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Creating a Sanctuary County for Felons

Arizona Revised Statutes Title 11, Article 2, Chapter 3, Section 11-441 (2) says "The Sheriff shall: Arrest and take before the nearest magistrate for examination all persons who attempt to commit or who have committed a public offense." It is the Sheriff’s duty to serve warrants on dangerous criminals in a timely fashion. There are over 40,000 outstanding felony warrants in Maricopa County. But Joe Arpaio’s office doesn't’t have a single deputy assigned to chase down any of these fugitives. In fact, of the top 20 largest counties in the United States, Arpaio's is the only County Sheriff's office without a warrants detail. This is outrageous dereliction of duty for someone who brags he is sworn to uphold all of the laws.

 

Compare the numbers of warrants in Maricopa County to Harris County, Texas. Harris County has a larger population than Maricopa. Its demographics are similar, and, like Maricopa County, it is close to the U.S. – Mexico border. But in Harris County, 40 officers are assigned to hunt down and arrest wanted felons. As a result, there are less than 10,000 outstanding felony warrants in Harris County, and crime rates are going down, while in Maricopa County, they are steadily increasing.

 

Other Valley police agencies routinely cooperate with the U.S. Marshals Service to apprehend dangerous fugitives. But Arpaio claims his budget is insufficient to participate in these operations, even though he operates a public-relations team at a cost to taxpayers of over $500,000 per year and a private office in a private office building at the cost of over $40,000 per month. “It’s a huge problem,” said U.S. Marshal David Gonzales to the Chandler Times. “Violent crime is on the increase in Arizona, and one of the primary reasons is the sheer number of fugitives hiding in our communities,” he said. Sheriff Arpaio, arresting murderers and rapists, not self-promotion, should be your top priority.

 

Arpaio shifts the blame for these outstanding felony warrants, each representing a fugitive felon whom his office is not pursuing, to other law enforcement agencies. “of those 40,000 warrants…12,209 belong to Phoenix,” he said in an April 16, 2008 press release. But the approximately 100 officers in the Phoenix Police Department’s Major Offender Bureau do focus on bringing that number down. Phoenix Police and other law enforcement agencies, like the Pima County Sheriffs, routinely cooperate with the U.S. Marshals Service to apprehend fugitive felons. In August, the U.S. Marshals collaborated with 25 agencies to arrest dangerous fugitives in Arizona. Again, citing budget concerns, Sheriff Joe declined to participate. [see U.S. Marshals FALCON press release] Arresting fugitive felons is simply not a priority for Joe Arpaio.

 

Taking Credit for the Work of Others

 

No one likes it when other people take credit for someone else' work. No one likes it when someone they work with pushes their way to the front of the line to get recognized or take credit for something a team of others accomplished while they sat on their hands. No one likes it when someone they have to work with misrepresents and spins the amount of effort they put into a task.

 

In a press release dated August 21, 2008 titled "Sheriff's Office Illegal Immigration Warrant Arrests," Arpaio takes credit for having "cleared 7,872 felony and misdemeanor warrants, with another 2,883 warrants identified and cleared during routine jail operations." This is written to give the impression that the MCSO had actually made all of these arrests. This is written to give the impression that the MCSO is clearing the 72,000 outstanding warrants in Maricopa County. This is written to give the impression that undocumented workers are the main source of felony crime in Maricopa County. No one in law enforcement--other than maybe the Sheriff's office-- believes this claim.

 

The typical layperson has no idea of how or when detainees are turned over to the MCSO to be held in the jails or the process for doing so. The misleading information stated in Arpaio's press release involves the word "cleared," as opposed to "served."

 

There is an significant and practical difference between "serving" a warrant and "clearing" a warrant. Serving warrants is real police work, as on-duty officers actually make the arrest. Clearing warrants means the MCSO has checked to make sure the person brought in is indeed the person named in the warrant. Clearing warrants is administrative work. Serving warrants is police work. Joe Arpaio admits to doing administrative work and passing it off as police work.

 

The Sheriff has the statutory duty to hold all felony warrants in Maricopa County and is responsible for "clearing" them when they are served. It would be physically impossible for the Sheriff's Office to have "served" the 7,872 warrants as they would like you to believe.

