More on Arpaio

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

More on Arpaio

Arizona Sheriff Faces Civil Rights Probe, Allegations of Undermining Law Enforcement with Controversial Focus on Immigration

Democracy Now
February 18, 2009

excerpts:

Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Arizona’s Maricopa County has forced prisoners to march through the streets of Phoenix dressed in just pink underwear, housed prisoners in tents in the searing heat, and appears on a Fox reality-TV show. Now he could be facing a federal investigation for civil rights abuses and a trial on charges of racially profiling Latinos. He’s also been accused of focusing on immigration enforcement at the expense of other law enforcement duties.

Guests:

Ryan Gabrielson, reporter with the East Valley Tribune. He’s just won the 2008 George Polk Award for Justice Reporting along with Paul Giblin for their five-part series on Sheriff Arpaio called “Reasonable Doubt.”

Salvador Reza, member of the Puente movement in Phoenix that grew out the spate of arrests and deportations under Sheriff Arpaio in 2007. He is part of a large group of organizations calling for a national demonstration in Phoenix next Saturday against 287(g) agreements.

AMY GOODMAN: The man who calls himself “America’s toughest sheriff” could be facing a federal investigation for possible civil rights abuses and a trial on charges of racially profiling Latinos. The chairpersons of four House committees called on Attorney General Eric Holder and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano last Friday to investigate allegations of misconduct against Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County in Arizona.

Earlier this month, in a move the New York Times called a “degrading spectacle,” Sheriff Arpaio forced 200 shackled prisoners to march through the streets of Phoenix from a local jail to his infamous tent city that’s surrounded by an electric fence. Many accused the sheriff of pulling a publicity stunt to promote his new reality television show on Fox, Smile, You’re Under Arrest!...

...SALVADOR REZA: Yes. In 2007, Sheriff Arpaio said for ICE-trained sheriffs to basically patrol an area under control of a Roger Sensing, which is a private individual. So this private individual was utilizing them to actually scour the neighborhoods. He would call in the license plates of people that were picked up for day labor. And basically the sheriffs would go and stop them and then start interrogating everybody. He deported over a hundred people like that. So, out of that, we started a series of demonstrations against Pruitt. But now, since then, he has done a series of sweeps every so often, like every two months or so, where he goes into the Latino neighborhoods and basically intimidates, terrorizes and basically destroys business in the area while he’s there.

Well, the latest stunt, media stunt, by Sheriff Arpaio was parading 240 or so prisoners from one facility to the other, which is now the tent city. It’s not that far, but he called all the media to make a spectacle of the situation, and basically segregating by alienation, by national origin, and by color, a whole set of inmates, which is actually a violation of the Constitution. But on top of that, he said it was to facilitate visit by the lawyers and by the Mexican consulate or the consulate of other country. But what happened, in essence, he actually took away days. Now they only can visit them three days.

So, you know, he’s constantly lying and basically putting himself on the public eye and basically dividing the whole community into pro- and anti-Arpaio forces. And he’s utilizing the 287(g) agreements so that he can basically go after gardeners, after corn vendors, after, you know, maids, and basically intimidating. Now he’s interrogating the whole board of supervisors, county board of supervisors, and accusing them of violating employer sanctions. So he’s out of control. And I think investigation is due. Not only investigation, they should freeze the 287(g) agreements with Sheriff Arpaio until, you know, this gets resolved. Janet Napolitano doesn’t seem to want to do that so far. I hope she changes her mind...more