The most polite way to say it is that state Senate President Russell Pearce, facing a November 8 recall election in Legislative District 18, struggles mightily with the truth. In fact, he seems to struggle with it anytime he’s in front of a camera or a microphone. Most recently, he…
Just after noon on December 15, 2009, a Tempe police detective sent a very specific e-mail about how to conduct a child pornography investigation to this private address: detectiveoneal32[at]ma.com. Detective Burke Mattlin was writing from his work computer to a former colleague, Shaquille O’Neal — a.k.a. Shaq, The Big Cactus,…
Politics is an inherently dishonest profession. By contrast, most religions, and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints specifically, mandate that adherents be honest in all dealings with their fellow men and women. So perhaps it’s no great revelation that mass schizophrenia has taken hold of the deeply Mormon,…
El Mirage city officials, cops and firefighters filled up their gas tanks at the city’s only gas station for more than a year and a half without any qualms about the fuel prices.That’s back when Joe David, the shop owner, was a political ally.But now that David started opposing a…
Here is the long awaited second video from my colleague, Phoenix videographer Dennis Gilman, culled from the shenanigans that took place at a recent GOP Legislative District 19 meeting in Mesa. For an intro to the players and what’s going on, read my initial blog on this meeting, here, and…
In the 24-hour news cycle, it can be difficult to keep up. We have the solution. Check back on Valley Fever every evening for highlights from each of New Times’ blogs. Today’s entries:…
The Arizona Diamondbacks’ recently dormant bats finally came alive this afternoon, and it couldn’t have been at a better time. The locals held on to beat the Pittsburgh Pirates 8-5 at Chase Field in front of a lively crowd of about 25,000, all of whom seemed well-aware that the team…
Oprah-approved snake-oil salesman James Arthur Ray says he won’t be hosting sweat lodge events anymore, which is a great decision considering the last time he did, three people died and dozens were injured.Ray is currently awaiting sentencing after being found guilty of three counts of negligent homicide in the deaths…
We remember Debra Weyermann from our long-ago days trolling for stories for the Sierra Vista and Bisbee dailies down at the Mexican border. She was known as “D” in those days when she covered the courts for the Arizona Daily Star, and did a bang-up job. Fast-forward to now: Weyermann’s…
No More Deaths, a Tucson-based human-rights advocacy group, continues its push to end the abusive treatment immigrants suffer while in U.S. Border Patrol Custody.The group shares the stories of abuse, neglect, and humiliation of 13,000 people detained by the Border Patrol in a report released today — “A Culture of Cruelty:…
Litchfield Park resident Cherish Arroyo, 35, was arrested yesterday after police say she had sex with a 16-year-old boy. The boy, it turns out, is a teammate of Arroyo’s son on the Copper Canyon High School football team. Arroyo currently serves as treasurer of the team’s booster club.According to the…
State Senator Scott Bundgaard, facing an ethics complaint and possible expulsion from the Senate for his roadside fracas with his now former girlfriend and his invocation of legislative immunity, has filed an ethics complaint against three members of the state Senate Ethics Committee, which is currently set to hold hearings…
Bath salts, a designer drug that causes people to trip out, can apparently take average criminals and turn them into super-powered criminals with a penchant for violence.According to the Mesa Police Department, bath salts seem to be giving criminals “unusual strength,” particularly when they are confronted by cops.In fact, in…
An off-duty Department of Public Safety helicopter pilot, as well as two others, were killed in a head-on car wreck last night on the U.S. 93 north of Wickenberg.According to the DPS, Matthew Uhl, a 46-year-old civilian helicopter pilot with the DPS assigned to Kingman Air Rescue, was driving a…
Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon has reportedly pulled today’s City Council’s agenda his recommendation to appoint his girlfriend, Elissa Mullany, to the Phoenix Aviation Advisory Board.Gordon wanted to appoint her to the aviation board to replace Art Hamilton, whose four-year term is expiring in December.The recommendation — as with all appointments…
About three weeks after failing to starve himself to death while rotting in a Texas prison, child-raping cult leader Warren Jeffs has been released from the hospital and taken back to the big house.Jeffs, the former leader of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, is serving…
Are the Arizona Diamondbacks stumbling, rather than charging, into the playoffs? After losing 5-3 to the Pittsburgh Pirates on Tuesday night at Chase Field — the D-Backs’ fourth loss in their past six games — it appears they may be a little wobbly as they get a little closer to…
Mark Zuckerberg officially has the ability to piss off the entire world.Facebook (yet again) has made some unpopular changes — the degree to which we cannot even begin to explain (the computer geeks techies at ZDNet seem to have a grasp of what’s been changed and explain it all here)..In…
Since my recent column about well-known Phoenix mitigation specialist “Jameson Johnson,” aka, Jimmy Carroll Johnson, and his criminal record for armed robbery, a lot of folks have rushed to Johnson’s defense, arguing that his wrongdoing was all in the past, and since he had been doing good deeds locally, we…
In the 24-hour news cycle, it can be difficult to keep up. We have the solution. Check back on Valley Fever every evening for highlights from each of New Times’ blogs. Today’s entries:…
Mesa thief Anthony Lopez Rios used a samurai sword in an attempt to steal a guy’s bicycle last night. More laughable than using a martial arts weapon to try to rob a bike, the robbery attempt netted precisely zero bikes — and Rios can now add “failed bike robber” to…
Convicted rapist Edward Hartley, by his own account, has a small penis. It’s so small, in fact, that he whipped it out in front of a 13-year-old girl he found at a bus stop to reassure her that if the two were to have sex, he wouldn’t hurt her.He also…
