Respectfully submitted by Lawrence Rafferty (rafflaw)- Guest Blogger
If you ever wondered why the Justice Department is investigating the office of Maricopa, Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio, this latest story may be all you need to read. Recently, the Maricopa Sheriff’s office arrested and detained Briseira Torres and alleged that she was an illegal alien. Why is this one arrest such an important story? The short answer is that Sheriff Joe’s office and possibly the Prosecuting attorney ignored the most credible exculpatory evidence that was already in their possession. Briseira’s long form Birth Certificate, attested to by the State of Arizona as accurate, was left out of the record provided to the Grand Jury!
“In the pile of paperwork they provided to the court, to the prosecutor, and to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement was a silver bullet: a sworn statement from Arizona’s Office of Vital Records attesting to the legitimacy of documents on file for Torres. Among these docs is Torres’ birth certificate, showing she was born August 14, 1981, in Avondale. Salvatierra asked the court to remand the case back to the grand jury. Judge Carolyn Passamonte did just this, noting in her minute entry that Torres’ long-form birth certificate was “clearly exculpatory evidence that should have been presented to the grand jury.” The judge remarked that the documents on file with Vital Records had been “available to the state,” and in oral arguments, the prosecutor had to admit that he’d never bothered to pull the file and inspect it.
More troubling still was Passamonte’s observation that the MCAO’s lone witness, Detective Chris Oberly of the Arizona Department of Transportation’s Office of the Inspector General, told the grand jury this: In 1999, Vital Records discovered that Torres’ birth certificate, in his words, had been “falsely created” by Torres’ mother and so the department “canceled it.” This was not true, according to Vital Records. Torres’ birth certificate never was canceled and remains as valid as the day it was issued. ” Crooks and Liars
Detective Oberly may have a serious criminal problem staring him in the face due to his false statements to the Grand Jury. Of course, this is Maricopa County, Arizona and Sheriff Joe may not agree that lying to a Grand Jury by one of his detectives is a criminal act.
What really upsets me is the action or inaction of the Prosecutor who failed to even look at the file that would prove that Ms. Torres was indeed a legal citizen of the United States and the State of Arizona. The alleged perjury by a detective in the Sheriff’s office and the negligence of the Prosecutor resulted in Ms. Torres being locked up for 4 1/2 months! Because of these illegal and immoral acts by Maricopa County officials, Ms. Torres lost her home and her car since she was unable to work and make her payments during her illegal incarceration.
Sheriff Arpaio is currently under investigation by the Justice Department for alleged numerous violations of the constitutional rights of Latinos. Think Progress Sheriff Arpaio is also currently fighting a recent class action lawsuit alleging that his office was involved in racial profiling. Sheriff Joe With these investigations and lawsuits, one may think that there may be trouble in his office. Sheriff Joe, the former Arizona chair during Gov. Romney’s 2008 run for President, is also a died in the wool backer of the far right Birther movement. Birther Will Sheriff Arpaio believe any State’s birth records if he won’t believe his own State’s records certifying a valid long form birth certificate?
I am surprised that the residents of Maricopa County are not upset at the legal costs of defending their Sheriff’s allegedly illegal activities. This time the illegal actions of his office have cost a legal citizen dearly and presumably will cost the citizens of Maricopa county dearly. When will this far right bigot be forced out of office? Is anyone in Arizona listening? Stay tuned.
Malisha,
I don’t live in Waukesha County, I live in Racine County. You’re the best.
Had to go to court in Racine County too.
Malisha,
I cling to the idea that we can build a clean nation from the bottom.
By the sheer will power and numbers we can build trust between ourselves. Some “cells” will address one sort of problem, others other types of problems.
Techniques learned will be passed from group to group, just as new laws to counteract our techniques will be enacted, or powers claimed based on existing ones.
But the battle will go on and unless mass killings and mass incarcerations are employed, then we can win. Gerilla tactics and bands will be developed. We won’t have KKK costumes in our closets, but hatred in our hearts which will unite us.
The story is long, but so will the war be. Take Syria as a model. Take the Paris commun as one. But not the bolshevik one.
How many chinamen do we need to exploit to maintain our living standard. And is our standard actually dependent on exploitation. If so, time to change.
NSA is listening even now.
Matt J: If there is a competition in which all counties in all states participate, every single county will have trouble getting into the top thousand! Even Waukesha! But undoubtedly, it will make the cut.
I know about Crooks and Liars. In Waukesha County, Wisconsin.
