Manny Ramos and Jay Cicinelli, two of the six Fullerton cops who presided over the death of transient Kelly Thomas on July 5th, 2011 were told today by Superior Court judge Froeberg that they would be standing trial in June for the death of the schizophrenic homeless man. Their running buddy, Joe Wolfe the third Fullerton cop charged, has another hearing to dismiss in March.
According to the judge there was sufficient evidence to go to trial. Of course we already knew that; and we also know that newly minted Chief Danny Hughes, the boss of the Fullerton Six told them they did a good job that night. He also claimed there was no Culture of Corruption in the FPD, and other bedtime fairy tales.
Kelly Thomas was killed eighteen months ago.
Another effort by the lawyers for the FPD cops charged in the murder of transient Kelly Thomas has failed.
The Voice of OC(EA) has the story succinctly, here. Apparently the issue will be revisited again on the 18th in Judge William R. Froeberg’s court, but from the statements made by the judge it sure looks like this will go forward.
Of course everybody in City hall knew the dirty little secret. The illegal 10% water tax that was hidden by the confusing name of “in-lieu fee.” Year after rancid year the City Fathers and Mothers – from daffy and angry liberal spendthrifts like Molly McClanahan and Jan Flory, to supposed conservatives Dick Ackerman and Chris Norby blessed the scam and put their imprimatur of approval upon it.
Of course they knew, or must have suspected, that the 10% was nothing other than a greasy rake-off that made their jobs easier and rewarded their friends in the bureaucracy. And they knew, or must have suspected, that the various City departments were already charging directly to the Water Fund – in direct contravention to the purpose of the original Resolution that created the”fee.”
This means that because the City departments were already charging to the Water Fund, that cost too jacked up the tax. Double Dip.
And all that free water wasted by the City over the years? You guessed it: the cost jacked up the illegal water tax. Triple Dip.
The fee was set at 10% of gross water revenue, meaning that every time the commodity cost of water went up, or transmission cost went up, so did the absolute amount of the tax itself. Quadruple Dip.
Naturally, the water tax itself was considered to be part of the gross “cost” of the water works, meaning that as the absolute value of the 10% increment rose, so did total of the tax!! The true amount of the tax was 10% of cost plus 10% of the 10%!!! Which is why the tax was actually about 11% of the true cost. Got it? Quintuple Dip.
The defenders of the Old Culture of Corruption and its slimey shakedown want you to believe that everything is pretty okay, that no harm was done, and that refunding any part of this felonious rip-off would just be a big waste of everybody’s time.
Wrong. Accountability and responsibility have their cost. Sooner or later you have to pay the piper.
For 40 years the City of Fullerton has added a 10% tax to your water. The ostensible purpose was to pay for general city costs necessary to deliver water, like the City Manager and the City Attorney. In the beginning the rate was a small 2%. Then in 1970 the City Fathers realized nobody was watching and they bumped it to 10%. But the fee had nothing to do with infrastructure or anything else withing the purview of the Water Utility.
For the first 27 years it was just a scam – the City departments were already charging directly to the Water Fund – the 10% was just pure high-fat content bureaucratic gravy, ripped off from unsuspecting water users by ignorant and lubricious politicians and administrators; then in 1996 Proposition 218 was enacted, requiring that objective studies, approved in public, be the basis of these charges. At this point the annually rubber stamped water tax became illegal; but it was still there, happily rising whenever the cost of the water commodity itself went up – from 1997-2012.
In 2012 the City itself acknowledged the magnitude of the ill-gotten revenue – over $27,000,000 since 1997, a sum that went into the General Fund to pay for salaries and benefits of employees who have absolutely nothing to do with the procurement or transmission of water, as well as other fun stuff – like council junkets to four start hotels.
Last year, the previous council majority made a commitment to return as much of the graft as possible. The new council? Don’t hold your breath. Mrs. Flory, one of architects of the ripoff, and someone who, arrogantly, has never even bothered to proffer an apology for her heist, has claimed that the City can’t afford refunds of even the minimum amount prescribed by law.
