An article from Yahoo on the best and worst run states.
Naturally ours is the worst run. Number 50. Check out the top and bottom five and see if you can discern any commonalities.
Haven’t heard that name lately? How about her alias, April Leanne Wilson?
She’s the FPD employee who (miraculously, considering the caliber of the detectives who work there) got caught last March stealing from the the evidence room at FPD Central. Here is Ms. Baughman’s court record.
Right now she’s free on bail after having ripped off more than $50K from the till.
To a certain extent you have to cut April some slack. After all, when you look around and see a culture of chaos, corruption, incompetence it must be hard for a person of marginal integrity not to give in to temptation.
According to police spokesholes, Baughman had been at it for quite some time. Which begs the inevitable question, who the Hell was in charge? Either nobody was doing inventories and audits, or the egregious Baughman had one or more accomplices helping her out. Will there be any accountability? Want odds?
Either way it’s another black eye for the department and its “leadership” who would have us believe everything is hunky dory at Commonwealth and Highland.
And before you feel obliged to credit the FPD for nabbing one of their own, consider what would have happened if Baughman were not a civilian employee. Would we ever have heard anything from the Culture of Cover up?
Here’s a fun reminder for those fighting the good fight. Last published in September, 2010.
– Joe Sipowicz
Be sure to enjoy the subtle image of the tennis racket lying on the bench!
He keeps popping up like a bad penny. It’s Iron Mike Sellers at the Rose Bowl.
That’s right, Fullerton’s former top cop who let Pat McPension’s Neanderthal goons run amok, and who, when the chips were down took 1) a vacation, 2) a tummy ache medical leave, and 3) a disability retirement and massive pension with thanks and well-wishes of the Albert Pujols of City mangers, Joe Felz.
Here is a sly observer expressing his view that a Fullerton cop appears to be more like a soldier than a civilian policeman.
Naturally he is rewarded with a combination of arrogance, error, and attitude by “officer” Contino.
While it is true that Prime Minister Robert Peel established the first permanent and professional police forces in Britain, the use of that factoid to explain and defend a paramilitary organization behaving like an occupying army would be faintly ridiculous if the consequences weren’t so, um, deadly.
And speaking of Mr. Peel, while living in Tamworth, the versatile gentleman was credited with the development of the Tamworth Pig by breeding Irish stock with some local Tamworth pigs.
We’ve all seen Fullerton cops texting on the job – on motorcyles, in patrol cars, and at Starbucks, when in fact they are supposed to be protecting us from evil, hippy dope-smokers.
But wait a sec! What’s this? Chief Danny texting during a Fullerton Council meeting?!
Well, I guess FPD “Detective” Ron Bair will soon be making another “Brown Act” record request!
I always hate it when the stooge press indicates that a “former cop” was convicted of something when the former cop was an active cop when he did what he did to get convicted.
And so I won’t say “former Fullerton cop Vincent Mater plead guilty…” Rather, I will say dirty Fullerton cop Vincent Mater who clearly had something to hide in the wake of the Dean Gochenour Fullerton jail suicide and who demonstrated as much by destroying his DAR plead guilty to day…
Here’s the text of the DAs press release:
FULLERTON – A former Fullerton Police Department (FPD) officer was convicted and sentenced today for destroying evidence by crushing his audio-recorder after an inmate committed suicide in jail following a driving under the influence (DUI) arrest by the defendant. Vincent Thomas Mater, 42, pleaded guilty to a court offer by the Honorable Frances Munoz to one misdemeanor count of destruction of evidence and one misdemeanor count of vandalism. Mater was sentenced to three years of informal probation and 60 days of community service. The People objected to the sentence, arguing for jail time based on the nature of the crime, destruction of evidence possibly related to an inmate’s death, and the defendant’s violation of his position of trust.
At the time of the crime, Mater was a police officer with FPD. At approximately 9:45 p.m. on April 14, 2011, Mater conducted a DUI investigation after making a traffic stop of a vehicle being driven without its lights on in the dark. Mater was in uniform and driving a marked FPD patrol car. Mater arrested the driver, Dean Gochenour, upon determining that Gochenour was under the influence of alcohol.
Mater transported Gochenour in his patrol car to the Fullerton City Jail (FCJ) and turned him over to FPD jailers to be booked upon arrival. Throughout the duration of his contact with Gochenour, Mater wore an FPD-issued Digital Audio Recording device (DAR), which was activated and would have audio-recorded any statements made by Mater or Gochenour.
At approximately 11:30 p.m., inmate Gochenour committed suicide by hanging himself in a cell at FCJ. The Orange County District Attorney’s Office (OCDA) was subsequently contacted to conduct the custodial death investigation.
In the hours after Mater learned of Gochenour’s death, Mater destroyed his DAR by crushing it and removing the mother board and circuit board. The audio captured on Mater’s DAR of the defendant’s interaction with Gochenour could not be recovered as a result of the damage. Mater destroyed the evidence that would have been relevant to the OCDA’s custodial death investigation.
FPD investigated the case against Mater regarding the destruction of evidence and submitted it to the OCDA for criminal prosecution.
To read the OCDA’s full report on the custodial death of Gochenour, visit www.OrangeCountyDA.com and select “OCDA Report Custodial Death Investigation – Inmate Dean Gochenour” from the Investigation Letters tab under the Media Center. The report was issued March 13, 2012.
Deputy District Attorney Brock Zimmon of the Special Prosecutions Unit prosecuted this case.
I don’t know who “the honorable” Frances Munoz is, but I sure want to end up in her court if I ever get busted doing anything naughty. Probation and sixty days’ community service? Really? You or I would be looking at hard time. Oh, well we’ve always know there were rules and regs for us and a get out of jail card for the cops.
Did something fishy happen to Dean Gochenour before or after he was deposited in the FPD jail? Thanks to Mater we shall probably never know.
Oh, and yeah, Mater’s now a former Fullerton cop, although whether he was fired or permitted to walk away we will never know. That shall remain a mystery, too.
It just gets worse. A premature discharge.
Fortunately the injured party is doing fine and no lawsuits are expected.
Updated list on Quirk-Silva NO-SHOWS:
9-7: Fullerton Chamber Candidates Forum
9-12: Cypress College Candidate Debate
9-21: OC Real Estate Managers Assoc. Legislative Forum
10-7: West Island (Anaheim Uninc.) Homeowners Forum
10-17: Cypress Chamber of Commerce Debate
10-27: West Anaheim Neighbors
I just received some interesting news about our Mayor Sharon Quirk who is running for the State Assembly – and its both embarrassing and telling.
I have it on real good authority that Ms. Quirk was invited to a “meet the candidate night” by the good folks in the unincorporated West Anaheim Island – a large area of unincorporated Orange County.
Now theses are the very people Quirk’s political handlers said she would do well with – the working class people of Anaheim’s flatlands, so you would think Quirk would jump at the chance to mingle with her peeps.
Nuh uh.
Apparently at first she just ignored the West Island Neighborhood group, and finally some campaign flunky responded saying that it might be a trap to embarrass Quirk with – questions! That sure has the ring of truth since a quick trip to Quirk’s website shows a cardboard cut out candidate who steadfastly refuses to take a position on any of the important propositions on the ballot this fall – including Governor Brown’s new tax and spend plans.
Nice work, Ms. Quirk.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=egkl8DHvbpQ
Kind of creepy.
And no, Ms. Executive Director, your monster is not asleep.