Maricopa County Attorney’s Office Justice for All June/July 2019
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The Maricopa County Attorney’s Office is working hard for you. Our prosecutors have been collaborating with law enforcement and crime analysts to share information and develop best practices to improve public safety by identifying and prosecuting crime drivers in the community and strengthening community outreach. We’re also busy assessing and improving programs to offer diversion to offenders and give them the tools they need to avoid return to the criminal justice system. Our efforts are being recognized as well, with three of our programs winning awards from the National Association of Counties (NACo). Our annual ‘Don’t Leave Me Behind’ Vehicular Heatstroke campaign is well underway. We, along with our partners, the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety, the Arizona Humane Society and Phoenix Children’s Hospital, urge you to help us to spread the word that ‘Not One More’ child or pet should die in a hot car. Wherever your summer plans take you, make sure you take precautions to secure your home before leaving on vacation and be aware of your surroundings as you travel to avoid becoming a victim of crimes of opportunity. Have a great summer!
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This Summer, Let’s Work Together for ‘Not One More’ Hot Car Death
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It is officially summer and you can feel it, which means whether you are new to the Valley, visiting, or just need a helpful reminder… it is far too hot to leave a child or pet in a parked car. A vehicle’s interior can heat up 20 degrees in just ten minutes in our heat, and even when the outside temperature is in the 60’s, a parked vehicle can heat up above 110 degrees. Children and pets are particularly vulnerable to heatstroke in hot cars because their body temperature can rise faster than a human adult. “It is never okay to leave a child or pet in a parked car this summer. Whether you are a parent, guardian, caregiver, uncle, aunt, neighbor or friend helping out, if you have a child in the backseat you have precious cargo. You must remember they are there and remember your responsibility,” said Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery. The Maricopa County Attorney’s Office is partnering with the Arizona Humane Society, Phoenix Children’s Hospital and the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety for its annual “Don’t Leave Me Behind” Vehicular Heatstroke Campaign. This partnership will work to help spread this important awareness message from now until August 31st through freeway billboards, digital ads, radio commercials and social media. In 2018, this summer campaign saw amazing success with ZERO deaths in Maricopa County from children or pets being left in a hot vehicle. This year, tragically, a young life was already lost prior to the launch of the campaign. However, we are working to ensure that NOT ONE MORE life is lost this summer in our community. “Last year was the deadliest year nationwide with 52 children dying of heatstroke after being left in a vehicle in 2018. Luckily, Phoenix was not one of those locations and there were no deaths here last year. However, we have already had one this year so clearly there is a need out there for us all to be aware and it is so simple. This is 100% preventable, but you have to be aware that there is a possibility of it occurring. You cannot let down your guard or believe that it can’t to happen to you,” said Dr. Anthony Pickett, Phoenix Children’s Hospital emergency department physician. Having a strategy to remember there is a child in the backseat especially when you are outside your normal routine is the best way to prevent tragedy. You can leave your phone in the backseat or if you have a car with keyless entry leave your key fob in the back, and the car will alert you if you try to lock the door and walk away. When it comes to pets, sometimes leaving them at home is the better option. “During the Summer, the Arizona Humane Society’s Emergency Animal Medical Technicians can respond to about 40 calls a day and up to half of those can be heat related. It is important to keep pets inside as much as you can and never leave them in parked vehicles which is like a hot oven than can turn deadly to an animal locked inside,” warned Tracey Miiller, Arizona Humane Society Field Operations Manager.
Serving as a tool for responders is the “Good Samaritan” law, put into place just last year, providing civil protections to those who may need to help a child or pet in distress. The Governor recently signed HB2671 into law, enhancing our animal cruelty statutes to provide greater penalties for intentional acts of animal cruelty.