Well, we’ll see how this plays out. In the meantime, stay tuned for Part II: How to Phony Up A Report.
OC Register excuse for a journalist, and notorious bad-cop-story-misser, Lou Ponsi, really outdid himself today with a ridiculous “story” about all the excuses his pals on the force heard from folks who wanted to dodge a traffic citation. Real tough, hard-hitting piece there, Lou.
I wonder if Ponzi will ever tire of writing stupid fluff pieces for one of the most notorious police forces in California. I also wonder if writing salacious cop-accounts of wanton females is the best story line, given the well-documented behavior of FPD serial sex batterer Albert Rincon, whose activities were essentially known, and condoned by the department.
Anyhoo, that’s all introductory to my own version of a real human interest piece, something of which we are all too familiar, by now. And that’s the excuses doled out by the cops themselves to try to explain away their own malfeasance – crap subsequently sucked up by drones like Ponsi. Enjoy.
1. He was running.
2. He was fighting.
3. He disobeyed a legal command.
4. He was reaching for his “waistband” (whatever that is).
5. That donut was supposed to be jelly-filled.
6. We put our lives on the line every day.
7. Our belts weigh 80 pounds.
8. We die at average 53 years old.
9. We try to arrest the right guy.
10. He thought he was beating up the right guy.
11. That’s POBR covered. Can’t talk about it.
12. It was not just honking. It was excessive horning.
13. No, it’s not tax deductible, but give us your money anyway, you’ll get a decal.
14. The job stress hooked me on those pills.
15. I just set my bag of chicken on that iPad. After that I don’t know what happened.
16. I got mad at my DAR and smashed it against the wall.
17. We slammed his head against the bars as we removed the dead body.
18. Those ladies weren’t like you.
19. Just wait to see the video. You’ll change your minds. I’ve seen it 400 times.
20. There were broken bones.
21. There was only one, maybe two deeply involved.
22. He was breaking into cars.
23. He was high on PCP.
24. He was a gang banger.
25. I feared for my safety.
26. The 90 pound girl with the jack knife entered the 22 foot radius so we had to shoot her 18 times.
27. Ron Thomas was never a deputy sheriff.
28. He was just a smelly bum.
29. The free sandwiches and beers are just a small perk for an otherwise unrewarding job.
30. My second wife doesn’t understand me and my girlfriend just wants a chunk of that pension.
31. It was suicide by cop.
32. He was a terrorist.
33. It was just a bong from the evidence room. It’s not like i was going to use it or anything.
34. Once you take a guided tour of the station you’ll feel differently about everything.
35. it was really all just a misunderstanding.
36. They are either misinformed or lying.
And now, feel free to add your own.
The Register is reporting that the Fullerton cops have collared a potential perp who couldn’t evade them. Not bad.
Can Detective Ron Bair solve this puzzler?
Yes, Friends, elections do have consequences. But you already knew that.
The results of the November election mean that the tepid and incompetent reign of Fullerton City Manager Joe Felz and City Attorney Dick Jones will continue as they preside over policies (or lack of policies) meant to evade accountability for your employees and electeds in City Hall.
Acting Chief Danny Hughes, the legacy boss of the FPD Culture of Corruption will soon see his title made permanent, even as the accusations by Ben Lira about Hughes’s direct involvement in cover-up and brutality, continue to swirl.
(No, you will not get a refund in any part for the illegal $27,000,000 tax that City Hall stole from you. But in the larger scheme of things, that’s small change)
I want to talk about justice.
In our State the cops can do damn near anything they want with impunity. Our spineless politicians have given them wealth, influence, and most importantly, virtually no accountability to anyone. The justice system itself, run by District Attorneys surrounded by ex-cops, has little interest in pursuing justice against their own allies, even when this means coddling the very perjuring cops that have scuttled many of the DA’s own cases. And when the cops themselves actually commit crimes, the law enforcement establishment immediately springs into action to defend the indefensible.
