Supervisor Don Stapley’s mug shot

Now that the US Attorney’s office has exonerated Andrew Thomas and Sheriff Arpaio from any wrongdoing in their attempts to prosecute powerful corrupt politicians, we’ve had a few people ask us to remind them what they tried to prosecute them for. Stapley was prosecuted for financial misreporting, leading to a risky loan that the FDIC is now investigating. He also engaged in a land swap with his business partner, convicted felon Conley Wolfswinkel, where Wolfswinkel would funnel him $15,000/month. Finally, he spent $86,012 in campaign funds raised for a campaign where he had NO OPPONENT on hundreds of luxury items for himself and his family!

Officials like former Representative David Burnell Smith were removed from office for far less violations. Clean Elections claimed that Smith violated election laws by spending a few thousand dollars more than authorized by Clean Elections, and removed him from office. It was a technical accounting mistake, it wasn’t like he had spent the money on lavish vacations for himself and his family like Stapley had, and it was only a few thousand dollars. Yet Smith was thrown out of office, and Stapley got the prosecutor disbarred and is now suing the County for thousands if not a million dollars over “stress” from being prosecuted.

You decide, who should have been prosecuted – Thomas or Stapley? Does it sound like Thomas and Arpaio had a “vendetta” against Stapley, or were they simply trying to prosecute someone who was VERY corrupt? Read the Arizona Republic article here, which contains even more unethical behavior by Stapley – http://www.azcentral.com/news/election/azelections/articles/2010/06/20/20100620stapley-spending.html.

Read the full shocking list of items Stapley spent campaign money on