Sheriff Joe Jumps the Shark

Get the butterfly net! Call the ski patrol. Waiter, a pinot noir for me, and a 72-hour psych hold for my friend, ASAP!

Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, Arizona, has just launched himself into the idiot-sphere. (Unfortunately with consequences for real people.)

Here’s the deal. Yesterday, Jumpin’ Joe took 60 deputies and a posse and staged a 2 a.m. raid in some unusual places in Mesa, Arizona. (A posse, no less! Do they still have posses? Yep, in Joe’s world they do.).

Anyway, Whack Job Joe, plus the deputies and the posse, rolled up to Mesa in the middle of the night— wearing battle gear, waving semi-automatic weapons, accompanied by dogs—-and proceeded to launch full-on raids on those bastions of crime: Mesa City Hall and the Mesa Public library.

And for whom were they looking with this Kevlar-clad assault force? An escaped serial killer? Terrorists with dirty bombs?

Uh, no. Undocumented workers.

Oh, and did I mention that Jack-Ass Joe has no real jurisdiction in Mesa? He’s the County Sheriff. But Mesa has its own police department headed by my pal, former LAPD Assistant Chief George Gascon.

In other words, aside from its other moronic qualities, this raid is the legal equivalent of Lee Baca taking a battalion of deputies (plus posse, let’s not forget the posse) and raiding Los Angeles City Hall and the downtown LA Library on 5th street. (In the middle of the night. Pointing semi-automatics. Looking to see if everybody on the cleaning staff has the right immigration papers.)

I’ve gotta go teach at UC Irvine, but here’s a clip from the story from Friday’s Arizona Republic:

“I believe the safety of our citizens was gravely compromised” when Maricopa County sheriff’s deputies in “battle gear” swept into city buildings about 2 a.m. while cleaning crews were at work, Mesa Mayor Scott Smith told reporters. “I believe we had set the scene where bad things could have happened.”

Arpaio defended his tactics, claiming the raid came only after a former city employee called the sheriff’s illegal-immigration hotline to report that a cleaning company under contract with the city was hiring illegal immigrants.
Arpaio said the informant had tipped off a Mesa police lieutenant and said the lieutenant brushed off the request, saying it was a problem for the cleaning company.

But a city spokeswoman late Thursday said police Lt. Wade Pew and city staff met with the cleaning company, Management Cleaning Controls, on May 21 after he received the information.

A follow-up e-mail sent June 4 by facilities maintenance director Dennis Ray to cleaning company officials reiterated the city’s concerns over “several security issues that have recently been brought to our attention,” and included a section of the city’s contract requiring that contractors ensure all workers are legal.

Predawn raid

Arpaio said the raid was set up after a sheriff’s undercover detective infiltrated the cleaning business, claiming to be an undocumented immigrant, and was schooled by a manager in how to obtain false identification that would get him past federal identification verification software.

About 30 deputies and 30 volunteer posse members in bulletproof vests and carrying semi-automatic weapons prepared for the operation in Pioneer Park across from the Mormon Temple shortly after midnight.

The deputies, carrying 25 arrest warrants, headed for the library and City Hall, an eight-story building that houses several municipal departments as well as the mayor’s and council members’ offices.

Deputies fanned out and arrested three people; 13 others, including a manager at Management Cleaning Controls, were arrested at residences later that morning, Arpaio said. Ten were arrested on suspicion of identity theft and six for potentially being in the country illegally.

The 16 arrested included six people who were not named in the warrants. Arpaio said they are still looking for 15 more company employees.

Smith said that most of the janitorial workers at the public buildings were either U.S. citizens or in the country legally and that they were terrified by the size and firepower of the sheriff’s force.

And please make sure you read this part:

Arpaio denied questions about whether the raid was politically motivated [He hates Gascon, who has out maneuvered him at every turn, simply because Gascon is the smarter, more decent officer) or that it was timed to deflect attention from a videotape that surfaced Wednesday depicting the brutal death of an inmate at a county jail, which his office runs. The inmate’s family has filed intent to sue the county.

Oh, gee. That certainly couldn’t have been it.

More when I have it. (And you can bet there will be more.)

(A Chapeau Tip for flagging the story to the always wildly smart Dan Kowalski.)