Think about what happened to Veth Mam. An innocent man was assaulted, arrested and falsely prosecuted. Fullerton cops knew the real truth and lied under oath to hide the fact that they beat up and arrested the wrong guy. Were there any repercussions? Of course not. Remember the Martinez kid who spent five months in jail thanks to the Fullerton cops? Well, Goodrich said everything was just fine – a slight error. Trevor Clarke says the FPD beat him, gave him a few sadistic “screen tests” just for fun, threw him in jail, and robbed him for good measure. Ben Lira says Danny Hughes was one of the instigators. Will anything happen? Not very likely, is it?
Let’s let the Albert Rincon case be our guide: we know that Albert Rincon serially molested women in the back seat of his patrol car. We know because of the depositions of just two of his victims (there are said to be a dozen). But the obscenity of what occurred, and importantly the roles played by Patdown Pat McKinley and Mike Sellers in covering up the whole mess, and worse, putting the creep back on the streets shall never be known. Why? because there was a settlement; a settlement approved by by-then Councilman McKinley himself.
The lawsuit settlement is the mechanism to hush everything up, from brutal and sadistic cops and an immoral FPD leadership, to a feckless city manager and city attorney who condoned the Culture of Corruption. If you wondered how the FPOA and the FPD/City Hall crowd could share a common goal, this is it.
And the path to settlement is the route no doubt most favored by Garo Mardirossian, the lawyer who is representing a whole slew of FPD/FPOA victims of brutality and perjury. For a lawyer a big payday without having to risk anything is a gift. And co-incidentally the same result will be a gift for Joe Felz, Pat Mckinley, Danny Hughes, Barry Coffman and the rest of the gang.
Your new council majority of Chaffee, Flory and Fitzgerald will make sure that Fullerton returns to the normalcy where no bad deed goes reported.
Of course it won’t be their money that goes to pay off Veth Mam and Kelly Thomas’s relatives. It will be yours.
And you will be poorer but no wiser.
Yep, he said it. In reference to his own union member, Benjamin Lira.
Listen to the Barry Coffman interview on KFI, here. Scroll to the 23:40 mark and enjoy the Fullerton cop union boss try as hard as he can to bad-mouth a dues paying member of the FPOA!
First he says Lira is on the way out, a POBAR violation if uttered by anybody in authority; and of course after the embarrassing question about how come he isn’t defending his union member, and an awkward pause, we learn from Barry that Lira is a real malcontent, a cancer in the presumably healthy body tissue of the FPD. Which is pretty hard to swallow given the evident Culture of Corruption in the department.
Comically, Coffman asks us who are we to believe, his own man, or the upstanding Michael Gennaco Report – a bucket full of pabulum coughed up by a paid hack in order to whitewash the felonious FPD and its command structure.
Say, what’s going on here? A union boss siding with management? Huh?
In response to the tricky question about how come his union didn’t bail out Ramos, Coffman (after another painful pause) exclaims that he and his boys just wanted the justice system to play out, a non-answer if ever there was one. He does admit that when the Thomas murder hit he and his fellow FPOA leaders were completely useless. We do know that they came onto this blog to post vulgar obscenities.
It’s hard not to relish the delicious double standard of the oh-so-ethical Barry C who never said a single word in public about Todd Major, Kelly Mejia, Albert Rincon, Vincent Mater, Kenton Hampton, Frank Nguyen, Cary Tong or any of the other FPOA miscreants whose behavior has been so amply demonstrated on these pages.
We just received a copy of a message to city manager Joe Felz from a Fullerton police officer making specific allegations of corruption, brutality, racism, cronyism and cover-ups under the leadership of police captain and current acting chief Danny Hughes. I also hear that officer Lira has been discussing these issues on KFI AM 640 this afternoon.
