When the day came for Adam Stoddard to put up or shut up, he appeared to surrender. But the question that day, whether Sheriff Joe Arpaio blinked, could not be answered by watching the trees and ignoring the forest. It seemed obvious that the problems afflicting Maricopa County wouldn’t be solved in a day, and that Crazy Joe wasn’t going quietly into the night.
Daylight brought some greater clarity to Arpaio’s tactics.
Some 20 minutes before a group of union members planned to rally in the shadow of Maricopa County’s main courthouse on Wednesday, their colleagues in the sheriff’s office gave the green light to reopen the facility after it had been evacuated for a morning bomb threat.
The result was that the law-enforcement unions got an audience in the hundreds as crowds streamed back into the courthouse for afternoon proceedings. But more importantly, they go a much-larger platform to call on the Superior Court to release an officer jailed for defying a judge’s order.
“We demand that detention officer (Adam) Stoddard be freed and his record cleared,” shouted John Solano, the president of the Maricopa County Association of Detention Officers, as the crowd stared and listened.
The attorney railed against what he called the “political war” that has been going on for the past year among Maricopa County’s elected leaders, judges and most-powerful appointed officials. But his comments focused mostly on the judiciary.
He echoed the sentiments of Stoddard’s colleagues who said the detention officer was “a victim” of the infighting.
“If you want to have your war on your own time, do it,” said Liddy, who used to have his own radio talk show and ran unsuccessfully for office before becoming a county lawyer. “But leave the people in uniform alone.”
Don’t laugh. It’s worked for Arpaio before. Whether it’s recognized as absurd spin by his constituents may not be the point, as they may well care a lot more about keeping the Mexicans down than any vague notion of justice. Remember, the threat that touches you personally is far more real than the one that only applies to the other guy.
And while this plays out, Adam Stoddard is holed up in the Mesa Hilton. By now, he’s got to be on overtime. Not a bad gig.
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Liddy’s said that Stoddard’s on the clock.
That’ll teach him; he may not have budgeted for the income tax on extra overtime pay.
Glad it’s not my dime. Does Stoddard get room service at the Mesa Hilton?
The state of justice in Maricopa County would fail as a spin-off script from, “The Office.”
Sir, just so you’ll know, not one word of this has reach our local news stations or papers in Texas. CNN touched on it and it went away with no follow-ups.
But when CJ made ’em wear pink panties & sleeep in tents the meadia gave daily updates. Go figure. Thanks.
The news may be limited to United States outlets. And who the heck is “CJ”?
It’s just not as believable.
CJ= Crazy Joe
D’uh. Thanks.
And in surely unrelated news, Arpaio’s chief deputy has just filed disciplinary commission complaints against all of the judges involved in the Stoddard matter.
It has something to do with their handling of a civil suit by the county public defender’s office, alleging that Arpaio illegally restricted their access to defendants in his custody. According to Arpaio and crew, almost all of the local judges are biased against the sheriff, and should recuse themselves from cases involving his office. Imagine that.
Well, as long as its unrelated. Frankly, this is where I have enormous difficulty understanding how the judiciary hasn’t shown the balls to stand up for itself, if not any semblence of law, against Arpaio. The battle lines are too clearly drawn, as they have been for a long time, and yet no save Arpaio seems to have the balls for the fight. Win, lose or drawn, it has to be better than going through life pretending you aren’t a gutless wimp.
Maybe not entirely orthogonally: I get the same feel, from this remove, about Arpaio, that I do about banana republic presidentes — he simply can’t afford to lose a fight.
He’s the king. And there’s only one way to get rid of the king. Arpaio’s got the nuts. Does anyone else in Phoenix?
How can the judiciary fight? If the judges have only court orders as weapons and no one to enforce them, what can they do? Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to see them best Arpaio. How can they do that?
In the late Roman Empire, while it was falling apart, the Emperors were often slain when they didn’t sufficiently compensate the largely mercenary army.
We’re not there yet, even in Maricopa County.
In any case, I know what you mean.
And the mugshot has now been released. No pink jammies, at least at that point.
Feh. That’s not a mugshot. Now this is a mugshot:
This one’s my own favorite:
pml, appreciate that.
Sir, that’s a good one & it explains everything! Thanks.
They can initiate contempt proceedings against the sheriff if he refuses to obey lawful orders, as they can with anyone else in that situation. Appellate courts, and the state executive can take matters up from there. They can subject themselves to the threat of removal, if they believe they’re right. In short, they can create a constitutional crisis. Or they can knuckle under.
The claim that it’s unfair to expect judges to risk their jobs misses the point that these are people who, in their arrogance, dare to seek the authority to sentence their fellow man to prison and death. Fair doesn’t enter into it.
They asked to be the wizard. Part of being the wizard is that you have to be great and powerful, lest people start paying attention to the man behind the curtain.