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If You See A Child or Pet In A Hot Vehicle: Arizona law protects a person’s use of reasonable force to remove a child or a household pet from a locked and unattended vehicle if the person does ALL of the following:
- Has a good faith belief there is an imminent danger of death or physical injury
- Check if the vehicle is locked and found no other reasonable way to get the child or pet out
- Call 911 BEFORE entering the vehicle
- Use no more force than necessary
- Remain at the scene until authorities arrive
As per Arizona law (ARS § 12-558.02) A person is not immune from civil liability if the person fails to abide by any of the provisions above and commits any unnecessary or malicious damage to the motor vehicle.
Warning Signs of Heatstroke in Children: Red, hot, and moist or dry skin No sweating Strong rapid pulse or slow weak pulse Throbbing headache Dizziness Unconsciousness Nausea Confusion Irritable or strange behavior
Warning Signs of Heatstroke in Pets:
Safety Tips:- Never leave a child or pet alone in a parked car – even with the windows rolled down or air conditioning on.
- Always check the back of the vehicle before locking the door and walking away.
- Never let children play in an unattended vehicle.
- Always lock your vehicle doors and trunk and keep the keys out of a child’s reach. If a child is missing, quickly check all vehicles, including the trunk.
- If dropping a child off is not part of your normal routine, take steps to remind yourself that the child is in the car:
- Place something you need to take with you in the back seat next to the car seat so that you’ll check the back seat before you leave.
- Set a reminder on your cell phone or calendar.
- Instruct your daycare provider to call you if your child does not show up.
- If a child or pet is in distress due to heat, get them out of the heat as quickly as possible. Cool them rapidly by spraying them with cool, not cold, water. Never use an ice bath!
Facts:- 2018 was the deadest year on record in the U.S. for children left in hot cars.
- Since 1998, more than 800 children have died nationwide as a result of vehicular heatstroke.
- 54% were forgotten in the vehicle.
- 27% gained access by themselves and became trapped.
- 18% were left intentionally.
- 1% were unknown cases.
- High body temperatures can cause permanent injury or death.
- Heatstroke begins when the core body temperature reaches about 104 degrees and a child’s major organs begin to shut down.
- Heatstroke becomes fatal at a core body temperature of 107 degrees.
- Heatstroke fatalities have occurred even in vehicles parked in shaded areas and when the air temperature was 80 degrees or less.
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MCAO Remembers our Veterans
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On Memorial Day weekend, MCAO joined with community members and groups from across Arizona to place American flags at the headstones of our veterans buried at the National Memorial Cemetery of Arizona. This is a long-held tradition to remember and honor our fallen heroes who have made the ultimate sacrifice in service to our nation.
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Three MCAO Programs Win National Association of Counties Achievement Awards
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The Maricopa County Attorney’s Office received achievement awards from the National Association of Counties (NACo) for three programs: “Stand Up to Put Downs,” Operation Double Check and our new Training and Travel app. “It is an honor to be recognized for this important work. We continue to be committed to implementing programs that positively impact our community in collaboration with others,” said County Attorney Bill Montgomery.
Stand Up to Put Downs Program Families all over Maricopa County have read about, heard about or experienced bullying in school, at home and in the community. Bullying is well-defined and as members of the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office Community Affairs team discovered, despite all the available resources, there was still a gap in the type of information being shared. “Stand Up to Put Downs” helps families, educators and students work together to not only help stop bullying but understand better the legal and social implications. The program provides parents and educators with a unique perspective on the consequences of bullying and is divided into three distinct categories, each one presented by an expert. Part 1 is an overview and introduction of bullying by the MCAO Community Affairs Team. Part 2 is a detailed look at how law enforcement investigates bullying claims, how juvenile crimes differ from adult crimes, bullying-related offenses that can be reported to law enforcement and actions to take with law enforcement if parents/teachers/students experience or witness bullying. Part 3 is an overview of how the juvenile justice system works presented by long-time MCAO prosecutors.
Operation Double Check If a defendant commits certain sex offenses in Arizona, the consequences of a conviction can last the rest of their life. Sex offenders must register with the state so that law enforcement knows where these offenders are if they aren’t incarcerated. A team within the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office Special Victims Division created Operation Double Check to confirm home addresses of these sex offenders, especially if they re-offend and prepare to make another prosecution journey through the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office.
