Banana republicans watch: September 7, 2012.

September 7th, 2012

Hey, remember Maywood? The city that couldn’t get insurance, and had to disband the police department and much of the municipal government, in large part because the cops were out of control? That Maywood?

Well, cops are going to be cops, right? And if they aren’t cops in Maywood, they’ve got to end up somewhere, right?

Guess where they ended up.

If you said “I bet they ended up with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department”, you get to drink from the firehose.

Should being employed by Maywood be a bar to signing on with LACSD? Given the level of misconduct and corruption in that department, I think a case can be made that yes, former Maywood officers should not be employed in law enforcement anywhere. But let us set aside the generalities for the moment and focus on specifics. Some of the former Maywood officers hired by LACSD included:

There were apparently four “questionable” applicants from Maywood hired (the article does not mention why number four was considered questionable) out of an unknown number of applicants from Maywood. As a reminder:

At least a third of the then-37 member force had left other police jobs under a cloud or had brushes with the law while working for Maywood.

Posted in California Über Alles, Clippings, Cops, Law | Comments Closed

Quick banana republicans update.

September 6th, 2012

The bankrupt city of San Bernardino has voted to cut 100 city jobs.

Of the 100 eliminated jobs, 41 are non-sworn positions in the Police Department. The rest are positions in other departments ranging from managers to janitors. The cutbacks also could lead to the closure of three or four library branches.

The city is not cutting fire department positions. (It is interesting that the original reports stated that 20 positions were proposed to be eliminated, nine people would be demoted, and nobody would be laid off. I wonder why, if this was the plan, there were threats of “rotating, temporary closures of fire stations”.)

(Thanks to Lawrence for the backlink yesterday.)

Posted in California Über Alles, Clippings, Law, Politics | Comments Closed

Obit watch: September 6, 2012.

September 6th, 2012

Art Modell, perhaps the single most hated man in Cleveland.

LAT. Cleveland Plain Dealer.

Posted in Clippings, NFL, Obits, Sports | Comments Closed

EarthQuest watch.

September 5th, 2012

Promoted from a comment left by SoapBoxMom:

Don Allen Holbrook’s frivolous harassment suit seems to be falling apart. He has dismissed the case against the Houston Press and Craig Malisow before they even had the chance to file a response. Malisow was the linchpin for Holbrook’s entire case.

Holbrook is still pursuing the remaining parties, including the John and Jane Doe taxpayers who have commented in these matters of vital public concern. Trying to silence folks discussing where their tax dollars are going is an outrage! I don’t think he should ever receive another dime from a governmental entity ever again!

I couldn’t find a mention of Holbrook dropping his suit on the Houston Press site, but I did find this quite interesting article on Holbrook and some of his more…colorful claims. For example, Holbrook claims to have “launched the first economic development Web site in the world in 1991”. Hmmmmmmmmm.

Posted in Clippings | 3 Comments »

Banana republicans watch: September 5, 2012.

September 5th, 2012

We previously mentioned the lawsuit by former police chief Randy Adams against the city of Bell over unpaid severance.

The other shoe has dropped: the city is suing Adams and wants all the money he was paid, plus “a portion of the $20 million the city estimates it lost as a result of a corruption scandal that led to the arrests of eight former civic leaders.”

The suit also asks that Adams be forced to pay the city’s costs to settle a whistle-blower lawsuit brought by Bell police Sgt. James Corcoran. Corcoran went to Adams with allegations of voter fraud, unlawful vehicle seizures, illegal selling of building permits and two instances of sexual harassment involving Rizzo. According to the lawsuit, Adams became upset when Corcoran told him he had taken the information to the FBI.

Corcoran was demoted, placed on “administrative leave”, and Adams “started an investigation for insubordination”.

After he was told he would be fired, according to the suit, Corcoran retired and sued the city. He recently settled for $400,000 and won back his job on the police force.

Meanwhile, the bankrupt city of San Bernardino is considering…cutting the city’s budget. No, really. (Edited to add: Or maybe not.)

I noticed this article yesterday, but didn’t have time to read it: Lawrence also sent me a link. Basically, police unions in California are behaving like bullies towards people who criticize them.

At a press conference held by [Costa Mesa Councilman Jim] Righeimer to spotlight the behavior of unions associated with Lackie, Dammeier & McGill, Councilman Fred Smith of Buena Park, who has also taken a tough stance on unions, said a uniformed officer approached waitresses and demanded to know why their restaurant had a Smith for Council sign in the window, as their squad cars blocked the restaurant parking lot entrance. Elected officials shared examples of threatening statements and text messages by police union operatives. [Costa Mesa] Councilman [Gary] Monahan has in the past said police have staked out his bar and pulled over patrons as they leave to harm his business.

