Sheriff Arpaio will alert Mesa before future operations
Sheriff will alert Mesa before future operations
Sheriff will alert Mesa before future operations
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by Gary Nelson and Nathan Gonzalez - Oct. 24, 2008 05:59 PM
The Arizona Republic
Sheriff Joe Arpaio has told Mesa's top two officials he will let them know in advance of future anti-crime operations in the city.
Arpaio met Friday with Mayor Scott Smith and City Manager Chris Brady eight days after a Sheriff's Office operation targeting Mesa's city hall, main library and a city security office triggered a Valleywide political firestorm.
Deputies were looking for employees of a janitorial firm who were suspected of using fraudulent identification to hide their illegal immigration status. Three people were arrested at the library and 13 others elsewhere that day.
Hours after the raid, Smith held a press conference in which he said Arpaio had endangered public safety by launching a post-midnight, para-military raid without informing city officials in advance. That same day, Arpaio held his own news conference and accused Mesa of willfully ignoring immigration laws.
Both men were considerably more calm Friday, although they characterized their meeting as blunt.
"We had what I would call a lively exchange of ideas," Smith said. "We focused on our No. 1 concern, which was cooperation between the departments so that public safety was enhanced."
Smith said he and Arpaio "agreed to disagree" on some points. "He obviously thinks that what they did was justified and we made it very clear that we didn't," Smith said. "It wouldn't do any good to argue about that back and forth."
Smith said he believed the meeting created an atmosphere where the two agencies can cooperate more fully in the future.
Arpaio called the meeting "very productive and cordial."
"I did make one thing clear and he totally understands," Arpaio said. "He says he's against illegal immigration. He does understand I will continue my policies in Mesa, enforcing state and federal immigration law. He has no problem with that."
But Arpaio said he agreed "whenever necessary in certain situations to at least let him or the city manager know (of sheriff's operations in Mesa), and I don't have a problem with that."
Arpaio said he admired Smith for seeking the meeting.
"I wish other mayors that do not agree with me would come over and pay a visit, but that hasn't happened," he said. "I have a lot of respect for what he did."
In addition to his clashes with Smith, Arpaio has locked horns with Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon and Guadalupe Mayor Frank Montiel over immigration enforcement.
Smith and Brady announced a new city policy in July under which every person arrested in Mesa for criminal offenses will be asked about their immigration status. But local police will not arrest everyone suspected of being an illegal immigrant. People pulled over in minor traffic cases, for example, might be asked about their status but not detained. If they admit being here illegally, that information would be turned over to federal officials.
Mesa's policy was designed to match the one announced earlier by Phoenix.
Meanwhile, new information from search warrants shows that sheriff's officials took a trove of city personnel files on contract employees and dozens of files kept by MCC Acquisition Co., a janitorial firm contracted with Mesa.
Sheriff's officials spent nearly three and a half hours Oct. 16 inside the city's municipal security building, where they confiscated 51 contract employee files for MCC Acquisition employees, court documents show. That visit started about 7:50 a.m., just a few hours after the library and city hall were entered.
During their search at MCC offices, detectives left with more than 110 employee files, other documents and notebooks with names, Social Security numbers and hiring dates of employees.
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