The program was created because many convicted sex offenders were putting false information on their registration paperwork and in some cases the offenders were claiming to be transient to avoid providing a permanent address.
Operation Double Check allows the MCAO to have access to the Arizona Department of Public Safety (DPS) sex offender registration database to confirm these addresses and match them up to what were previously listed as “transient” addresses in the MCAO case management system. With this access to the DPS database, MCAO staff can go through our case tracking system and flag those offenders required to register as sex offenders. Training and Travel App With nearly 1,000 employees, the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office has a busy Administration Department handling everything from payroll, to RICO money to grants, the overall Office budget and all requests from employees to attend training and related travel required for employee trips to conferences, required certification and prosecution-related tasks. Prior to July 2017, all training and travel requests from employees were completed on multiple pieces of different-colored paper. Starting in August 2017, this all changed. Paper requests for training and travel were discontinued and an improved use of technology helped make this process electronic. With most of the Office now using tablets and smartphones, the MCAO Administration and Information Technology teams were convinced that an electronic solution could be created. A new digital travel and training app was created featuring easy functionality and providing the ability to make these requests electronically, tracking each request through each of the approval steps and generating a completed and signed form back to the requesting employee in record time.
The NACo Achievement Awards were started in 1970 to recognize innovative and effective county government programs that enhance services for residents. MCAO has earned 74 NACo Awards since 1990, 20 since 2011 under County Attorney Bill Montgomery.
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Civil Division Serving MCAO and the County
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 Attorney Ann Uglietta, Paralegal Katarina Gagic and Practice Group Leader Joe Vigil from the MCAO Civil Division
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In 2011, shortly after Bill Montgomery took office, he and the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors (BOS) began discussing the differences that had led to the 2009 split of civil representation within the County. Within four months, Mr. Montgomery and the BOS had formed an agreement for the restoration of the personnel and services of the Civil Division to the MCAO. The BOS officially transferred resources and responsibilities of the County’s Special Litigation and General Counsel Departments to the County Attorney’s Office in March 2011 – where it continues to exist and flourish today. Inmate issues, including suicides and issues in the jails, allegation of civil rights abuses, flood control problems and transportation concerns are just a handful of the issues the MCAO Civil Services Division (CSD) works on each day. Our community can’t function without legal counsel and when Maricopa County needs variances, business licenses, has zoning issues and air quality issues, the Civil Services Division is working on solutions to these issues and more. The Civil Services Division represents the interests of the citizens of Maricopa County by providing legal advice and litigation and support to the various boards, agencies and officials of County government. The Division is organized around four Practice Group Areas: 1) Litigation led by Practice Group Leader Joe Vigil; 2) Human Resources and Behavioral Health led by Practice Group Leader Brandon Newton; 3) County Electeds led by Practice Group Leader Colleen Connor and 4) Board of Supervisors and County Departments led by Practice Group Leader Emily Craiger. Long-time attorney Tom Liddy rejoined the Office last year as the Division Chief and he is supported by a team of more than 40 attorneys and an almost equal number of expert administrative and accounting staff and paralegals. The current iteration of the Civil Services Division is a reflection of how the different components of the County have changed and how MCAO has increased efficiencies to embrace and impact these changes. The Practice Group teams within the Division were reorganized earlier this year to better focus on the fluctuating legal needs of what is now the fastest growing county in the U.S. The re-organization will be assessed again in September to determine the success of the changes and identify any gaps that may need to be addressed. The overall goal of the re-named Practice Groups is to keep the attorneys with institutional knowledge assigned across the new areas, while not changing their substantive work and to keep clients with the same attorneys as much as possible, avoiding disruptions. Having the Civil Services Division within the County Attorney’s Office and not as a separate, distinct entity, is unusual among prosecutor’s offices. Most district attorneys’ offices have an Office of General Counsel or a similar operating unit. It may be unusual for the MCAO to be structured this way – but it works. Also, as a result, the County Attorney has a greater role and is more involved in the litigation and representation for Maricopa County Departments and Officials. “I really enjoy the ‘Attorney’ part of serving as County Attorney,” added Bill Montgomery, Maricopa County Attorney. “The men and women of the CSD do a great job and working with them keeps me plugged into the day to day service we provide to County government.”
