Thread: Sheriff makes arrests at Mesa library

"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."

Actually bad things are more apt to happen if you come unprepared to meet all possible contingencies. It's always better to be prepared for the worst.

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.

This is something the PD could have done, but preferred to just blow it off. Sending an email to the contractors questioning their hiring practices obviously didn't work.

How many citizens are out at 2am that would have been "gravely compromised?" Kinda hard to miss 60 people & K-9 units, in riot gear with Sheriff written all over them, isn't it?

Face it, Mesa PD got caught with egg on their face and derservedly so.

"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."


LOL.....citizen safety gravely compromised at 2:00 a.m. in downtown Mesa? And across from the Mormon Temple no less.....Yep....that area is just hoppin' at that hour, let me tell ya

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.


Well geez.....sure sounds like they had probable cause, now doesn't it?

No warrants would have been issued if the prosecutor didn't think they had a case and the judge signing them didn't agree.

So Mesa......what's your next excuse? Let me guess..... you were in the process of sending the cleaning company an actual letter to follow up on that email you sent?

Smith said that most of the janitorial workers at the public buildings were either U.S. citizens or in the country legally


"Most" does not mean ALL, now does it Mr. Mayor?

Smith said if the Sheriff's Office wanted information about contractors and employees, it could have submitted a public-records request and easily obtained the information.


Which version? The one available for public scrutiny or the truth?

I just can't wait until we find out the connection between the city contract and who's brother-in-law, or other relative, is tied in with the cleaning company.

Smith, who appeared distraught as he spoke with reporters, said he also took great offense that City Hall was targeted.

Distraught? Not over illegal aliens being arrested, I'll bet. More like he was distraught at the realization that the nasty little cat was out of the bag and information the public was never meant to know about was going to become very public.

Who knows.....could turn out that the mayor has some vested interest in that cleaning company himself. Now, THAT would be funny

"The citizens of Mesa, Arizona, this is their City Hall. (It) was, in my belief, violated by another government agency. I don't believe that's proper . . . and I believe that also crosses the line as to what law enforcement should do," he said.


Well gosh Scott....it's MY City Hall too and the only thing I feel like it was violated by are illegal aliens and/or identity thieves.

Oh......and elected officials and police officers who knew about this and did NOTHING.

As a taxpaying citizen of Mesa AZ..... and, according to you, part owner of my own little slice of Heaven referred to as City Hall....... we'll just call Joe Arpaio and his deputies MY guests at a little after-hours gathering and leave it that...mmkay?


Arpaio denied questions about whether the raid was politically motivated 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.


Talk about grasping at straws!!! What in the hell does one have to do with the other

And as for the lawsuit......good luck with that. The guy who was murdered had entangled himself with the Aryan Brotherhood, was supposed to make a hit inside the jail, didn't do it, and the Aryan Brotherhood had him taken out.

The lawsuit is claiming that no jail personnel was around to see this happen and stop it, so it's the Sheriff's fault.

I'm not expert, but it seems that I recall an MO of most murders taking place when no one....especially law enforcement....is around to stop them.

It's something else again when the family of a jail inmate who dies because of his own involvement with a violent gang can sue because the COs weren't around to stop it.

Joining Arpaio in an afternoon press conference, Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas said the cleaning company had been under investigation for months. When asked why Mesa police could not handle the case, Arpaio said, "It's my jurisdiction, too. You seem to forget."

It wasn't even a case of why Mesa PD couldn't handle it.....they wouldn't handle it.

As Andrew Thomas pointed out....this had been under investigation for MONTHS. Mesa PD knew about it for a lot longer than the Sheriff's Dept. did and they didn't take care of it, did they?

And, knowing what I know about how business is conducted in Mesa when it comes to awarding government contracts, I'm willing to bet anything that not wanting to enforce immigration laws is only a PART of the story behind why nothing was done

People pulled over for minor traffic violations, for example, would not be arrested even if they admit they're here illegally.

