Slashdot Mirror
Arizona Judge Tells Sheriff "Reveal Password Or Face Contempt"
An anonymous reader writes "Four days ago, deputies from the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office in Arizona conducted a raid against the county government building hosting computers for a law enforcement database. After threatening to arrest county employees who would stop them, the officers proceeded to secure the room and promptly changed passwords on many of the servers. In a hearing on Friday, a Superior Court judge threatened to hold members of the Sheriff's Office in contempt if they did not reveal the passwords by next Wednesday. Following this, the Sheriff's Office claimed to be conducting an investigation against other Superior Court judges. Courts have asked for passwords before, but never under conditions like this."
Summary doesn't make it clear that the Sheriff in question is Joe Arpaio, a sadistic, authoritarian monster that that believes in making prison as demeaning and painful affair as possible no matter what the offense. He's a sick, twisted psychopath that needs to be stopped at all cost.
The correct article is here.
Amazing this is happening in the United States
This raid looks pretty outrageous. The court is probably the least politicized and most appropriate agency to take control until the situation can be resolved. The silver lining to this is that it is so outrageous that it may finally get that madman Arpaio removed from office.
Yes they do have an IT guy. Appears he built the system. No I don't believe he does need the password. But he is reported to have told the judge it would be "convenient" to have it but that he didn't really need it.
Hendershott Could End Up in Jail Next Week in Showdown Over Password
It is a Constitutional Federal Republic. This means that there are various check on the majority. 50.0001% of people can't vote to oppress the other 49.9999%. Things like constitutional law can only be changed by a very lengthy process (66% of both congressional bodies, 75% of all states have to approve it).
So while the majority may agree with what he's doing, or at least the parts of what he's doing they are aware of, that doesn't make it right, or legal. He has, on many occasions, been sued successfully for various rights violations.
It is something that needs to be fought, not something that people should just say "Well the majority elected him. Doesn't matter that they did, he is still accountable to the law. That's how the system is setup.
In more convenient linked form: Phoenix Police Seize PCs of a Blogger Critical of the Department
What the hell is going on there? Do people actually support this BS?
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
Disclaimer - I work as the IT manager for a major university police department.
Criminal Justice Information System (CJIS) Security Policy - the governing policy from the Department of Justice for managing criminal justice systems. The policy is law enforcement sensitive and not public.
The Sheriffs office is arguing that that the law requires this server, which has NCIC (National Crime Information Center) access, to only be managed by a criminal justice agency. There are entire previsions in CJIS that allow for delegation of CJIS management to noncriminal justice agencies including municipal governments and contractors. The only provision states that responsibility for management of security and network control remains with the criminal justice agency - meaning the blame for not following the CJIS security policy lies with the law enforcement agency.
Unless Arizona has different laws regarding NCIC access this looks like a power grab to me...
Because Joe Arpaio is a power-tripping constitution-ignoring murderously negligent nutjob ?
The man is batshit insane, not unlike what you would get if the Bush family pursued ferocious inbreeding for the next ten generations. Then you take that mentally stunted child, give him a government job and a gun, and let him loose upon the world.
This is a man who gets his goons to physically threaten press reporters, when they get too close to his dirty secrets, and when he's done intimidating these law-abiding journalists, he saddles their offices with "punitive" over-reaching FOIA requests. He's perfectly happy to do the same thing to judges and state officials he dislikes. He's like a gangster with federal employee ID.
There's a great expose on Sheriff Joe in a recent New Yorker that argues quite the opposite; his obsession with his own self-aggrandizement has eclipsed attacks on real crime in favor of a sensational (and indulgently predatory) approach to law enforcement.
Huh. It's safest just to let Sheriff Joe arrest you and fight it in court. Juan Mendoza Farias thought that too.
It's wishful thinking. The East Valley Tribune won a pulitzer for an expose of Sheriff Joe's tactics that concluded, among other things, that his focus on illegal immigration has actually stolen the focus away from violent crimes.
A) They're FOIA requests (not FAIO).
B) He sends them against elected Phoenix officials, like the mayor, whose email he requests for political reasons. He does NOT send FOIA requests to journalists as is incorrectly claimed by GP.
C) That said, Joe does appear to lean on journalists, but he does that with search warrants and deputies. Slashdot has covered this in the past and there is much information to be found on Wikipedia concerning the incidents of note.
Basically, he's an incompetent Sheriff who hasn't been voted out because too many people are too enamored with his "tough on crime" stance to notice that he's completely incompetent and not making the people of Arizona any safer. They'll try to defend him by claiming that the opposition is in favor of illegal immigration or some other utterly political nonsense, while ignoring the fact that his incompetence has cost Arizona taxpayers something like $100 million.
(That's a very rough estimate using the sources on Wikipedia, but it's about the right order of magnitude, especially when you count what we pay for legal liability insurance and Arizona's insanely high deductibles).
Don't be afraid of the Phoenix Police. Be afraid of the imposters.
In Phoenix, you stand a good change of being the victim of a home invasion staged by Mexican Army Regulars...
Or Mexicans in Phoenix police drag, fulfilling their contracts...
Or Phoenix Police whose chief and the Phoenix mayor just can't take much criticism.
Try and discredit the reports based on the sources I use. Not working. The incidents did happen. Police officers were calling into local radio shows and confirming the reports.
It seems most home invasions in Phoenix are carried out by those who attack drop houses the 'coyotes' use to stage illegal immigrants on their way to other cities. Taking some hostage and making a quick buck is the motive. Posing as police works very well until the real police show up. then, hope the bad guys run out of bullets, which they often do.
Our mayor, Phil Gordon, is death against enforcing immigration law, as is our former Governor and now head of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano. It's so bad the Feds are demanding that local law enforcement accept a new policy that pretty much prevents them from enforcing the law. That's the 287(g) program that apparently is too successful.
Sherrif Joe also has tangled with the local alternative paper, which published his and other officials home addresses and apparently violated grand jury statutes. It's only an arcane law when it is applied to you.
Sherrif Joe has his view of law enforcement. It enrages many of the liberal intelligensia around here, who would rather we put the illegals up in the Phoenician and give them a chance.
Me? I back Sherrif Joe, knowing full well he can get carried away. The alternative is to have everything not nailed down stolen by the illegals as they stream through here on their way to a better life.
At least he doesn't PRETEND to be doing his job.
You ought to live here. Then you would grasp a little more of the nuance. Much too easy to take things at face value. 4 years here has taught me that we have a serious illegal immigration problem. How to solve it is unfortunately simple - clean house, starting with the House of Reperesentatives. Our government has too many conflicts of interest, business sees illegals as cheap labor, Democrats see them as new voters, and regular citizens have no one on their side. But I'm not hopeful.
Why the focus on illegal immigration? That's the crux of the trouble over Sherrif Joe. That's all it is.
Bring it on.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.