Something good finally happened in Arizona:
Former Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas and his onetime deputy, Lisa Aubuchon, were stripped of their law licenses today as a disciplinary panel handed down the toughest sanctions possible for ethical violations in a case that attracted national interest.
The panel also suspended Rachel Alexander, another Thomas deputy, from practicing law for six months and one day for her role in filing a federal civil racketeering lawsuit against judges and county officials.
What did they do to deserve this punishment? Just about everything possible:
They were Republican Arizona’s golden boys, the plain-spoken, get-tough sheriff and his legal and political foil, Sheriff Joe Arpaio and attorney Andrew Thomas. According to a post at Talking Points Memo, Thomas “might have had a bright career in Arizona politics,” but instead is today facing disbarment, criminal charges and professional disgrace.
In his six-year reign as Maricopa County’s top prosecutor, Thomas and Sheriff Arpaio went on a legal rampage against their perceived political enemies, drumming up and pursuing criminal charges that they knew were false, charges that rarely held up under scrutiny. As a result, say investigators, Thomas “undermined the public trust and inflicted great damage to the system of justice. The only way to restore that trust and to repair the damage to the system is to disbar Thomas.”
***An overview of the charges outlined in the case, however, makes one wonder what the lawyers have to be lighthearted about. Reportedly, shortly after being elected to office in 2004, Thomas and Arpaio became a team, often working together against individuals and institutions who defied them.
After both men were reelected to their positions in 2008, they escalated what had been a policy of ongoing political infighting and elevated it to a crusade, using the sheriff’s office to file spurious criminal charges against their political enemies, including the 14 public officials who made up the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors.
However, none of the charges stuck. Often, Arpaio and Thomas failed to provide evidence that they had promised the court. In other instances, the statutes of limitations had long expired on the alleged misdeeds.
Investigators say that Thomas and Aubuchon knew that the cases they were pursuing were bogus, but pressed ahead anyway, hoping to muddy the waters enough to permanently damage their opponents’ reputations. Investigators have labeled this practice perjury, and as such punishable by the termination of their licenses to practice law.
Arpaio really is one of the most disgusting human beings in the country. Did he make the Buffalo Beast list this year?
pragmatism
only wingnut welfare can save them now.
Bubblegum Tate
@pragmatism:
And they’ll be getting some of it, no doubt.
But man, FUCK Arpaio. His fall is gonna be oh so sweet.
cathyx
But at least Arpaio hasn’t given up on trying to prove that Obama isn’t born an American by birth.
General Stuck
Arpaio can only circle the wagons so far, until the feds come knocking with some justice for his gestapo sheriffing. It would only be fitting when frog marched off to the pen, the feds make him wear pink panties and serve only baloney sandwichs in a dog bowl to save taxpayer money and make him a chain gang of one to earn his keep and git his mind right. It will be a fine day when that miscreant fucker pays his dues.
MobiusKlein
Jail perhaps?
For perjury by the sheriff, seems a valid option.
gaz
@pragmatism: That’s what I was thinking.
I’m sure they’ve already entered into contract negotiations with Fox.
blondie
TPM has a copy of the findings- all 247 pages of them. They were clearly written for the public but in this day and age of cover-ups, and “look forward not backward” failures of the government to self-police, language like this is refreshing:
eemom
but wait….I thought all legal proceedings everywhere were presided over by Koch whores? Ya mean they forgot to infiltrate something as obvious as the Bar Association in their own personal playground, Arizona? Sheeyit.
cathyx
And by the way, Arpaio doesn’t sound like an American name to me. It sounds foreign. We should check it out and have him show us his birth certificate.
Southern Beale
Tennessee’s “Monkey Bill” has just become law. It’s okay for Creationism to be taught in the public schools now.
God I fucking hate this state.
cathyx
The best part is that they knew the cases were bogus and pursued them anyway. They must have skipped that ethics in law class.
cathyx
@Southern Beale: Since I am not a religious sort, maybe you can answer this. Do all religions have the same creationist beliefs?
Joe Brown
Why is Arpaio not in prison?
gaz
@Joe Brown: For much the same reason George Zimmerman isn’t, from what I can gather.
Face
But Obama reminded the Supreme Court of the need to maintain precedent, so both sides defile the justice system in America.
Mark S.
Seriously, I think I’ve been reading about Sheriff Joe for the last twenty years. How in the hell is he still around?
redshirt
@cathyx: Hindu creation myth is best creation myth. All about the milk.
Punchy
Anyone else pretty sure that if they ever tried to enforce an arrest warrant on Arpaio, that it would likely end very, very badly? The guy just doesn’t think the law applies to him. Corrupt as shit.
Punchy
There’s enough straw there to build three men.
