As predicted (as if it was hard to guess), Sheriff Joe Arpaio has geared up his PR machine to go after Judge Gary Donahoe for taking Adam Stoddard “political prisoner.” Crazy Joe put out a press release dedicated to proving that Donahoe is a criminal’s best friend.
An examination of Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Gary Donahoe’s record over the past 18 months shows that defendants who have committed crimes such as child abuse, drug, and aggravated assault, often walk away without serving any jail time. Yet, this week when a young Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office detention officer who acted in good faith attempting to maintain the safety and security of courtroom staff and the public, was ordered to serve jail time by Judge Donahoe as a way to fire a political shot and to send a message to the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office.
Oh my. Evil judge. Except Crazy Joe’s attempt to stack the deck against Donahoe with example after example of heinous criminal freed by this pinko liberal criminal lover didn’t pan out quite as well as he hoped. From the Phoenix New Times :
“Judge’s Record Shows Bias…” reads the headline of the news release. It goes on to state that criminals who commit the crimes of “child abuse, drug possession, and aggravated assault often walk away without serving any jail time” when sentenced by Donahoe.
The Sheriff’s Office wants to rescue its employee from the hoosegow and come off looking like a martyr. But it really hosed this one.
A bit of extra research (with the help of Superior Court staff) shows that, in five of the six examples, Donahoe either included prison time in his sentencing or was following the recommendations of the County Attorney’s Office.
Well, this is certainly a bit embarrassing. It turns out Arpaio’s flak must have rushed the research, and now makes the Sheriff look like a blithering idiot and a liar. Hardly what one would expect from such a crackerjack investigator as Sheriff Joe, especially coming after his last brushup with the media when they finally figured out he was making up the law in his press interviews.
A screw-up like this could blow the whole Get Donahoe Campaign, and then he would just be left with Stoddard stealing from a defense lawyer’s file. That could look bad. Attempts to reach the author of Sheriff Joe’s attack ad were rebuffed, when it was learned that the old flak was now living in a tent in the Arizona desert and digging holes by day.
But as a top notch scheme, Sheriff Arpaio has prepared for all eventualities. The Sheriff has asked the Maricopa Board of Supervisors for an additional $7 million to cover anticipated legal fees not otherwise included in his $271 Million budget. When going to battle, you can never have a big enough war chest.
Whether the Board of Supervisors will accede to Sheriff Joe’s request, or give him more money than he’s asking for, remains unknown. They are all hiding under their desks to avoid getting splattered with the blood from Judge Donahoe’s expected decapitation.
Update: And just to make sure that nobody on the Board of Supervisors might, oh, vote against Crazy Joe’s request, or do something really mean like cut his budget to zero or make him sleep in a tent in the desert, N.html”>he’s going after two board members :
A screw-up like this could blow the whole Get Donahoe Campaign, and then he would just be left with Stoddard stealing from a defense lawyer’s file. That could look bad. Attempts to reach the author of Sheriff Joe’s attack ad were rebuffed, when it was learned that the old flak was now living in a tent in the Arizona desert and digging holes by day.
But as a top notch scheme, Sheriff Arpaio has prepared for all eventualities. The Sheriff has asked the Maricopa Board of Supervisors for an additional $7 million to cover anticipated legal fees not otherwise included in his $271 Million budget. When going to battle, you can never have a big enough war chest.
Whether the Board of Supervisors will accede to Sheriff Joe’s request, or give him more money than he’s asking for, remains unknown. They are all hiding under their desks to avoid getting splattered with the blood from Judge Donahoe’s expected decapitation.
Update: And just to make sure that nobody on the Board of Supervisors might, oh, vote against Crazy Joe’s request, or do something really mean like cut his budget to zero or make him sleep in a tent in the desert, N.html”>he’s going after two board members :
Maricopa County Supervisors Don Stapley and Mary Rose Wilcox were indicted on multiple counts related to their work with the county, according to records County Attorney Andrew Thomas released Tuesday.Concidentally, Stapley just become chairman of the Board of Supervisors, but Arpaio would certainly not go after him to persuade the others that disagreement might have dire consequences. On the other hand, maybe the message is that if they don’t get some balls and put an end to the tyranny, they will always be hiding under a desk praying that Crazy Joe doesn’t indict them for fun.
Stapley was indicted in November 2008 on 118 counts alleging omissions and misstatements on his financial-disclosure forms during a 14-year period. But retired Judge Kenneth Fields dismissed the misdemeanor counts against Stapley in August, and prosecutors decided to drop the remaining charges in September. Days later, the Sheriff’s Office revealed a new probe into Stapley’s suspected misuse of campaign funds.
The indictments from a Maricopa County grand jury are the latest allegations Thomas and Sheriff Joe Arpaio have leveled against county elected officials and administrators.
H/T Jameson Johnson
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Perhaps he wants to use the fees from the Supervisors to pursue his civil RICO action against them.
And, in today’s update, Judge Donahoe has denied Prisoner Stoddard’s request to unseal the letter that he, err, made off with. He wasn’t terribly wordy.
Also of note, I do not believe ANY in-custody defendants were produced in Superior Court today. There was a “lockdown” due to a security threat at the jail.
Does Sheriff Joe Arpaio have the authority to indict people. I do not do criminal law but I thought only a District Attorney or a US Attorney could issue an indictment.
Awfully good question. When I read the article, it struck me as well, though it seems that they do a lot of things differently in Maricopa County than they do in the United States. Or even the Republic of Texas.
Nice game of gotcha by the Sheriff. Of course, Flores could hold Arpaio in contempt for this alone, but she won’t. Instead, she has recused herself as judge from the case of the defendant who was before her when this all started.
Sheriff Joe and County Attorney Thomas are pretty much a packaged deal of injustice in Maricopa County.
Never enough – County Attorney Andrew Thomas, with the help of Arpaio, have now filed felony charges against Judge Donohoe. The complaint and the underlying facts appear to have been written by a four year old, as opposed to supposedly-competent prosecutor Lisa Aubuchon. It is as devoid of facts as it is of reason. In short it stands no chance of making it past the preliminary stage.
It appears that the powers-that-be are at the point where they’ll do anything to make headlines for the “horse-sense” public to gobble up. I just wonder where the bar association is during all of this – it appears that they have no chance at making it anywhere near a jury and yet they had the gumption to file this mess.
The mind reels.