FFFF supports causes that promote intelligent, responsible and accountable government in Fullerton and Orange County
Somebody captured this campaign sign recently. It suggests one of three things.
1) Don Bankhead is a liar who wants people to think he is an incumbent; or,
2) Bankhead belongs in a memory care unit since he can’t remember that he was recalled four months ago and is no longer on the City Council; or,
3) he is too cheap to buy new campaign signs and is using old ones.
Well, which is it?
Well, that’s former officer Wolfe to you. Here is the D.A.’s announcement:
THIRD FORMER FULLERTON POLICE OFFICER ARRAIGNED ON INDICTMENT FOR BEATING-DEATH OF 37-YEAR-OLD HOMELESS MAN
SANTA ANA – A third former Fullerton Police Department (FPD) officer was arraigned today after Orange County District Attorney (OCDA) Tony Rackauckas obtained an indictment from the Orange County Grand Jury against him for his criminal participation in the July 2011 beating-death of 37-year-old homeless man Kelly Thomas.
Former Officer Joseph Wolfe was indicted Sept. 24, 2012, on one felony count of involuntary manslaughter and one felony count of the use of excessive force. He faces a maximum sentence of four years in state prison if convicted. Per the statutory bail amount, Wolfe surrendered on $25,000 bail. The defendant is scheduled for a pre-trial hearing Nov. 2, 2012, at 9:00 a.m. in Department C-40, Central Justice Center, Santa Ana.
The first two defendants in this case, then-Officer Manuel Ramos and then-Corporal Jay Cicinelli (see below), were charged Sept. 21, 2011, in Case #11CF2575. Since that time, the OCDA has actively continued its investigation and legal review and decided to seek an indictment against Wolfe following extensive legal and factual analysis and development of evidence.
The Orange County Grand Jury heard testimony from 10 witnesses and examined 113 exhibits of evidence over three days beginning Sept. 19, 2012, before returning an indictment on Sept. 24, 2012.
The law requires that grand jury transcripts, including any evidence or testimony, to be sealed until 10 calendar days have passed from the date of receipt of those transcripts by the defense. Due to this restriction, the OCDA is legally prohibited from discussing any information related to the grand jury proceedings at this time.
Just the other day Fullerton City Council candidate Jan Flory was heard to remark about needed reform: protecting the poor, underpaid and overworked city staff that used to bring her all those important projects when she was “on council” right after the last ice age.
Well here’s a staff-driven project that her beloved staff dumped on her and which she happily voted for: The Poisoned Park.
We did a whole series on this fiasco that you can read about here and here. In a nutshell, the City bought contaminated property from the Union Pacific Railroad on West Truslow for a community park. Forget the basic fact that nobody in the neighborhood wanted a park, let alone a gang hang out; the land was there and a private party wanted to buy it.
Fullerton’s stellar bureaucracy led by Susan Hunt (Parks Director), Bob Hodson (City Engineer), Jaim Armstrong (City Manager), Gary Chalupsky (Redevelopment Director), and Paul Dudley (Planning) just couldn’t get in the way of a pending deal fast enough. The City steeped in and bought the land for over a million bucks, then they built their park. More millions spent. All approved by Jan Flory.
And then disaster. It transpires that there was a toxic flume under the site. A fence was set up around the offending park and it remains closed to this day, over ten years after it was purchased, falling into decay. Nobody had ever bothered to to a proper environmental assessment and make the sale contingent upon its results.
The Poisoned Park may well be the exemplar of an incompetent collection of boobs from whom no accountability was ever demanded and from whom none was ever delivered.
But to Jan Flory’s “lights” these are the “heart of the City.” Hmm.
It sure as hell isn’t you. Or any other taxpayer or citizen. Nope. Here she is holding forth on who really matters to her. Her idea of ‘reform” is to place the interests of the City’s workers ahead of yours.
In an era of bloated salaries and, crippling pension burdens on the taxpayer and their great-great grandkids Jan Flory cares first and foremost about the plight of unionized government workers!
Did we put words in this dinosaur’s mouth? Nope. She did it all by herself.
Once in a while we here at FFFF like to pluck a particularly trenchant comment from a thread to give it the attention it deserves.
Here is a great comment from one of our readers who cuts to the chase about the crazy, spittle-flecked ravings of Jay Cicinelli’s step-father, John Huelsman, the other night. Huelsman is some demento who supposedly used to be a cop in Anaheim – a claim that is perfectly believable.
This Huelsman character is clearly bonkers. But his twisted argument has been appearing on these pages from FPD cop trolls since the summer of 2011.
Enjoy some clarity of thought:
#192 by Finally, Justice for Kelly on September 22, 2012
With regard to Huelsman, I have to say I find this specimen to be all too typical of police intelligence.
First he confuses “the court system” to be somehow connected to Kelly Thomas, conveniently overlooking the awkward fact that his out-of-control son-in-law acted as judge, jury and executioner on the night of 7/5/11. And this is the whole point of the public outrage: Kelly was denied justice thanks to the Fullerton Six. He is dead. The justice system has no bearing on Kelly.
The justice system however, does have Cicinelli in its clutches, although woefully undercharged by our pathetic DA. And the court of public opinion has and will continue to condemn a Culture of Corruption that has festered in the FPD. Flory can deny it. Hughes can deny it. Quirk can deny it. Goodrich, Coffman and Gennaco can deny it. The cowards left and right can deny it. But we know the truth.
