A m e r i c a n P o s t – G a z e t t e
Distributed by C O M M O N S E N S E , in Arizona
Thursday, March 11, 2010
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Dept. of Justice agrees to take over racketeering case against Supervisors and Judges
March 11, 2010 By 31 Comments
Arizona Politics for Conservatives: Sonoran Alliance
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not surprising, the feds were already investigating several county supervisor employees, including county manager David Smith who went out and hired a criminal defense attorney for the questioning. the supervisors and their “Axis of Corruption” partner Yvonne Wingett at the Republic are doing their best to spin this otherwise as overblown prosecution, but the feds are onto them. Tick tock, tick tock.
You see the article by EJ Montini in the Republic today? He thinks it’s fishy that the judges appointed someone to investigate Thomas’s bar complaint who has worked for the Supervisors. DOH!!
More evidence of your “Axis of Corruption” between the judges and the supervisors. Montini probably wrote it to show that the Republic isn’t completely part of that axis, he’s got the guts to stand up to the unholy alliance.
This is very bad news for the Sups…their friends the Superior Court judges can’t protect them from this FEDERAL investigation!
Any predictions as to when the lamestream media is going to stop repeating the Supervisors’ false claims that the feds are investigating Thomas, and start acknowledging that the feds are actually investigating the SUPERVISORS and JUDGES?
Maricopa County is bigger than half the states in the union so it’s entirely appropriate that federal officials do this work to find out what county leaders like the Supervisors are doing. I mean public confidence in government is already so low, it can only help if they are either cleared completely (can’t see how that’s possible) or leave office one way or the other.
The weird part to me is how both Democrats and Republicans on the BOS are covering for each other.
What a relief. As a fiscal conservative, this bothered me. Do you know how much taxpayers dollars the supervisors & judges were spending on outside counsel? They had hired 7 of the biggest, priciest law firms in town to represent them, all on the public dole! Until Arpaio brought Driscoll in, Arpaio and Thomas were handling the entire racketeering case inhouse. Don’t expect the media to report that though, that might make the supervisors and judges look bad.
What I never understood is why Arpaio and Thomas went after Stapley and Wilcox. Stapley is a Republican, and since the Supervisors control the purse strings of Arpaio’s & Thomas’s offices, it was like asking for a world of hurt. The beating they’re getting in the press is pretty bad. Obviously they weren’t hoping to score political points (isn’t that what Judge Leonardo accused them of?). The Supervisors are truly crooked, but sometimes you can’t take out the bad guys, it’s impossible.
Let’s all sing together now – hallelujah, hallelujah! Maybe now we can get this corruption cleaned up.
Now I feel a bit vindicated after writing so many times about what creeps these supervisors are, and how the judges must be complicit in the monkey business.
To Cola drinker above: party label is not an indicator of who will do wrong and who won’t. Crumminess (is there a word like that?) is a human condition, not a characteristic of party affiliation.
Next time we go to vote, let’s listen a lot more carefully to what the candidates are saying, and watch carefully what they do. Maybe we can finally have some clean government for a while, at least till the next bunch of jackasses get in.
Alicia, you are right that there are rascals in both parties, I was only surprised that one party would cover for the other to the point of their own peril.
As a human condition, you are also right that it’s not possible to eliminate corruption. But just think of what would happen if Thomas were not doing his job, looking the other way…
So it looks like Greg at Espresso Pundit has some egg on his face. Any bets as to whether he will apologize?
Greg has turned out to be a shill to support Betsey Bayless and her $370,000 a year job. Since Betsey supports these corrupt supervisors, so does Greg. Look at the newest blog ranking, Espresso Pundit is near the bottom and still plunging. But let’s not turn this post into a discussion about how Greg went left on us. It about a major victory for the County Attorney and Sheriff.
Divid Smith, county puppet master, got the Feds involved thinking he could get the Board control AzRepublic to beat on Sheriff Joe and Mr. Thomas. While the Feds were poking around, they saw some things that indicated the case has merit. Watch the channel 10 report on the press conference.
Great news for all taxpayers and a tribute to the perseverance of out County law enforcement!
I heard that Stapley and Wilcox wet themselves after the press conference.
I re-registered to vote against McCain, but I got to say republicans have a lot more fun. The corruption of the Board of Supervisors is unmatched. While I’m voting you the primary, I will add Thomas for AG to my list. The courage and tenacity he shows going after corruption, even in his own party, convinces me he is a man of integrity.
kudos to APG for getting this out while the republic trys to make us think Thomas threw in the towel.
Greg’s bizarre rants have everything to do with destroying Andrew Thomas’ reputation so he can’t run for Attorney General. That way Greg’s close friend Len Munsil can jump into the race, and Greg will get a sweet job if he wins. Truly slimy politics.
This is a great victory for Joe & Andy. Stapley & Wilcox sure will have some sleepless nights, for sure.
Maybe this will cleanup the BOS.
Next time we should be careful who we vote for.
This is the opposite of what the republic said. Go figure. It looks like more of the “we don’t know the facts, but this is what we are reporting anyway” style the American Gazette said in an earlier post.
Give em Hell Sheriff!
This is excellent news!!! Billbo, I got a great quote for Andy or Joe. “I didn’t give them hell. I just told them the truth and they thought it was hell.” Seems like someone might have said that before in a different war…
Good quote Roger. The exact on from Truman is:
“I don’t give them Hell. I just tell the truth about them and they think it’s Hell.”