Gayla Finn, a career MCAO employee, brings more than 30 years of MCAO service and expertise to her role as the Civil Services Division Operations Manager. “Civil is like a family. I’ve met so many great people working in the Civil Services Division and my position has afforded me some spectacular opportunities, said Gayla. Tom Liddy concurs, “These experienced and skilled attorneys are often the unsung heroes of the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office. They work numerous hours behind the scenes for their community and their clients and provide unsurpassed legal counsel.” Practice Group Leader Joe Vigil also agrees, “We serve the citizens of Maricopa County in a variety of ways and the work we do may not be as high profile or glamorous as prosecuting criminal cases, but it is very important to the County and benefits the citizens of Maricopa County. We are lucky to be part of this Office and especially lucky to be part of the Civil Services Division.”
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County Attorney Receives the ChildHelp ‘Champion for Children’ Founder’s Award
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Recently, Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery was honored by Childhelp with the Founder’s Award- Champion for Children. The award resembles a flame and Childhelp Founder Sara O'Meara remarked that the award is a fitting match for the fire in the heart of Montgomery, who has demonstrated a deep commitment to protecting children in our county. Previous award recipients include former first lady Nancy Reagan and former Arizona Senator Jon Kyl and his wife. Childhelp Children’s Center of Arizona depends heavily on the support of law enforcement and the legal system to ensure that child welfare cases are brought to justice and that children in the state are protected from heinous crimes. Montgomery has worked for eight years with the organization through their Children’s Center. Honored for being a champion, Montgomery has brought positive attention to the Center and assisted in the work by providing victim advocates and prosecutors to support the Center’s mission. Since 1998, Childhelp Children’s Center of Arizona has provided treatment, intervention, and investigation services in a child-friendly and child-centric environment. By working in tandem with teams from Phoenix Children’s Hospital, the Office of Child Welfare Investigations and local police agencies, the center offers a multidisciplinary response to child maltreatment cases. Childhelp was founded in 1959 by Sara O'Meara and Yvonne Fedderson, and has brought the light of hope and healing into the lives of countless children as one of the largest non-profit child abuse prevention and treatment organizations in the nation, dedicated to helping abused, neglected and at-risk children. Childhelp’s programs and services include residential treatment services, children’s advocacy centers, therapeutic foster care, group homes and child abuse prevention, education and training.
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Information Focused Prosecution Work at the MCAO Going Strong
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In May, nearly 60 attendees from law enforcement agencies and prosecutor’s office across Maricopa County converged downtown at the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office to participate in the inaugural Information Focused Prosecution (IFP) Seminar. Analysts, officers and prosecutors attended the free two-hour seminar, a collaborative effort that featured presenters from different criminal justice agencies. Josh Maxwell, a prosecutor in the MCAO Repeat Offender Bureau joined Maryann McKessy, Community Based Prosecution Bureau Chief and Phoenix Police Officer Ethan Coffey as they discussed “Effectively Prosecuting Crime Drivers.” These experts discussed repeat offenders and crime drivers and how close coordination between prosecutors and law enforcement coupled with strong community outreach can have a measurable impact. “IFP is designed to increase information sharing and collaboration with community partners to reduce crime and make our communities safer,” stated Micah Gaudet, Director of Crime Strategies at the MCAO. “Our efforts to reduce crime and make communities safer is dependent on the good partnerships MCAO enjoys with local law enforcement and the community. Our goal is for these seminars to be engaging and motivate us to work toward reducing crime and making our communities safer.” Overwhelmingly positive feedback from attendees confirmed that more IFP related topics and presenters will be planned over the next several months. Also in May, two long-time crime analysts in the Valley, Margarita Encinas with the Chandler Police Department and Tobie Sanderson of the Mesa Police Department met with the prosecutors in the MCAO Sex Crimes Bureaus and presented information on two unique reports, the Adult/Child Contacts Report (Mesa) and the Special Victim Contacts Report (Chandler). These reports, developed at each agency solely to assist with apprehending previously undetected sex offenders, provide prosecutors with analyses on information coming from tools like computer aided dispatch (CAD) calls. “These reports continue to help detect hard to find sex offenders,” said Margarita Encinas. “We want to be able to assist in serving justice at a level that complements police work and helps not only catch the bad guys, but successfully prosecute them.”