And the truth will set us free; it will not however, set Wolfe, Ramos or Cicinelli free.
This piece was sent in yesterday by an FFFF reader who calls himself Brandon. I’ve also included a video of the acting chief making the city’s announcement.
Well it took 14 months but the Fullerton Police Department finally admitted what many had suspected since the beginning- Kelly Thomas was not doing anything wrong the night he was harassed and eventually beat to death by 6 Fullerton Police Officers. According to a statement made by Fullerton acting chief Dan Hughes, “There is no evidence of which the Fullerton Police Department is now aware that Kelly Thomas actually tried to steal anything from any of the vehicles in the lot.”
While this information is not surprising to anyone who has been reading the Friends for Fullerton’s Future blog over the last year or so, it is a victory toward holding the officers involved in the beating death accountable. A large part of the defense of the two (and soon to be possibly three) officers currently facing charges in the case rests on Thomas’ “criminal” behavior on the night he bludgeoned, electrocuted, and suffocated to death by six of Fullerton’s finest. With this admission by Chief Hughes, the lawyers for Manuel Ramos and jay Cicinelli will likely have a difficult time trying to convince a jury that Thomas was asking for his deadly beating that night. Of course the attorneys representing the ex-officers will no doubt still try to paint Thomas as a dangerous criminal whom their clients were afraid of that night. But when you are defending one of the most heinous, callous murders ever caught on tape, you have to draw at straws in order to have a chance at getting your clients off.
While many are no doubt happy to see the FPD finally confirmed what they had been suspecting and postulating on for over a year, relatives of the accused are not among those rejoicing. John Huelsman, the stepfather of Cicinelli tried to blame the current Fullerton City Council for directing Hughes to make the statement. “This is a criminal matter,” Huelsman told reporters. “These guys can go to prison… and the City Council just said they’re guilty because Kelly Thomas was innocent.” Talk about overstating the obvious. Mr. Huelsman’s incredulity at the fact his step-son could possibly be complicit in the murder is rather amusing given all of the evidence supporting it. And I don’t think the Fullerton city council has to tell anyone that your step-son and his comrades are guilty. We’ll let the video evidence and eye witness reports do that.
Sometimes you don’t know whether to laugh or cry. Like the case in Philly where a local businessman may be sued by the Redevelopment Agency for cleaning up trash and beautifying a piece of blighted Agency-owned property that they willfully refused to clean up. So ths guy spends 20 big ones of his own dough since the City blatantly ignored its own mess, and is now looking at a potential lawsuit – a lawsuit some asshole city bureaucrat says is based on “principle.” Principle. Now that’s a scream.
What’s really funny is that if the city had done the work it would have cost twenty times as much and taken ten times longer.
Of course apologists of Fullerton’s former Redevelopment Agency (you know who they are) would be quick to point out is that this sort incompetence and arrogance never happened in Fullerton; Fullerton Redevelopment folks were just so darned…well… you know.
But consider this: Fullerton has had a long and inglorious Redevelopment history that includes building, then demolishing concrete trestles along Harbor, giving away a public sidewalk to a politically connected apaign contributor, subsidizing dozens of boondoggles, supporting architectural design Nazi-ism, stealing an old lady’s property to give to a car dealer, and nasty little sales tax kick backs from Redevelopment funds – all done to promote more tax revenue to pay for pensions, League of City junkets, and all those inevitable step pay increases for the gang.
A final thought: even though Redevelopment is supposedly dead in California you can bet the farm (if they don’t steal it for High Speed Rail) that the lobbyists are busy at work in Sacramento trying to revive it, and that local mall fry politicians and local political wannabes are real eager for it to come back.
Why not? It’s fun and it isn’t their money.
It took a year, and some double talk by our esteemed DA, but news reports are saying the OC Grand Jury is convening to day to indict former Fullerton bully cop Joe Wolfe in the death of Kelly Thomas. Originally Tony Rackukas said Wolfe couldn’t have known what was going on between Ramos and Kelly and therefore was excused from any wrongdoing, a yarn so unbelievable that, well, nobody believed it, especially when the video came out and we could see a fully engaged Wolfe take batting practice on Kelly.
And here’s some food for thought: Joe Felz and Acting Chief Danny Hughes put this cheapjack goon (or so the story goes – and it has the perfect ring of truth) on a disability retirement for throwing out his shoulder beating up on Thomas! In any case Wolfe is gone from the Department, but not ’til afer getting a clean bill of health from our new, reformed police department and its esteemed Acting Chief. Fortunately the Grand Jury is likely to be a lot more discriminating as to who it determines to be Hero. Ad hopefully this Hero will get what he deserves.
Here is a fun image I just harvested from the Orange Juice blog, apparently the creation of local liberal activist Stephan Baxter who has gotten it into his noggin that Fullerton politicians should be held accountable for their actions (or to be more precise, their inaction) in the wake of the Kelly Thomas murder at the hands of members of the FPD. Funny the ideas some folks have.
Even more disturbing to some, Baxter doesn’t seem to care that the object of his scorn happens to be an old Democrat war horse named Jan Flory. who really loves the FPD.