From: Ben Lira
Sent: Friday, July 20, 2012 12:42 PM
To: jfelz@ci.fullerton.ca.us; City Manager
Subject: message/information from Benjamin LiraMr. Felz
My name is Benjamin Lira, and although we’ve never met, I’ve been a nearly 17 year dedicated employee of the Fullerton Police Department. Recent events have left the city, the Police department and it’s employees in turmoil. I’m saddened to think I’ve had anything to do with that.
I apologize for reaching out to you via email but myself and my colleagues have stood quiet long enough. I ask that you PLEASE take the time to read this email and reflect on it’s contents.
If my name doesn’t ring a bell, then let me introduce myself and tell you I am the person who drafted the email to solicit bail funds for Manuel Ramos. I’m not writing you to debate the KT events; they speak for themselves. I’ve said all along that I didn’t condone the actions of the Officers, but Manuel Ramos is my friend and I did it to help a friend. Not only did I try to help a friend I checked with then Acting Chief Hamilton who told me, “I can do whatever I want as long as I do it on my own time.” Employees at the PD were confused because having not seen the video where told by Captain Crum, “that’s what happens when you fight with the Police.” On my own time I drafted an email and distributed via PORAC. I didn’t have any intentions other then to solicit donations through union members. Unfortunately, someone from LAPD put the email on his facebook page, Big City Cops. I do not have any affiliation with BCP nor do I agree with their views.
Since drafting this email I’ve been demoted. After my demotion I was placed on paid leave for a text message I did not send and was distributed by members of the FPD. It’s unfortunate that I and on my own time am held to higher standards then some on of the members of the FPD while on duty. Many in the public refer to the “culture of corruption” in the FPD and I’m here to tell you it exist. I’ve resisted long and hard the “culture of corruption” and I can no longer sit back and allow this to ruin the reputation I spent long and hard building with the community, my co workers and my colleagues in the LE profession. Which was once a childhood dream to become a Police Officer has now become a nightmare.
Up until now I’ve decided to remain silent, mostly at the advice of my attorney’s. I can no longer remain silent and my passion to clean up the Police department and re store it’s reputation remains stronger then ever. I feel it’s ironic the person now in charge of the Police department, Dan Hughes, has led the way in the culture of corruption and now makes the decisions for the Department. I implore you to please continue reading and know that against my attorney’s wishes I’m reaching out to you to give you information you may find useful.
When I first began my career in 1995 I was eager to make a difference and that difference started in my assignment at the FPD jail. While working in the jail I watched then Senior Officer Dan Hughes slap an inmate 6-8 times in the face. I thought to myself this person doesn’t need to be a Police Officer and never did I ever imagine this person would one day be in charge. The assault was investigated and as a probationary employee and only 19years old I feel as though I was told what to say and not asked what I saw.
During my career I worked up the ranks from Cadet, Sr Cadet, Jailer, Reserve Officer, Police Officer and Corporal. I attended CSUF and obtained my Bachelors degree in hopes of one day promoting. Sadly I was wrong because I soon realized there was a culture at FPD where a group of White Officers would promote and then promote their friends leaving the rest of us on the outside looking in. If you look at the make up of the PD it’s made up of Supervisors, their family members and friends. I know it’s hard to believe but as you continue to read on I hope you see the evidence I show to support my claim.
In my nearly 17 years as an employee of the Fullerton Police Department I have received one citizen complaint and it was at the beginning of my career. I personally think this is impressive because all of my career but 2 years has been spent in patrol because I’ve never been given a chance to prove myself in details, assignment, training, etc. This frustration grew in to depression and in 2005 I took a leave of absence. Embarrassed as to how I was feeling I didn’t tell anyone. I did what I had always told people and that’s if your not feeling well then seek counseling, and that’s exactly what I did. Unfortunately, this didn’t meet the mold of the culture at FPD because when I returned to work I had 46 metal hangers intertwined on my locker preventing me from opening it. I reported this, but of course nothing ever happened.