Certainly fits.
I stand corrected. BTW Billbo, you left out the “e” in the word “one.”
Got you back!
The only real problem is Stapley and Wilcox will go to a federal prison which has much nicer digs. Oh well, once Stapley meets Bubba, he won’t worry about those hair plugs.
Blue Meanie ,
The sad part is that the corruption in Pinal County, although it involves less money, is much worse tahn Maricopa. Pinal is ranked as the sixth most corrupt county in the country.
What a joke. Arpiehole is using smoke and mirrors again. The only thing the feds will do is go after Joe Arpiehole and Candy Andy. The BOS is now free and clear. Why do you really think Candy dropped the case. I can’t wait to see the emails that were recovered from MCSO. Truth will be told and the Joke and Candy days are numbered.
John:
If the truth ever gets told about the present inhabitants of the B.O.S and the current County Mgr., they’ll be holding executive sessions in Florence!
Let me get this right…Joe and Andy just gave up and tossed everything over to the Obama DOJ, and were supposed to be happy?
I thought they were elected to do the tough job. They gave up today. They tossed up the white flag. And why is everyone that was anti DOJ/Dennis Burke 2 days ago now thinks Washington has all the answers? The DOJ won’t do anything about the BOS. In the end, the people loose. So it goes…
Joe and Andy just spent a ton of my tax dollars only to jump outta the kitchen when it got a little too hot. I’m far from happy.
I don’t think Obama’s DOJ will do too much either, BUT…
I see something good happening… Wilcox and friends are on the radar now–officially. So are the not so just justices in Maricopa County.
Publius you are an idiot. The Stupidvisors spent millions preventing Thomas from investigating. The called anything he did a conflict and wouldn’t let him get an independent prosecutor. Then the got the feds involved and now the feds want to investigate the stupidvisors.
Even the mainstream liberal media now gets it. Did you even hear what the Fed guy said about the case? Go crawl back under which ever rock you slithered out from under.
A few million dollars?…the BOS spends more than two thousand times that every year. Again, stopping the BOS abuse of taxpayers is a bargain at that price.
Yeah, okay, I’m the idiot… All I read was that the feds are “undertaking a review.” A “review?” So I’m an idiot because I feel insulted as a taxpayer that Joe and Andy spent a ton of my money and then kicked a case to the feds so they could take a look at it?
I don’t fell like and idiot as much as I feel like a sucker.
And by the way, your theory about Andy not being able to get a special prosecutor only covers one of the issues here. The RICO suit was filed in the Federal Court. There was never a request for a special prosecutor in that case. It is separate from the criminal complaints against Wilcox, Stapley, et al filed in Maricopa County (that’s where he wanted the special prosecutor). So why did they drop the federal case? Why not pursue the BOS in federal court? I say it’s because Joe and Andy wanted to make a smart political calculation (montini for once is right). Well hat’s off to them, they made a smart political move. They saved their backsides, and in the process the people lost their opportunity for justice against the BOS.
This article and most of the comments are proof some of you are living in an alternate universe! LOL! Thomas and Arpaio just basically completely gave up the RICO case and most of you guys are calling it a victory?! They gave up because they knew they would lose! The RICO case was a joke from the start. Pretending that the feds are going to investigate this is just a bunch of spin. All the feds agreed to do was “review” it. Arpaio and Thomas know full well all that means is that the feds will “review” the paperwork for a few seconds before throwing it into the garbage. LOL! Wake up knuckleheads. Arpaio and Thomas are taking you all for a ride!
Friends,
We can all rest a bit better today now that the Federales are coming to the rescue! Yes, the introduction of the Department of Justice will remove any accusation of playing politics with the office of the County Attorney. Welcome to the sunny southwest!
We now need to step back and think hard about the incredible work that our County Attorney (and his office staff) have put into the investigation of our crooked Board of Supervisors. And that work will be shared with the new group at DOJ to help them move this whole process along. It was time, money, and effort well spent in “connecting the dots” between all of the corrupt and back-handed dealings which have emanated out of the Board of Supervisors. ALL of that work will be of tremendous assistance to the DOJ! I can’t wait until the trial starts-it will have any number of real revelations as fact after fact is revealed and put together. I am told that stripes makes a man look short-is that right Don?
The term Board of Supervisors is really a misnomer. The REAL power in that department is the manager-David Smith! He has a little ring through the nose of each of the Board members and they do exactly what he wants them to do! What spineless people are they? Corrupt is the first word to come to mind and that will be the question of the day. However, until then, it is good ole David Smith who is the REAL SUPERVISOR-and don’t forget it! I just have to wonder how deep in this corruption scandal is Mr. Smith???
Stay tuned guys and gals as we start the next chapter in the novel: “Corruption at the Highest Level”. You just know that someone is going to write a book about this mess!
Oops. Guess you guys got it wrong. No investigation by the Feds. Guess you can’t believe everything (anything?) Joe says. Read the letter from the DOJ
Ooops. Looks like Joe and Andy’s victory lap wasn’t what it was cracked up to be.
http://www.azcentral.com/news/election/azelections/articles/2010/03/13/20100313joe-arpaio-attorney-letter.html#reply19557026
LOL! Basically Arpaio lied to us! Nothing new there!
http://www.kpho.com/download/2010/0313/22830757.pdf