 

What purpose can Joe Arpaio have for knowingly taking credit for the meaningful work other law enforcement agencies have taken to keep our community safe? What possible reason could Joe Arpaio have for purposefully misleading the public to make it sound as though he was actually doing hard police work? Once again we see the Sheriff's office willingness to mislead the public with these inaccurate statistics. This is nothing more than Joe Arpaio trying to pad his numbers on the backs of dedicated and honest law enforcement agencies throughout Maricopa County sound he can continue to sound tough.

 

Only a thorough review of the records would show that a major majority of these arrests would have been done by all of the local law enforcement agencies here in Maricopa County, not the Sheriff's Office. Regardless, the public should be very skeptical of any such claims coming from the MCSO.

 

As the saying goes, there is no "I" in "team." But when it comes to Joe Arpaio, there is no "we" either.

Who is really concerned about our safety?
Other law enforcement agencies have picked up the slack to make Phoenix and Maricopa County safer in the vacuum created by Arpaio's inaction. Working cooperatively with neighboring police agencies and the U.S. Marshall, the FBI and Phoenix PD have arrested many times more serious criminals than Arpaio. Here are a few examples of who is actually working to make our county safer:

 

Mesa Police and multi-agency Gang Task Force arrest 130

Police departments from Chandler, Gilbert, Scottsdale and Florence; the Arizona Department of Public Safety's GITEM team (of which the MCSO is not a member); the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office and the Maricopa County Juvenile Probation Department all participated in an 18-day operation that resulted in the arrest of 65 felons for crimes such as armed robbery, aggravated assault, sale of dangerous drugs and possession of explosives. Using more effective "surgical targeting," these combined efforts have arrested 785 arrests of felons and gang members this year alone. Joe Arpaio's MCSO was no where in sight.

 

East Valley Tribune: Anti-gang operation nets 130 arrests in cities, towns

The Arizona Republic: Crackdown nets 130 gang arrests in Southeast Valley

 

Marshals' Operation Falcon called a success in fighting crime

June 2008 - Using what Phoenix Chief of Police Jack Harris called "an appropriate use of our resources," Federal Marshals and local police agencies successfully rounded up 312 felons, including 150 narcotics suspects and 10 sex offenders. According to an Arizona Republic story, "analysts with the U.S. Marshals Service began combing through nearly 3,000 felony warrants from Arizona a couple of months ago, said David Gonzales, U.S. Marshal in Arizona. The group narrowed down the thousands of warrants to those for the 300 most significant offenders whom they could identify and about whom they could develop quality leads." [Link]

Over 350 Fugitives Arrested During Operation FALCON Arizona.
March, 2007 - The Maricopa County Sheriff's Office did not participate in one of the largest fugitive initiatives ever undertaken in the Phoenix-Tucson area in 2007. The U.S. Marshals Service teamed with law enforcement agencies, arresting 350 fugitives and clearing 381 warrants during a recent six-day sweep. [link]

Top Mexican Mafia Member Arrested by U.S. Marshals and Phoenix Police
March, 2007 - The United States Marshals Service (USMS) High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA) Task Force and Phoenix Police Fugitive Apprehension and Investigations Detail (FAID) arrested a man believed to be involved in the shooting of a Glendale police officer and a high ranking member of the New Mexican Mafia. [Link]

 

America's Most Wanted Arrested in Glendale

On April 20, 2008, the Phoenix FBI Fugitive Task Force and the Glendale Police Department arrested Robert Gaye without incident in Glendale, Arizona. Gaye is wanted by Hennepin County in Minnesota for Criminal Sexual Conduct in the first degree related to the alleged sexual assault of a nine year old girl on May 2, 2006, in Golden Valley, Minnesota. [Link]

Child Sex Trafficker Found Guilty

May, 2008 - Hanoi Barbaro Acosta, 30, of Portland, Ore., was found guilty of Transportation of a Minor for Prostitution by a federal jury today. Acosta transported his 16-year-old victim and three adult females throughout various states so that they could work for him as prostitutes. The investigation leading to the guilty verdict was conducted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Mesa Police Department. [Link]

Three Violent L. A. Gang Members Sentenced to Prison for Bank Robbery

Isaac James Henderson, Jr., 28; Anthony Edwards, 21; and Christopher
Andrew Lara, 22, who are criminal street gang members known as “Crips” from Los Angeles, have been sentenced to federal prison for a violent bank robbery that occurred in 2006 in Goodyear, AZ. The investigation was conducted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Goodyear Police Department. [Link]

 

Can you help?

Do you have a story that helps explain why Joe's got to go? Send it to us at: info@joesgottogo.com