Posted in California Über Alles, Clippings, Law | 1 Comment »

TMQ Watch: September 4, 2012.

September 4th, 2012

Once again, TMQ’s all-haiku predictions roll around. Let’s jump in and listen for the splash of water…

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Clippings, NFL, Sarcasm, Sports, TMQ watch | 1 Comment »

You had me at “bacon”.

September 4th, 2012

The State Fair of Texas has announced the winners of the 2012 “Big Tex Choice” awards for the best fair food this year.

The winner of the “Most Creative” award was Butch Benavides, with the “Fried Bacon Cinnamon Roll”, described on the TM Daily Post site as a “cinnamon roll dipped in a special sweet pancake batter, rolled in crispy fried bacon crumbles, deep fried and sprinkled with powdered sugar.”

The winner of the “Best Taste” award was Abel Gonzalez Jr. with “Deep-Fried Jambalaya”, “jambalaya using shrimp, Cajun sausage and seasonings, then coated in lightly seasoned flour and fried”.

More from the TM Daily Post here. And here’s a link to an article from last week breaking down the eight finalists.

Almost everything that made the finals sounds good to me. I’m not a huge fan of jambalaya, but I might even try that.

Posted in Clippings, Food, On a stick | 1 Comment »

Morning random notes: September 4, 2012.

September 4th, 2012

Would you pay $18 for a 40-minute vinyl record of previously unreleased Charles Manson songs?

Yeah, I wouldn’t, either.

The album’s title, a vulgarity that means wasting time…

I want to come back to this later and elaborate on the idea some, but I’m getting more than a little tired of the mass media being coy in their reporting. (See also: Russian punk bands.)

Vasquez turned to the funding website Kickstarter to raise several thousand dollars to pay to have the album cover printed and 500 copies of the record pressed.

This kind of bothers me, too, but I’m not sure I can articulate why.

Headline in the NYT:

Gotham: A Summer of Easy Guns and Dead Children

First paragraph:

In Harlem, Paula Shaw-Leary talks of her youngest, Matt, who got his college degree in May and was accepted to graduate school…

Matt’s death is tragic, but a 21-year-old man who has been accepted to grad school is not a child.

(Gee, doesn’t NYC have strict gun control laws?)

I don’t think I ever saw anything Michael Clarke Duncan was in, and I wouldn’t say I was a big fan of his work. But 54 is just too young. (NYT. LAT. A/V Club.)

The Frank Lloyd Wright archive is moving to New York City. This sounds like a very good thing:

The models will live at MoMA, which has extensive conservation and exhibition experience. The museum will display them in periodic presentations and special exhibitions. The papers will be housed at Avery, whose librarians will make them available to researchers and educators starting at the end of next year.

(Well, a very good thing for everyone except Mike the Musicologist, who hates NYC.)

Headline from something called “The Root”, linked from the WP site:

Few African Americans at Burning Man

“Word Ends: Women, Minorities Hardest Hit”.

Posted in Art, California Über Alles, Clippings, Guns, Law, Media, Movies, Music, Obits | Comments Closed

Random notes, September 3, 2012.

September 3rd, 2012

Workers of the world, unite! Dyslexics of the world, untie!

In 2009, the two-year-old Southern lifestyle magazine [Garden and Gun -DB ] lost financial support from its first publisher. Its employees, many of whom had relocated from New York City to work here, were left with dwindling buyout packages and the promise of freelance pay. Real estate developers could no longer afford to buy advertisements, and some new prospects said they would not give a cent to the magazine until the owners took “gun” out of its title.

Oh, yes. Garden and Gun. I remember them. I was considering subscribing: that is, until they refused ads from the NRA. Now they can die in a fire, as far as I am concerned.

In other news, the NYT wants you to know that you should be careful buying art online.

My big question for the day: now that Reverend Moon is dead, how long will the Washington Times be around? I’ve gotten the distinct impression that it has survived that long purely because he wanted it that way, and his successors are not as wild about the paper as he was.

Mike Nesbitt has resigned as offensive coordinator at the University of Houston. That would be two days after the season opener, which they lost 30-13 to Texas State.

I’ve been kind of tied up the past couple of days and haven’t had a chance to blog the Austin Police Department acting as agent provocateurs to Occupy Austin story. I don’t really know what to make of it, so instead I’ll refer you to the Statesman story above, and the coverage from Grits for Breakfast here. (The other problem I have with this story is that much of the coverage comes from sources I don’t read and don’t trust.)