Common technique in fighting it: Have unlimited time, money, energy, and especially money; have good press and no bad press; control the media; never run out of money; get more money; have something on everybody; have media sources willing to publish what you have on everybody; have even more money; never get tired; get more money; never lose energy; get more money. Oh, and another thing: GET MONEY.
Not to get theoretical, but….
The techniques we see here may seem those appropriate only to the local level where the big frog in the small pond operates. True, but I feel that essentially the same techniques can and are applied in any control circuit.
This would be so in Malisha’s own case—-excuse my using your name/case—- where several independent circuits cooperate to do injustice in their own interests. The cases she had fought, or those illustrated here can be found to follow the same corruption methods.
In fact, I believe it is so that it operates at the highest circuits in our country. All such operations are then constrained by competitive forces. Not the LEO nor the agencies entrusted with those control functions.
Does that suggest that there might be a common technique of fighting it?
I lost my home in Summit County to a sophisticated mortgage fraud scam out of Maricopa County, AZ. I’m a senior who was targeted for over $1m equity in my longtime primary residence. Summit County DA, Republican Mark Hurlbert, refused to prosecute a fraudulent, illegal mortgage.
Just another cover-up by Republicans for their own. The predatory lenders who stole my home are wealthy retirees living in Maricopa County.
Just another example of cronyism, corruption and cover-ups by Republicans in office – whether in AZ or CO.
Someone needs to take a close look at some of the actions by Republican office holders in Summit County, including DA Mark Hurlbert and Sheriff John Minor. Serious crimes and theft of major assets have been covered up. Currently Sheriff Minor and one of his captains are defending a civil rights case in Federal court, see: 11-cv-00004-CMA-MEH. Herbert Briggs v. John Minor and. Erik Bourgerie
It’s questionable whether Maricopa County or Summit County is more corrupt – it’s time for the Summit County crimes and cover-ups to be aired.
My US Senator’s regional director expressed concern I’d be framed for a felony to stop my petitioning for justice. How ’bout that!!! Federal Grand Jury, where are you???
nick,
we were never unruly as kids..just wild and crazy!
Kraaken, I certainly do; grandma’s “Basta..basta” was accompanied by the wave of her arms shooing us unruly kids outdoors.
gbk,
What raff said.
Nick, you DO realise that ‘Basta’ means ‘enough, right? 🙂
gbk,
Well said.
The privilege of white men with guns and authority granted by the state knows no bounds in today’s political climate.
May they choke while they eat their own; may the last of them admit on their deathbed their racist perspective and fess up to the fact that in their time many of the institutions that bettered their lives are being disassembled by their very advocacy.
This xenophobic and outright selfish perspective can probably best be summed up by one of Bron’s — he of no empathy — statements to rafflaw’s recent article post, “Just Who Gains From Voter ID Laws?”
“[sic] since I have multiple ID’s and a voter ID card, I do not understand the problem.”
http://jonathanturley.org/2012/08/05/just-who-gains-from-voter-id-laws/#comment-401441
I wish all the world was just like me because then there would be no problems, eh?
What in the name of all that is unholy and not does it takk to get this a**hat the f*ck out of office? I do hope he gets booted before the election, if the dynamic duo of a**hats manage to win the White House then we can expect more of this type of behavior to go unpunished.
Amen nick!
rafflaw, The Sister of St. Joseph and the Sisters of Mercy[ironic name] also had the same “hammer” as it were. But, the good sisters were hardly even tempered or gentle like my grandmother. There is a lesson here.
Lotta,
I agree that Ms. Torres needs to dump a very big number on the county and Arpaio. The 4 months in Jill would be enough or me to demand a punitive number.
Nick,
The good Benedictine nuns didn’t use words to stop us when we got out of hand. Thatwashat the yardstick or pointer were for!
I too am of the mind that a ginormous civil settlement should be on the horizon for Ms. Torres but Kraaken’s posting gives one a good idea why the many civil suits filed against Sheriff Joe hasn’t worked. In a very rich county the cost isn’t great enough to give ones supporters pause. He can literally afford to act like a racist despot.
itchninBayDog, your list of damages is good but we also need to add the cost of the house she lost while sitting in the slammer. Also, is this a case wherein ‘tort reform’ (spits) will eventually cap whatever the damages awarded may be ’cause I’m all for some lawyer going for a personal best of 1bn$. If the marketplace (tax revenue v outlays for civil suits) plays heavily in the retention of bad office-holders then it should be a contest of Olympic proportion’s on both sides just to make it fair.
idealist707, You made me smile. My grandmother was an even tempered, gentle woman. However, when she was watching her grandkids and we got out of hand she would yell, “Basta..basta!!” It was so out of character for her we would all take note and abide.