Southern Beale
Zimmerman website seeking donations is real.
Chris
He is. He really, really is. The personification of everything that’s been wrong with our Green-Beret-wannabe police departments for practically half a century.
Southern Beale
@cathyx:
No, all religions do not have the same creationist beliefs. In fact, even Christians do not have the same creation beliefs.
There are THREE creation stories in the Bible. THREE.
calliope jane
This is good. This is very, very good.
And the opinion makes for good reading. I’m barely into it and they’ve already quoted Proverbs and used the phrase: “Like darkened clouds on the horizon, there were, in retrospect, certain events that gave fair warning to the then–impending storm this Complaint addresses.”
They’ve also reduced the former County Attorney’s career to one sentence. A multiple-line sentence, yes, but just one sentence. Heh.
blondie
@Joe Brown: because he is either indoctinated or terrorized the general population here and our Rebpublican elected officials lack the balls to slap him around as necessary or are devoted sycophats (although admittedly no one was as bad as Thomas- those guys were like the toxic twins.)
Roger Moore
@Joe Brown:
Who could have prosecuted him? The local DA was in his pocket. Other politicians in Arizona were intimidated by the tactics being described here. And for much of his career the Bush DOJ wasn’t professionally looking the other way. He may not be in jail yet, but the Obama DOJ is closing in.
Shari
@Southern Beale:
I know there are differences between the first and second chapters of Genesis, but where is the 3rd version? I tried the google, but couldn’t find it.
Ash Can
@Southern Beale: He’s going to need them, too — his legal team just bailed on him.
An idiot client and a couple of rank amateurs as counsel? Whocoodaknowed…
ETA: messed it up; here’s the link: http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entries/george-zimmermans-legal-team-withdraws-council
scav
Zimmerman case is getting a little weird too, with former lawyers and nobody talking to anyone face to face unless its the media and I can’t figure it all out. I’ve been playing with the 1940 Census which moves a little slower.
burnspbesq
Excellent. The professional disciplinary system, WAI.
Next up should be that horror-show US Attorney in Alabama who railroaded former Governor Seligmann. All the damning details are in Scott Horton’s archive.
Horton currently has a hard-on for the people who fucked up the Ted Stevens case. Not to mention Yoo and Bybee.
burnspbesq
Eventually, the criminally underfunded State Bar of California will work its way through its backlog and get to Orly Taitz.
MildGyrate
Great, now all you preening self righteous tools can tell yourselves that Arizona is the only place where there’s official prejudice against Latinos. News flash: racism is terrible and it happens everywhere. And you’ll never bother to find out how much crime in the Phoenix area is attributable to immigrants. Hint: a lot. Fucking hypocritical dumbasses.
Kyle
Gee, and it only took eight years of blatant abuse of power. One cheer for justice.
Chyron HR
@Punchy:
Hey, she’s a lawyer with a case, and she’ll defend her client (the Republican wing of the Supreme Court) no matter how bad the evidence against them looks. That’s what makes lawyers better people than you or me.
kc
The lawyers have been (rightfully) disbarred, but Arpaio is still in power, and still abusing his power.
Ash Can
Shorter Gyrate: “All foreigners suck, which means YOU are the real bigots. Oh, and hypocrites. Oh, and dumbasses, too. So there.”
WyldPirate
@cathyx:
Pretty much all religions have creation myths most of which are dissimilar while sharing the similar trait of being ludicrous imaginings ungrounded in anything other than superstition.
dogwood
@cathyx:
I don’t know about the creation beliefs of most faiths. but the move toward creationism and intelligent design seems particular to evangelicals and pentecostal types within the Christian faith. Mainstream Protestants, Mormons, and Catholics are ok with Darwin and evolution.
Satanicpanic
Remember those judges in PA that were sending kids off to jail so they could take kickbacks? I propose a law enforcement corollary to puritan = hiding a dirty secret. Tough on crime = probably engaged in crime.
MildGyrate
While you self congratulatory twats are clucking over Tennessee I’ll just interrupt to ask if you fuckwits are aware of how many northern states have creationism in the public school curriculum? Or would that take away from your hypocritical south-bashing party?
Jay in Oregon
@Kyle:
8 years?
My wife is from Arizona and I remember her family talking about him before we got married, which was over a decade ago.
Cap'n Magic
Nope-Arpaio didn’t make the Buffalo Beast’s 50 Most Loathsome this year-which in of itself is an amazing feat.
nellcote
In other lawyer news, Zimmerman goes rogue and his lawyers quit.
http://www.myfoxtampabay.com/dpp/news/state/zimmerman-attorneys-quit-041012
kay
Yay!
I am going to completely enjoy watching this get closer and closer to Sheriff Joe.
Tick, tock, you disgusting worm. Off to the Tent City with you.
