Early this morning the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office served search warrants at Mesa Public Library and Mesa City Hall. According to sources, they’re looking for undocumented and illegal workers under a controversial new law in Arizona which allows for the punishment of business owners for hiring illegal immigrants.
Details are sparse at this time, but statements are being prepared by the City Of Mesa.
MORE ON THE RAID – Video and slide show from ABC, also a comment from Mesa’s Mayor, “Mayor Scott Smith spoke out at a news conference late Thrusday saying the Sheriff never informed anyone in the city or police department that the raid was going to take place. He says it could have been dealt with better and felt the raid put officers and citizens created a safety concern. “It is one thing to enforce the laws,” he said “It’s another to put people at physical risk.”
And now… opinion
I wasn’t going to put this with the story because it’s speculation and opinion and I wish to clearly mark it as such.
Anyone living in this area knows that the City of Mesa and MCSO have been in a tug of war over crackdowns and operations performed by the Sheriff’s Office within Mesa city limits. Mesa claims that MCSO never informs the city of these ops and MCSO claims that they don’t have to tell Mesa a damned thing.
What you are seeing here, ladies and gentlemen, is political faggotry at its worst. Sheriff Joe Arpaio is raiding Mesa City Hall and the library for one reason: To show that he can.
Some books contain the machinery required to create and sustain universes. Tycho (Jerry Holkins) @ Penny Arcade
Well he can
The sheriff has jurisdiction in the city should he choose to exercise it. The city shares concurrent jurisdiction and handles most routine police matters and investigations. The sheriff handles civil matters and some adjunct functions like detention and evidence processing.
However, no matter who does these raids looking for illegal aliens (and remember being here without the proper visa is a civil violation not a crime) is really wasting their time and the taxpayers money. Enforce the criminal laws fairly and completely and the civil infractions will become of little consequence to local authorities – they will again be the work of the federal agencies entrusted to secure our borders and enforce immigaration rules, regulations and laws.
Are they shelving the books in the Spanish section? Why the library Joe?
Jurisdictional nastiness
Was the sheriff proceeding under color of a state law or a federal one? If I understand the federal matter correctly, such is just a civil violation. If a state law also operated in that area of law without conflicting with federal laws concerned, how likely might that be able to withstand challenge? As far as I can recall, the sheriff might not have been after illegals themselves but enforcing sanctions laws against anyone caught employing illegals. Enforcing a sanctions law like that is quite different from arresting illegal aliens for deportation.
In the Las Vegas metro, the offices of county sheriff and the chief of police for the City of Las Vegas were merged. Today’s Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department serves as the police of the City of Las Vegas as well as sheriff’s deputies county-wide. Even though we have our own municipal police force in the City of Henderson, Metro can still act if they so choose. NHP can also get involved in particular cases which also muddies things. Even though Clark County is Nevada’s most populated county similar confusion can happen in counties like White Pine, Elko, and even Lincoln. Then again, Lincoln County has little green men, a different sort of alien, to deal with due to Area 51 being located there and all…
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Wait a minute…
Arpaio is being a horse’s ass? Unbelievable!