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MCAO Carries the Torch for Special Olympics
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On May 3, County Attorney Bill Montgomery and members of MCAO staff ran in the Arizona Law Enforcement Torch Run for Special Olympics. MCAO employees raised money for the Arizona Law Enforcement Torch Run for Special Olympics through casual day donations. Those who hit the streets to participate in the MCAO leg of the torch run also helped to raise awareness for Special Olympics and its programs.
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Measuring Success: Diversion Programs Offer A New Path
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Prosecution-led diversion is not a new concept at the Maricopa County Attorney‘s Office, but over the past year the Diversion Program Bureau has been working to establish diversion as a key option for prosecutors to achieve justice outside of the traditional courtroom prosecution model. “Diversion programs offer our prosecutors another option to help seek justice and reduce recidivism,” said Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery. “Our success is measured by seeking justice for victims and our community and reducing recidivism. Diversion or deferred prosecution programs provide eligible offenders with an opportunity to stay in their communities while learning the necessary skills or getting the help they need to stop the cycle that may cause them to reoffend in the future.” Created in Spring of 2018, the Diversion Program Bureau was established to exclusively focus on the development, performance and sustainability of prosecution-led diversion programs. The bureau is led not by prosecutors but by staff with extensive professional backgrounds in human services, specializing in serving the justice-involved population. “Sometimes ensuring justice in a case requires us to think outside of the box and look beyond simply seeking a conviction,” said Patricia Cordova, MCAO Diversion Program Bureau Chief. Diversion programs allow prosecutors to divert certain felony cases into education and treatment programs that address the offender’s thinking patterns and decisions as well as issues associated with substance abuse that led to their criminal behavior. These programs hold the individual accountable and provide strategies and community support for positive change. If the offender successfully completes the diversion program, charges will not be filed, or if they were already filed, they will be dismissed. If the offender is unsuccessful, they will return to traditional prosecution through the courts. With one year of successes and learning under their belts, the bureau is concentrating efforts in three main areas: assessing program outcomes, engaging in continuous program improvement and evaluating the need for future diversion program types. Each of these areas centers on reducing recidivism – the primary goal for diversion programs. “Contracted service providers must apply researched-informed practices in the delivery of each diversion program to achieve favorable outcomes for offenders and the public. Monitoring and measuring these outcomes is essential in determining the impact of these programs,” said Cordova. That mission is at the heart of a training conference for contracted diversion program providers that MCAO will be hosting at the end of June. About 30 service providers’ staff will be in attendance to ensure they are all using the same uniform assessment tool, the Ohio Risk Assessment System (ORAS). The tool will ensure that all diversion program providers evaluate crimogenic factors in the same way and report findings both at the beginning of treatment and again before successful completion of a program. This uniform data collection will then give the bureau the ability to ensure treatment is being successfully provided to those who are the most likely to reoffend. “We want to make sure that diversion programs are meeting all the key goals, especially reducing recidivism or the likelihood that someone will commit a new crime and create another victim in our community,” said Cordova. Cordova stresses that the benefits of prosecution-led diversion programs apply not only to an offender, but also a victim and the community as a whole. The programs engage victims in offender accountability; work to achieve safer communities with reoriented offenders; reduce offender collateral consequences such as loss of employment and family instability; and for a deputy county attorney, utilizing a diversion program is also a practical response to heightened expectations among the public we serve that we are making distinctions among the types of offenders we prosecute. Currently, the Office offers several diversion programs: Felony Pretrial Intervention Program (FPIP), felony drug possession, justice court misdemeanors, specific first-time child abuse offenders in need of parenting classes for excessive discipline, bad check writers, and in collaboration with the Maricopa County Juvenile Probation Department, several juvenile diversion programs. The newest program, FPIP, was created for participants charged with class 4, 5 and 6 non-drug possession felony offenses. The program began in July of 2015, and from then through mid-April 2019, more than 1,000 offenders have been referred to the program. Currently there is a 70% successful completion rate by participants and only 4.1% of participants have gone on to commit a new offense. A key element of the program is also helping the victims of these crimes, and FPIP has successfully collected more than $145,000 in restitution for victims. The bureau is currently working to develop a diversion program for offenders involved in certain animal cruelty cases and a program for individuals diagnosed with a serious mental illness.
