture of the archbishop. Strangely enough without my glasses I fancy there's something of a resemblence.
http://www.geo.ed.ac.uk/scotgaz/images/p3996.jpg
And I work in anonymity for squat.
you overwork your future son-in-law, ysb
Now I got you:
That's a reference to the Mabinogion tale "How Culhwch Won Olwen."
Man, myth, legend. a true giant amongst men. Happy holidays.
Have an antic Alban Arthan...
was a Welshman with a pituitary condition.
That's my joke,
I'm only 5'3".
When did you graduate Hogwarts? Or did you go to the Salem Witches Institute?
In some ways it's inherited, some ways learned. The Plantagent's were supposedly of Elven stock, and my immediate unnamed family were from the river Tweed, and rumor had it were spirits from the depths of the river.
http://osdir.com/ml/culture.templar.rosemont/...
Additionally our family has some roots with the Ozark mountains, supposedly magical, and we count theosophists, and those with odd influences over animals and/or children.
No, not that kind of odd...
should write a book....
I think I already have, scattered all over this site the past few years.
Santa Fe's really pretty liberal, even down deep. But that's mainly because there's a long, colorful history of tolerance there.
I remember riding the rock slides outside Sedona in my youth...much fun...
As a resident of San Diego, I've crossed off Arizona, in the same way
I crossed off Mexico as a place I'd visit, until some semblance of law
and order is restored
USof A, And the borders are opened for immigration.
The whole Mexican/US border is a nest of vice and violence due almost entirely to illicit drug and human trafficking...
The chaos along the border is deep and brutal and quite fearsome. The local media reported the Mexican police found a pile of 10 headless corpses in a truck, and the heads were in a near-by house. No suspects. No arrests.
Then there's the rash of 500 maquilladora girls murdered over the last several years. Displaced by NAFTA, they came north to the 'trade zones' for work and wages. The authorities find their bodies in fields around Juarez, mutilated and abused.
If you're gonna vex the 'clever monkeys' (us humans) with unwanted/unwonted upset, you should probably not give 'em modern weapons and cities to hunt and hide in...
If you happen to be around on the first friday of the month, my band will be playing on the corner of 2nd and Roosevelt in the street at the artwalk.
Come say "hi."
...used to play art show openings, such as at MARS, and for the 10K every year. And of course we did the Mason Jar (but they'll let anyone in), where we opened for the Gin Blossoms just before they hit nationally.
That was before ol' Joe's time, though.
I'm a long ways from there now, both temporally and philosophically.
Things were going as planned.
http://www.oldamericancentury.org/15_solution...
some very expensive lawsuits -- that might bring some change -- if civil rights are being suppressed perhaps you could get the Southern Poverty Law Center involved, especially if prejudicial/hate crime can be proved.
This has been going on for years, the county has gone through a new risk manager (who deals with these legal actions) every year for 5-7 years.
Jolly Holidays
The irony is that Arizona used to be a part of Mexico, that is until America took it by force in 1847.
Whenever I want to be thankful that I live in Pima County, I spend a day in Phoenix.
Torture Inc. Americas Brutal Prisons
At 23:50 the segment on Arpaio's jail begins.
Not for weak stomachs.
I was in Phoenix for Thanksgiving this year. I grew up there and went back to visit the fam and attend my 10 yr high school reunion.
I too was appalled by the police state. It was just beginning as I was growing up, but now it's out of control. At night, there were undercover cops cars everywhere! I couldn't drive for more than two blocks without seeing someone pulled over and submitting to a FST. I was shocked to see a "mobile DUI processing center" at the Fashion Square mall. My sisters told me it's where they take the arrestees to get their test results so the officers don't have to waste time driving to the police station before they're back on the street pulling over more cars. The amount of people being pulled over was incredible for such a medium-sized city. In Los Angeles I've never seen anything like it.
My sister also told me a terrifying story. The New Times in Phoenix wrote an expose of the Sheriff's racial profiling of hispanics. At 3 AM Sheriff's deputies showed up at the reporter's house with guns drawn screaming outside for him to surrender. The reporter called the Phoenix police (a much more sane organization) and said if they were to be arrested, they would not submit to anyone other than the Phoenix PD - refusing to let Sheriff Joe's men take them into custody on trumped up charges.
I haven't found a link to this yet to verify, but if anyone does I would love to read it.
I hear the mayor of Phoenix and Sheriff Joe don't get along. Sheriff Joe shows up with deputies at the mayor's events just to intimidate people.
minor drug paranoia and enforcement--a big part of why I left SoCAl for Florida.
And it's GREAT NEWS when the county sheriff does not get along with the police chief of its largest town, especially with a city the size of Phoenix. So many things could just happen to ol' Joe and/or his buds inside the City limit...
Thank you again David for writing about old Joe.
First all the country supervisors are Republicans. They DO NOT control or audit the Sheriff's office even though they have the power to do so. There has been story after story of the abuse of power from the Sheriff's office for years.