Citizen_X
@MildGyrate:
Well, we know at least some crimes were carried out by the former DA. Is he an immigrant?
Svensker
@Ash Can:
If you look at Mild’s name and then examine the name of the commenter directly under you, some things may become obvious.
eemom
@Chyron HR:
Fuck you, asshole — if you think that anything I have said on this blog EVER is a “defense” of the “republican wing of the Supreme Court.”
MildGyrate
@Svensker: Fuck you, Svensker, and all your Obama worshiping friends. Not a goddamn one of you cares about Mexican-on-Mexican violence. All you can do is criticize the people who do something about it. There’s a lot more to Joe Arpaio than a few mistakes, but I realize that doesn’t fit in with the echo chamber’s cartoon character of him.
les
@MildGyrate:
jebus, dude/dudette–build up some history or cred before you go to full on spit spraying incoherence. And the “you didn’t condemn my hobby horse, you can’t condemn my pet” line of reasoning is so 90’s.
chopper
@WyldPirate:
it’s a lot like black-on-black crime.
gwangung
@Citizen_X: DNFTT.
Besides, too much copy/paste/replace.
les
@Svensker:
damn, I hate when the obvious goes right by me.
MildGyrate
@les: Les, if you are a Mexican, I apologize. Mexicans are noble people who contribute a lot to American society. I’m just fucking sick of all these prissy asswipes acting like anti-immigrant stuff only happens in the southwest. This blog is packed with fucking regional bigots. And they don’t even know how much of Arizona’s resources goes to supporting Latino criminals, or they wouldn’t bitch about law enforcement doing necessary profiling. It’s not like they’d last a day in a squad car where they might break a nail.
kerFuFFler
@dogwood:
Actually, the Mormons are not OK with the theory of evolution. I think they are with the young earth creationists in their beliefs.
Citizen_X
@gwangung: I know. Self-flagellation in progress.
les
@kerFuFFler:
Well yah. That’s why god gave us brains–we’d be easier to fool when he buried all those fake fossils and set up that whole “carbon dating” and “physics” thing.
Kyle
@Jay in Oregon:
Thomas became top prosecutor in 2004.
The fact that Arpaio is still in power and abusing it to the hilt, with the slack-jawed cheering of most of the sun-fried population of Phoenix is even more depressing.
dogwood
@kerFuFFler:
Where do you get that Mormons are not ok with evolution? Just had dinner the other night with a Mormon friend who was in town for a few days. She is a by-the-book Mormon in good standing. Her husband is a Bishop. We discussed the fact that both the Mormon and Catholic church have not adopted the creationism thing and that the powers that be in both churches have made it clear that evolution does not contradict church teachings on creation. Any Mormon or Catholic who espouses creationism is not in line with church doctrine. I don’t doubt that there are right wingers in each faith that have turned into anti-science nut jobs, but there is a reason that in states like Utah and Idaho where Mormons control politics that there has been no big push to teach creationism in schools.
kay
Sheriff Joe has been featured more than 4,500 times over the years on television and in other media as America’s Toughest Sheriff.
He brags about it on his website.
They created this monster.
A celebrity psychopath. Good job! Hope it was profitable for them.
Svensker
@MildGyrate:
DougJ, izzat ewe? ***bats eyelashes***
Jebediah
@burnspbesq:
Not soon enough for my taste, but I suppose I have no choice but to be patient.
Jebediah
@Punchy:
Absolutely. He either shoots some federal agents, they shoot him, or both. As much as I loathe him, I don’t want that asshole made into a martyr, inspiring future violence from future assholes. I want him shamed and humiliated, then imprisoned for life and forgotten.
burnspbesq
@Jebediah:
Mine either, but it is what it is.
piratedan
yay!
finally the walls show something more than crack… if Joe tumbles stay tuned, our state lege will soon follow as the corruption trail will lead to Cactus Barbie as we find out when Joe sings about how he was seduced to go hard on immigrants to keep the private prison industry happy.
Cacti
As a member of the Arizona Bar, I can barely contain my glee.
Thomas and Aubuchon were corrupt political hacks, storm troopers for the vendettas Sheriff Joke, and all around swine both as lawyers and as human beings.
Good riddance to bad rubbish.
Procopius
More to the point, does it look like he’s going to be reelected again this year? Who’s running against him. What’s the voter mood like? What kind of comments has this story been betting in the Maricopa newspapers? I suppose there are some good people living in Maricopa County. Why are a majority of the people there evil?
Lex
This kind of egregious behavior ought to be prosecuted by the feds as a criminal denial of civil rights and conspiracy to commit the same.
It’s one thing to differ about the country’s direction. It’s quite another to blow up the road. That’s what Arpaio et al. have been doing.