Why? Can the Mesa PD be certain that the person pulled over for that minor traffic violation is being truthful about who they are? How do they know that person is not wanted for a crime? Isn't a gang member, drug dealer, smuggler?

The only way to find this out would be to arrest that person.....for being an illegal alien.....and run them through the database, now wouldn't it?






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Sheriff Arpaio Tipped Off
to Laid-Back Mesa’s Illegal Cleaning Staff
By Ray Stern

It doesn’t seem like a stretch to characterize the raid by Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s deputies on the city hall and library of Mesa early Thursday as a heavy-handed political move. As covered in the July 10 edition of New Times, the city’s outspoken Cuban immigrant police chief, George Gascon, and Arpaio have sparred publicly since before Gascon came to Mesa from Los Angeles two years ago.

But this time, Mesa was asking for it. The city left a weakness for the sheriff to exploit.

A chat with city spokesman Steve Wright yesterday afternoon makes it clear the city pretty much blew off concerns raised last May about illegal immigrants on cleaning crews. And because those concerns were coming from a “disgruntledâ€

Yet the city probably should have taken the concerns about illegals more seriously. As Wright related, those concerns were coming from a "disgruntled" city employee, Chuck Wilson.




Well, it's about time the "disgruntled former employee" came up......what took them so long?

I could care less if the complaint came from an employee.....present or former, gruntled or disgruntled......this SHOULD have been properly investigated and it wasn't. It wasn't because of the good ol' boy network attitude that has historically dominated Mesa politics, business contracts, etc. and because of IA sympathetic police officials.

And all the City of Mesa figured they had to do was hide behind the "disgruntled former employee" excuse.

Well not THIS time

Mesa Mayor Scott Smith is just upset because Aripo had a warrant.

Smith didn't do his job. All that cover your ass talk about we met with the cleaning company and we sent an e-mail...

4 months later and they still have 200 out of 320 illegal employees and they are still roaming around in city buildings late at night!!!!! That's a huge number Mr. Smith.

Dixie

Mesa police investigating Arpaio's accusation
Comments 11| Recommend 1
Gary Grado, Tribune

Mesa police have opened an internal affairs investigation of the lieutenant whom Sheriff Joe Arpaio accused of turning a blind eye to illegal immigrants forging documents to get city identification badges.

Mesa police Chief George Gascón sent a letter Friday asking for the cooperation of the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office in the internal investigation by providing names of witnesses and investigative leads to support Arpaio's allegations.

Sheriff's deputies raided the city library, city hall and a records building Thursday, acting on a May 21 tip from fired security technician Chuck B. Wilson, who said illegal immigrants working for a cleaning contractor were using fake identification to get authorization into city buildings.

Arpaio said Wilson, a civilian, initially tipped off Lt. Ward Pew, a sworn police officer and one of the supervisors in the municipal security unit. But Pew did nothing, even though the allegations involved felony crimes, according to Arpaio.

The city has acknowledged that Pew and other officials met with representatives of Management Cleaning Control on May 21 to admonish the company about the importance of following state and federal hiring laws. The city also sent a follow-up e-mail on the same subject, according to city records.

Detective Diana Tapia, Mesa police spokeswoman, said the internal investigation will look into what conversations Pew and Wilson had.

The Tribune has requested copies of any police reports Pew may have written about his contact with Wilson or any criminal investigation that might have been generated from the tip.

Tapia said Pew might not have necessarily generated a report or an investigation, depending on what information he gathered and his evaluation of it.

Arpaio, who is scheduled to meet with Mayor Scott Smith on Friday to discuss the friction between the city and the sheriff's office, said Monday he will continue to investigate the case.

Deputies arrested three janitors inside the library at 64 E. First St. and one outside. Thirteen more were arrested at their homes or at the company's Phoenix location.

They were jailed without bail on suspicion of forgery and fraud.

http://www.eastvalleytribune.com/story/128533

Report alleges Mesa police ignored illegal-hire claim
by JJ Hensley - Oct. 21, 2008 12:00 AM
The Arizona Republic

Mesa police are investigating a claim from a former municipal employee that a Mesa police commander ignored allegations that city contractors were hiring illegal workers.