In the election this year, the sheriff's office would get the FEC list of donors of his opponent and then start harassing them or anyone in their family. A local evening TV anchor did a story...... and her adopted daughter from Honduras keeps getting picked up going to ASU for driving while brown AND demand to prove her citizenship on site.
The jail that the Sheriff controls for people waiting trial, THEY are considered innocent until convicted lost it's national health certification. An inmate was denied his diabetic medication and died in custody PRIOR TO TRIAL.
David if you can when you are here pick up the Arizona ACLU newsletter, it is stuffed with Sheriff Joe information.
I would suggest anybody with civility and a conscience leave the area immediatley.
People, you better get used to it. It is coming nationwide before too long.
Many people in this country are fond of this sort of mistreatment, it makes them feel powerful. I am not optimistic about the future for my country.
This is a great video, it is hopefully going to be done all over this country. Because this government and the press have not been doing their jobs with impunity.
Congress even got a raise this month, if we want to stop the madness, we have to get out and make it stop. That's what Obama said at the acceptance speech, government is not going to make everything better. Like FDR said: Make me.
I think it was FDR, correct me if it's a different prez.
This is a great video, it is hopefully going to be done all over this country. Because this government and the press have not been doing their jobs with impunity.
Congress even got a raise this month, if we want to stop the madness, we have to get out and make it stop. That's what Obama said at the acceptance speech, government is not going to make everything better. Like FDR said: Make me.
I think it was FDR, correct me if it's a different prez.
This is a great video, it is hopefully going to be done all over this country. Because this government and the press have not been doing their jobs with impunity.
Congress even got a raise this month, if we want to stop the madness, we have to get out and make it stop. That's what Obama said at the acceptance speech, government is not going to make everything better. Like FDR said: Make me.
I think it was FDR, correct me if it's a different prez.
Most states permit civil suits for malicious prosecution. If it costs them enough tax funds, even the conservatives of Maricopa County will want a change of government representation.
Arpaio is already the most sued Sheriff in the Nation. Over 44 Million Dollars have been paid out in law suits. You would think that would 've been enough to wake up the voters of Maricopa County-yet enough White Supremicists and elderly retiree's reelected him with 55% victory. This will take local and National presure, Federal investagations. We need all of America to join us in Maricopa County as this cancer has a way of spreading. Already other places are looking at Arpaio's methonds as the answer instead of the problem. (Tent City jails, 287g agreements, etc..)
This is a great video, it is hopefully going to be done all over this country. Because this government and the press have not been doing their jobs with impunity.
Congress even got a raise this month, if we want to stop the madness, we have to get out and make it stop. That's what Obama said at the acceptance speech, government is not going to make everything better. Like FDR said: Make me.
I think it was FDR, correct me if it's a different prez.
Groucho,
Well said and I agree. We cannot think that our work is over simply because we helped get Obama elected. The work to rebuild has just begun.
all 3 times i tried to post this remark, the computer said it didn't work. then i look and it's on 3 times. my apologies
Arpaio is leaving himself wide open for not only lawsuits, but for the well-known media "gotcha".
Incidents could be created which expose, graphically, his misdeeds.
This man is naive if he thinks he is not liable or accountable.
David,
Thanks for covering the arrests that took place in Phoenix. Thank you also for posting the video. As the creator of the video I had hoped that the word would spread Nationally and your article helped.
As for lawsuits-Arpaio welcomes them. The unfortunate situation with Arpaio is he is a monster we created. Before the polarizing immigration issues, he became nationally recognized for using tents to house prisoners ( in the Arizona summers, they reach 150 degrees) He achieved popularity for putting male prisoners in pink underwear while it hardly made the news when he had 700 prisoners walk through public streets in the pink underwear 4 city blocks in 2005. He is a master of media hype and has come to the point where he feels he is unstoppable. His racial profiling sweeps have destroyed thousands of families and jailed many innocent of no crimes. The problem is complex as too many on the left (our Governor) allowed and encouraged it. Gov. Napolitano helped him get 287g agreement which he has abused and she will become Secretary of HomeLand Security using that very action as a victory. It is a grime failure of a hateful period we need to stop, correct and not repeat.
I make better videos than I write so I encourage the readers to check them out if they want to know more about what Arpaio has done and what is happening in Phoenix: Ground Zero on the immigration Battle. Our behavior will be looked back on with shame in years to come. I hope President Elect Obama is able to stop what we have failed to locally.
Here is a link to a video with the arrests and other info: http://blogs.phoenixnewtimes.com/bastard/2008...
I am pleased to see that this group is finally taking action against this horrible man.
I, for one, am sick to death of hearing his reference in all California posts.
Keep it up, and let your voices be heard. We, in California, hear your voices.
We, here in California, are fighting our own battles. Many inmates are dying. Many families have suffered huge losses. People unite. Together, we can effect change for our children's sake and future.
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