Throughout my career I watched as this Culture of Corruption grew and they became increasingly racist. Mexicans would be referred to as “wetbacks” and African Americans would be referred to as the “N” word. I voiced my displeasure but to no avail. On July 22, 2008 a departmental photo was scheduled and during individual photos a group of Mexican Officers were called, “wetbacks,” “where’s your oranges,””Where’s your Chiclets.” For the first time in my career, while in uniform and not on the scene of a tragic crime, I wanted to cry. I filed a complaint and my frustration grew when the FPD brass deemed my complaint “spirited bantering.” I was mortified and couldn’t understand why this could be. From then on I suffered even more ridicule by colleagues teasing me for making a complaint.
Since this time I’ve continued to suffer discrimination. I’ve reported this and ultimately then Chief Sellers scheduled an independent investigation. RCS investigating and consulting ultimately met with me and the results of this investigation have never been given to me. During this investigation I reported how supervisors would leave early and go drinking downtown. I reported how the supervisors would then have Officers take them home in Police/City vehicles. Ironically these same officers who would give them rides home would begin to get promoted and preferred details in the Department. I reported how then Captain Petropolous would teach at FJC and allow FPD members enroll in his class and never show up and get A’s in the class. Doesn’t sound like much until you consider Officers would use these credits which led to certificates and increase pay.
This investigation went on and I reported a laundry list of incidents which largely alleged supervisors were derelict in their duty. I reported how supervisors would go and teach at FJC academy when they should be working at the PD. I didn’t feel it was fair to the citizens that the watch commander was getting paid to teach at FJC instead of being at the PD, but this was the norm and til this day hasn’t changed.
10 days after this interview I was called in on a Sunday to the Watch Commanders office. I was met by an angry Dan Hughes. Hughes told me I was ordered not to talk about the above mentioned investigation and that someone had filed a complaint against me. I was never given a copy of the complaint, I was never told what the complaint was and a follow up investigation took place. I later learned from the Association that it was Dan Hughes attempt to cover up the interview which in turn led to his promotion to Captain.
The more I look around I can’t help but feel Dan Hughes is the common theme amongst corruption that has occurred. For instance, the city is being sued by Clarke, a citizen who said he was assaulted on St Patrick’s day 2010. All those involved know it was Dan Hughes who initiated this contact and took Clarke down to the ground causing him injuries yet no record of this ever exist. In fact, this arrest was followed by Officer Cary Tong purposely slamming on the brakes and while recorded on DAR you can hear Officer Tong allowing the inmates face to slam on the “cage” three times in the Police car. I think it’s sad and ironic how now the city is being sued but up until now Hughes’ involvement is not known. To me this shows what kind of person he really is. In addition to that during this investigation he had Sgt Chocek secretly/privately go up to each officer involved and promise them lenient discipline in return for not reporting Dan Hughes’ involvement.
These are just my stories and quiet frankly I have several more and so do other members of this department. Theres employees that are afraid to come forward in fear of risking their career like I have. There’s a lot of good employees at the FPD, one being Captain Lorraine Jones. Sir, whether you agree with me or not I ask that you please consider the common goal we have and that’s to clean up the Police Department. It breaks my heart to have to listen to the advice of my attorney’s and prepare for lawsuits because that’s not what I’m about. If you question my intentions please ask my friend, Captain Lorraine Jones. She speaks highly of you and it’s for that reason I’ve chosen to reach out to you.
On May 17 I met with the FBI and reported what I’ve said along with other things. The FBI, like yourself, have the opportunity to make a difference for this city, it’s citizens and it’s employees and I urge you to please consider that. I think at the very minimum I’ve given you some evidence of the misdeeds perpetrated by Dan Hughes and I’m hoping it’s enough to launch an investigation and place him on administrative leave. I hope that if at any point you want to meet with me and or use me to help, that you know I’m committed to you and this city and it’s citizens.
I’m sorry for any inconvenience any of my actions have caused.
Sincerely,
Benjamin Lira