The accusation emerged after Maricopa County sheriff's deputies conducted an early-morning raid on the Mesa Public Library on Thursday, arresting more than a dozen custodial workers on suspicion of identity theft and forgery.

Following the raid, the Sheriff's Office released a statement that said a former Mesa employee had provided enough specific information to get search warrants for the operation, and that the employee had first informed Mesa police Lt. Wade Pew of the potential violation of the state's employer-sanctions law.
Pew reportedly responded that, "This isn't Mesa police's problem. It's the cleaning company's issue," according to the statement from the Sheriff's Office.

Pew commands the municipal security division, which includes issuing secure badges to municipal employees and contract workers.

The Sheriff's Office also included language in the statement that pinned the blame on Pew's alleged indifference to a lax illegal-immigration enforcement approach by the Mesa Police Department.

Mesa Police Chief George Gascon requested information from the Sheriff's Office to back up that allegation in a letter that was hand-delivered to Sheriff Joe Arpaio's office on Friday.

The department has already launched an administrative investigation to determine if any Mesa policies were violated, said Mike Denney, assistant chief of Mesa police.

"Our department policy is really quite simple: Anyone who makes an allegation of misconduct against any of our employees, we investigate it," Denney said. "We want to clear it up and find out what happened."

Mesa police does not know any more about the allegations than what sheriff's officials released to the media, Denney said, which makes it difficult to say how far this investigation will stretch.

"Could it branch into something more? We don't know," Denney said. "We don't know what (Arpaio) knows. Once he tells us, we can begin investigating."

Administrators from the Sheriff's Office are trying to clarify some of the information Mesa is requesting, said Capt. Paul Chagolla, a sheriff's spokesman.

He anticipated that the Sheriff's Office would cooperate with Mesa's request.

A city spokeswoman said last week that Pew and other city employees met with the cleaning company, Management Cleaning Controls, on May 21 after he received the former employee's allegation.

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

www.azcentral.com

Records revealed in ID-fraud case
by JJ Hensley - Oct. 22, 2008 12:00 AM
The Arizona Republic

Sheriff's deputies knew in August that more than 20 custodians were using fraudulent information to illegally work in the United States but held off on arresting the Management Cleaning Control employees until last week, according to court documents The Republic reviewed Tuesday afternoon.

The documents, which led Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Gary Donahoe to issue a search warrant last week, shed light on the scope and length of the five-month fraud and ID-theft investigation that culminated when 60 deputies and posse members raided Mesa municipal buildings.

But the records do little to quell the budding dispute between Mesa police and sheriff's officials about the role a Mesa lieutenant is suspected to have played by ignoring an employee's claims that the cleaning contractor was hiring illegal workers.
The court documents show that a Mesa employee raised the issue with Mesa police Lt. Wade Pew on May 20. Unsatisfied with Pew's response, the employee placed a phone call the next day to the Sheriff's Office with specific information about custodial workers using false IDs and Social Security numbers.

That day, according to Mesa officials, Pew met with Management Cleaning Control administrators to discuss the information he'd received a day earlier.

The employee who tipped off the Sheriff's Office was concerned when a supervisor with the cleaning company brought in a new employee to receive a security card. Based on the condition of the ID, the employee believed it was fake and would not accept it, documents show.

The employee grew even more concerned when the cleaning company supervisor returned two hours later with the same employee, who was carrying a new ID.

When asked, the supervisor explained that the new hire got the identification from the state Motor Vehicle Department. But another Mesa employee placed a call to verify that and learned the ID number in question was actually issued to a 44-year-old man living in Wichita, Kansas.

The employee then contacted Pew, the documents show. The tipster said Pew replied that he would "contact management and let them deal with the employees."