Speaking of Grits, he also has an interesting followup on the Texas Highway Patrol Association and other similar scam organizations.

Posted in Art, Austin, Clippings, Cops, Guns, Law, Media, Obits, Politics, Sports | Comments Closed

Musical note.

August 31st, 2012

At the moment, I have some of the worst crap in the world stuck in my head.

And I can’t get it unstuck.

(Hotel. Motel. Holiday Inn.)

Posted in Music | 1 Comment »

Bad boys, bad boys…

August 31st, 2012

Our first story is kind of strange.

Matthew Itkowitz was drinking tequila one fine night in March of 2008. Apparently, Mr. Itkowitz got into an argument with his wife; Mrs. Itkowitz ran up to several people, including a man named Ryan Gonzalez, who were standing nearby, and asked for help.

Mr. Itkowitz claims that Mr. Gonzalez brandished a handgun, threatened to kill him, then punched Mr. Itkowitz and knocked him to the ground. Mr. Itkowitz deployed his own weapon and shot Mr. Gonzalez five times, killing him.

…the Los Angeles district attorney’s office declined to prosecute Itkowitz in 2010, despite concluding that his account of the shooting was “patently inconsistent” with video footage captured by a wall-mounted security camera in the alley.

Mr. Itkowitz has now been indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of “deprivation of rights under color of law, using a firearm in relation to a crime of violence and obstruction of justice”.

The video footage in question appears to show Mr. Itkowitz pulling his gun and hiding it behind his right leg as Mr. Gonzalez walks away from him.

Still walking toward the tattoo parlor, Gonzalez turns back toward Itkowitz and motions for him to leave. When he doesn’t, Gonzalez turns and walks several steps back in Itkowitz’s direction. He is about 10 to 12 feet away when Itkowitz raises his gun and fires.

By the way, Mr. Itkowitz is a deputy US marshal.

Meanwhile, the LAPD is investigating five of their officers after a woman died in their custody.

And Lance White had his 2009 conviction for weapons possession overturned by a federal appeals court in Manhattan. Why?

…should have been able to tell the jury that the main witness against him, a New York City police detective, had been found to have testified untruthfully in proceedings involving an unrelated gun case.

Noted:

…the panel’s decision made it “far more likely that future juries will hear that an officer has previously lied or somehow been found untruthful. And it will make prosecutors think twice before they use him in future cases.”

Posted in Clippings, Cops, Law | 1 Comment »

And we’ll have fun, fun, fun until Daddy takes the newspapers away…

August 31st, 2012

The street finds its own uses for things.

Oh, look! Julie Taymor and the “Spider-Man” producers have settled their lawsuit out of court.

Terms of the settlement were not disclosed and representatives for Ms. Taymor declined to comment further on Thursday. A press representative for “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark” also declined to comment.

Quel frommage!

The worst Division I football program in history?

Over 11 seasons, Savannah State, the self-proclaimed University by the Sea, in a charming city distinguished by oak trees that sprout Spanish moss, has won 17 games, just five against Division I teams. It has changed coaches six times — once because of a death — and had nine athletic directors, including interims. It has been placed on N.C.A.A. probation twice and faced a pair of embarrassing lawsuits that claimed racial discrimination.

Savannah State is playing Oklahoma State and Florida State in the first two games, and will collect $860,000 (“which represents about 17 percent of the Tigers’ modest athletic budget”) for those games.

By the way, last year was a “1-10 season that included losses by scores of 63-6, 41-6, 47-7, 45-3 and 59-3, in addition to a defeat at the hands of a team that had lost 29 conference games in a row.”

There’s an interesting piece in the LAT about George Perez, former city manager and city councilman in Cudahy. (Previously.) Perez has not been charged with any crimes, yet, but is a major figure in the criminal cases against other Cudahy officials:

…court documents repeatedly refer to a top city official identified as “G.P.” orchestrating much of the alleged wrongdoing. Two law enforcement sources said “G.P.” is George Perez.

Perez started out as a janitor in Cudahy and worked his way up to the city manager position

…despite his populist persona, rumors of corruption long flowed from Cudahy City Hall, where nothing seemed to happen without Perez’s blessing.

And this is kind of interesting:

By 2000, Perez, married and with four children, was serving on the City Council and working at a building materials store. Then he lost his job. The council changed city laws so it could appoint Perez city manager. A group of Southern California city managers were so disturbed by Perez’s elevation that they asked for a criminal investigation. County prosecutors launched a conflict-of-interest probe, but investigators were met with silence at Cudahy City Hall, they said. In a memo produced by the prosecutors, they wrote that it was “clear that Perez liked politics and power more than the building materials business.”

