The other night I went to see a preview of the new Milos Forman film The People vs. Larry Flynt. It’s a good movie. It’s got God and sex and romance and tragedy and struggle. You know–I laughed, I cried, it was better than Cats. But I’m no critic, and…
Pronghorns of a Dilemma I never cease to be amazed at the media’s propensity toward slanted coverage of subjects that would seem to much better serve the public if offered in a more objective manner (“Boom, Boom on the Range,” Jeremy Voas, November 21). I found it particularly instructive to…
Early in 1995, Mary Simmerer stumbled upon an alarming situation. Simmerer, who manages a section of the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality that monitors compliance with drinking-water regulations, discovered that on one day–November 24, 1994–the city of Scottsdale served approximately 70,000 of its citizens drinking water containing illegal levels of…
Germaine Steudler was arrested on September 19 for a probation violation. What follows are excerpts from her journal. 9/26/96: Awakened at 1 a.m. and asked what size pants and shirt I needed for court. The guard returned a half an hour later . . . we were shackled together and…
PNI Confidential The Flash has often noted that the Arizona Republic seems intent on offending nobody but its readers. Now Phoenix Newspapers Inc. employees have been chillingly reminded that they are not to offend anyone inside the company, either. In a company memo titled “Electronic Messaging Policy,” PNI employees are…
Game Plan Most interesting article on the Luke Air Force Base/Goldwater Gunnery Range and the Sonoran pronghorn antelope (“Boom, Boom on the Range,” Jeremy Voas, November 21). As I read, no fewer than a dozen (in groups of two) F-16’s screamed over my abode in Surprise. Sometimes, on really clear…
Something felt awful and familiar as I strolled toward the set of Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s latest made-for-TV movie (Charred Riots of Fire, MCSO Studios, 1996) when it began shooting at the Durango Jail a couple of weeks ago. The unsavory sense of deja vu had something to do with the…
A fellow I knew used to spout the theory that, based on a kind of friends-of-co-workers-of-friends network, you were always just three phone calls away from the president of the United States. As of last weekend, I can do that one better. I was one phone call away from God…
Time is one thing prisoners have plenty of. What to do with all that time? When they’re not conjuring diabolical plots to steal county-issued underwear, some of them write to us. What follows is a mere sampling of the prose, poems, diatribes, sketches (there’s even a “restaurant review”) sent to…
For most of us, getting ready for the holidays means whipping up a batch of Chex mix, hacking up a Hickory Farms beef log and hoping that this year’s monthlong ordeal will pass as quickly and as painlessly as possible. But when it comes to Christmas, twin brothers Bob and…
Joe Young lives in a modest brick house with a broken garage door. The garage itself doubles as Young’s paint-spattered studio, where the Arizona State University art history professor stores the product of his years as an artist. Dozens of canvases stacked vertically around the room track the history of…
It’s the party line since the Tent City riot: Sheriff Joe Arpaio and his detention officers blame problems in the jails on understaffing and, more to the point, underfunding by the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors. The sheriff complains that he can’t afford more $21,000-a-year detention officers; however, just weeks…
Smile, You’re on Convict Camera KNXV-TV Channel 15 could hardly contain itself last week. With its futuristic promo machine set on full-tease, the station announced its latest journalistic coup: Tony Kovaleski had gone undercover at Sheriff Joke Arpaio’s jails just days before the Tent City riot! That’s right, only days…
Television reporters called in live broadcasts from the Durango Jail complex last Wednesday night when it looked as though a second riot at Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s famous Tent City jail had started. It was the first evening inmates were in the jail since the initial riot on Sunday, November 17…
Here in the Valley of the Sun, the names “Fife” and “Joe” are not synonymous with “happiness” and “joy.” Though the respective physical appearances of these men may be enough to bring about an occasional smirk, their actions aren’t funny at all. In fact, our governor and sheriff seem to…
Mondo Fido On New Times’ Comics page (November 14), Ernie Pook’s Comeek showed how it is for lots of innocent dogs in animal shelters: They are given out to torture laboratories! A horrible betrayal of the trust dogs have in us. They are experimented on in fraud “testing,” so that…
A few Sunday mornings ago, Mary and Ernie Howard found a sitter for their three children and drove to American Legion Post 75 in north Phoenix. The Glendale couple didn’t know anyone at the Sunnyslope chapter, but had been invited to attend a flag-raising ceremony in honor of Mary’s late…
Biologist John Hervert, arguably the world’s foremost expert on the Sonoran pronghorn antelope, hoists an antenna in his left hand and listens to a receiver for blips indicating whether any radio-collared pronghorns are nearby. He hears nothing but static. Before him stretches the xeric wilderness of the Growler Valley, a…
It was to be Maggie’s first airplane ride. She was flying to Los Angeles to lose her virginity. And there were other reasons for her to be skittish. Maggie, a Jack Russell terrier, was being left with a stranger. That stranger, a baggage handler, had propped her travel kennel atop…
Sheriff Joke’s Unhappy Campers When word of the Tent City riot reached The Flash, his first reaction was: What took so long? Sheriff Joke Arpaio has been wishing and hoping for riots for the longest time. In May, during one of his many visits to KFYI-AM–the sheriff’s favorite Criticism-Free Zone–Joe…
If you build it, they will come. That is, build a stadium, and entrepreneurs will cater to the resultant demands of the marketplace with shops, restaurants and bars. And parking garages. In response to the parking problems anticipated for the opening of Bank One Ballpark in 1998 (“Parking Breaks,” November…
If I said, “Excuse me, but if I were to serve you a fragrantly seasoned lamb kebab with a side of kibbe-nayeh, would you be interested in watching a little belly dancing?” you’d probably say, “Yes. Please bring on the lamb kebab, the side of kibbe-nayeh, and, by all means,…