"I can't tell you whether anything that's in that affidavit is or is not factual because I haven't talked with any of those people," Mesa police Assistant Chief Mike Denney said. "Some of the information provided in that affidavit might be a topic of conversation at some point for Lieutenant Pew or others."

Mesa police announced Monday that they're conducting an internal investigation to determine if Pew violated the agency's procedures in his handling of the allegations.

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio said last week that Pew's response to the situation was indicative of the Mesa Police Department's approach to fighting illegal immigration in general.

Denney said the department so far has no way of knowing whether the details contained in the affidavits are accurate.

"We have not had the discussion with Lieutenant Pew about what his response was to anything that was brought to his attention by (the city employee). Until we do that, I can't comment on whether or not response was even accurate," Denney said.

The current version of the state's employer-sanctions law protects a general contractor, in this case Mesa, from prosecution when the burden of employee verification rests with the subcontractor, in this case the cleaning company.

This is what happened after the May 20 encounter that started the investigation, according to statements from Mesa officials and court documents:


• May 29: The employee met with sheriff's detectives and presented information including names of custodial employees who were issued badges along with data from the Legal Permanent Resident and/or Alien ID cards used in the process.


• June 3: Pew encountered sheriff's detectives in Mesa and offered assistance. Detectives informed Pew they were working on an ID-theft case and told Pew the tip came from a city employee.


• June 4: Mesa facilities maintenance director Dennis Ray sent an e-mail to cleaning company officials that reiterated the city's concern about "security issues" brought to the city's attention.


• June 10: Sheriff's detectives tried to reach the informant and were asked to contact Pew directly for more information on the case.


• July 3: Detectives began working with Arizona Department of Economic Security officials to determine how many Management Cleaning Control employees had data discrepancies.


• Aug. 7: Detectives determined that 22 of 25 employees were using Social Security numbers not assigned to them.


• Oct. 14: The judge signed warrants authorizing the raid.


• Thursday: Sheriff's deputies converged on the Mesa municipal buildings.

www.azcentral.com

Our View: No one wins in feud between Arpaio, Mesa
Comments 4| Recommend 1
Tribune Editorial
A couple of lessons have emerged in the aftermath of the raid by the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office on Mesa City Hall and the main library branch to arrest contract janitors who were allegedly illegal immigrants working under false identities.

First, Mesa was rather naive when city officials shook their fingers at a private janitorial contractor, Management Cleaning Controls, earlier this year and then trusted the business' word that it was following federal and state laws about hiring only legal workers. A former city security guard had come forward with a detailed description of a conspiracy involving a local company manager to slip illegal workers into municipal buildings under the city's nose.

We have said repeatedly local police don't have the time or the manpower to become immigration agents. But Mesa police could have referred the allegations to the proper federal or state authorities to investigate, or even invited in Sheriff Joe Arpaio despite his antagonism toward Police Chief George Gascón. Failure to make any effort to independently check out the accusations offered an unfortunate opportunity for Arpaio to embarrass Gascón and the city.

Potentially far worse, Mesa also exposed to city property to physical damage, theft or other mischief if the accused janitors turn out to be something else than poor people looking for a steady income.

On the other hand, Arpaio and his team don't deserve any gold stars for their performance. Research by the Tribune writer Gary Grado shows the sheriff's office sat on the evidence that it had about the janitors for months, conveniently conducting the raid and making a total of 16 arrests just as Maricopa County voters were deciding whether to re-elect Arpaio to a fifth term.

As we have preciously noted, the sheriff's raid brought in far too much firepower and invaded the heart of Mesa city government in the middle of the night without a single warning to Mesa officials. Deputies even lied to a Mesa police officer who stumbled onto raid preparations in a nearby city park. Mayor Scott Smith remarked that Arpaio would have been livid if city police had tried something like that at the county complex in west Mesa, and Arpaio would be in the right.

Such actions are sowing distrust and disdain between the sheriff's office and local police when these agencies must be united to cope with crime from a variety of sources in the face of shrinking tax revenues.

http://www.eastvalleytribune.com/story/130028