So there were concerns twelve years ago, but nothing happened? Quel frommage, again!

Posted in California Über Alles, Clippings, Geek, Law, Loser, Sports, Theatre | 1 Comment »

“Gun” death.

August 29th, 2012

Stealing from Weer’d again:

HOLLYWOOD PARK, Texas – A South Texas mayor has been found dead after apparently being attacked by a 500-pound donkey on his ranch.

According to the sheriff’s office, it was a “male, aggressive donkey”. Thank you, Captain Obvious! We were thinking it was one of those pacifist donkeys.

More from the (quasi) local paper here.

Posted in Clippings, Obits | Comments Closed

21-50 to headquarters!

August 29th, 2012

Have you ever heard of the Texas Highway Patrol Association?

Did you know they had a museum in San Antonio? I did not. I might have gone down to see the museum, had I known it was there. But in retrospect, I’m kind of glad I didn’t make the trip: here are some photos of the museum from the Texas DPS website.

As you might have guessed from that link and the associated commentary (which I personally think is very unusual for Texas DPS), the THPA was one of those charities that does telemarketing calls, collects your money, and does very little to benefit anyone but the company that makes the calls.

In particular, the organization apparently promised to pay a $10,000 “death benefit” to families of troopers killed in the line of duty. The organization never paid, the families sued, and…

As part of a 39-page agreement, property belonging to the Texas Highway Patrol Association in Austin and a museum it operates in San Antonio will be liquidated…

Interestingly, the museum was founded by a former state legislator from Waco, Lane Denton. (Waco is also the home of the Texas Rangers Museum, which is actually well worth the drive from Austin to visit.)

In 1995, Denton was found guilty of theft and misapplying money belonging to a different organization, the Texas Department of Public Safety Officers Association, and sentenced to six years of probation.

And:

The lawsuit said state investigators found that few survivors received any financial assistance and that money from a scholarship fund went to children of board members. The suit also said officials used up to $10,000 in donations a day to buy tickets to amusement parks and movie theaters and to pay for airfare across the United States.

(Subject line hattip. I loved that show when I was a kid. No, I’m not that old: one of the local UHF stations showed syndicated reruns.)

Edited to add: In case you were wondering, here’s a Google Maps street view of the THPA headquarters. Note that this isn’t the large building on North Lamar, across from Texas DPS and right next to Dan’s Hamburgers, but another building.

Posted in Clippings, Cops, Law, Museums | Comments Closed

Playing dice with the MSM, August 29, 2012.

August 29th, 2012

We haven’t had a good Bell update in a while, but now the drought is broken.

Eric Eggena used to work for the city of Bell. He was the city prosecutor, director of general services, and was in charge of code enforcement.

While Eggena was in charge of code enforcement, the city collected tens of thousands of dollars from business owners and scavengers cited for violating city laws. The Times found Bell officials created official-looking documents and told violators that they had to pay the city. The vast majority of these cases never were filed with the court, as they were supposed to be.

Mr. Eggena was fired after the fecal matter hit the rotating blades of the impeller in Bell. He has not been charged with any crimes, and is not currently under indictment.

Mr. Eggena is now suing the city of Bell for $837,000, “including compensation for 329 unused sick and vacation days.”

When Eggena went to work for Bell in 2002 he earned $90,000 a year, but his salary nearly tripled over the next eight years, his total compensation swelling to $421,000 annually, putting him in the top tier of city officials nationwide.

But wait! There’s more!

In addition to his salary, the city paid the employee portion of Eggena’s Medicare and Social Security deductions, and he accumulated double sick and vacation time, according to his contracts.

And because we can’t mention Bell without mentioning Robert “Ratso” Rizzo:

The Times also found that Eggena and Rizzo were involved in a deal in which the city bought a piece of land for more than double its assessed value as part of an unusual redevelopment deal that required the seller to donate $425,000 back to the city — a sum that cannot be accounted for.

Today’s NYT has a nice tribute to the late DeAndre McCullough. (Previously.) The paper did run an obit several days after his passing, but this is more of a retrospective piece about DeAndre’s life and struggles.

This, along with some things Weer’d has said, and my reading of Bill James’ Popular Crime: Reflections on the Celebration of Violence, has got me thinking. If I have time this weekend, I’m hoping to do a longer, more thoughtful post tying these things together.

Posted in California Über Alles, Clippings, Law, Obits | Comments Closed

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