Litigation

Lawmen?s Actions: Threat to Judicial Independence?

By Peter Hardin

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio (photo above, courtesy of Los Angeles Times) likes to call himself “America’s toughest sheriff.”

But the aggressive tactics he and County Attorney Andrew Thomas have used against those who disagree with them in local government and the judiciary  have led to serious questions. The questions are about lawmen with contempt for the rule of law and about threats to an independent judiciary.

On Dec. 21, more than 250 activists and lawyers staged a rally outside a Phoenix courthouse to protest legal actions, including a racketeering lawsuit and criminal charges, lodged against county officials and local judges, according to an article in the ABA Journal. Shawn Aiken, a lawyer involved in organizing the event, told the Huffington Post:

“There seems little need to overstate the case: the independence of the judiciary in Maricopa County is at stake here.”

Arpaio has a reputation for tough tactics to collar suspected illegal immigrants. He is Republican, highly popular, and considered a possible candidate for governor. The Los Angeles Times has depicted him as a colorful character given to outfitting jail inmates in pink underwear and in Phoenix’s torrid summers, keeping them in outdoor tents.

Those kinds of tactics pale in contrast to the legal tactics he has employed against critics, with Thomas’s help, and the resulting, extraordinary war led by the lawmen that has led the Arizona Republic to denounce “bullies with badges” (Dec. 16) and “not the rule of law…[but] the rule of brash thuggery” (Dec. 18.)

Here are two actions that have provoked some of the most intense  controversy:

• In a dispute with the county supervisors who oversee the sheriff’s funding, Arpaio and Thomas brought a federal racketeering lawsuit, accusing the supervisors and at least four judges of corruption. The lawsuit was brought in connection with the building of a $340 million court office tower, according to ABA Journal.
• They lodged a criminal complaint against the top criminal judge with bribery charges “that appear to be largely based on his rulings on court matters he is overseeing,” ABA Journal reported.

“Some judges are afraid,” Denise Quinterri, a local defense lawyer, told Huffington Post. Arpaio’s deputies have made visits to the homes of judges’ assistants and to the homes of county and court employees. The Yavapai County attorney publicly denounced “the totalitarianism that is spreading before my eyes.”

In the Arizona Republic, columns and editorials have taken an increasingly tough, and alarmed, tone. Wrote columnist Robert Robb:

“If Thomas and Arpaio are wrong about the existence of…a massive conspiracy, they are themselves guilty of an assault on the independence of the judiciary and the rule of law in Maricopa County.”

In an editorial entitled “No higher form of corruption,” the newspaper implored the state’s top leaders to take a stand:

“The governor has no bully pulpit? The attorney general is without standing to condemn the implosion of the rule of law in Arizona’s most populous county?”

On Thursday, the newspaper reported that a retired state chief justice was appointed to oversee the legal battles among Maricopa County elected officials “in a move to keep the county judicial system functioning amid myriad allegations of conflict of interest.

In addition, Pinal County Attorney James Walsh wrote a letter to the newspaper questioning the actions of Thomas and Arpaio, explaining:

“There’s something very disturbing about attacking the independent judiciary, something very disturbing about attempting to intimidate lawyers who are defending criminal charges. There is something utterly disturbing when everybody that speaks out is the next subject of an investigation.”

Full post as published by The Gavel on December 24, 2009 (boomark / email).