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Vacation Plans this Summer? Protect Your Home Before You Go
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Some of us spend a lot of time planning our summer vacation. We meticulously research hotel rooms, airfares, study maps and plan activities. But as vacation season gets underway, how much are you thinking about the security of your home when you’re away? Criminals look for the path of least resistance and only need a few minutes to break into your home and steal what is valuable. But there are a few simple actions you can take to deter crime from your home. - The first thing to think about is how to make your house the least appealing house on the block for criminals. Do this by making sure that your entrances, garage and driveway are visible from the street by keeping shrubs and trees appropriately trimmed and keeping these areas well-lit at night.
- Having a home alarm system is a great deterrent, but even if you don’t have one, you can display an alarm company sign.
- Never hide a spare key in obvious places. Criminals know what those hide-a-key boxes look like and all the typical hiding spots, such as under a rock, planter or mat by the door, or on top of the door ledge. Instead, get a coded key box or leave a spare key with a trusted neighbor.
- Arrange to have someone pick up your mail or have the Post Office hold it for you. The same goes for newspaper deliveries.
- If you can, leave a television or radio playing to make it sound like someone is home.
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A thief takes only 5-30 seconds for entry and spends roughly 3-5 minutes in your house. The first stop for a burglar is the master bedroom and master bath, so find another location to store valuables. The most valuable thing a thief can take is your identity, so don’t leave documents with sensitive personal information out in the open or in easily accessible places.
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When you’re at home: From burglary reports reviewed by the MCAO, we regularly see scenarios where a homeowner was too busy to answer the door, or didn’t recognize the person knocking, so they ignored it.
Bad idea! Frequently, these situations are followed by the door being kicked in or a stranger breaking into the house from the back yard. Typically, burglars are attempting to locate homes where the residents are NOT present so that they can enter without confrontation and have a better chance of stealing property without being identified. A good piece of advice is to ALWAYS respond to the knocking when it is someone you don’t know by calling through the door, “not interested,” “go away,” “I am busy, go away or I will call the police,” etc. but NEVER open or unlock the door, just loudly call through it. The object is to let the stranger know that someone is at home inside the residence who is awake and alert and able to call the police. In another scenario, a stranger may come to your door and ask to use your phone. They may say their car broke down, or it might be someone adamantly insisting that they need help. In those instances, DO NOT open your door, but offer to make the phone call for them. If someone comes to your door to perform a service on your home or property and you weren’t expecting them, ask for identification. It’s okay to call the company and verify that they sent someone out. Lastly, call the police anytime you see strange activity in the neighborhood.
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Coffee with the Community
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MCAO detectives joined with the Buckeye Police Department on May 18 for Coffee with the Community. It was an opportunity for residents to come out and meet their local law enforcement, to ask questions and voice any public safety concerns.
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Employee Health and Fitness Day Walk
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On May 9, MCAO staff joined the 2019 Employee Health and Fitness Day Walk. Nearly 1,500 employees from the County and City of Phoenix got up early to walk from the Maricopa County Courts Building to Chase Field and back to the Office in support of Employee Health and Fitness Month.
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Upcoming Events Calendar
Safe Kids Summer - Mesa Brimhall Aquatics Center Wednesday, June 5 2:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m. Mesa Brimhall Aquatics Center 4949 East Southern Avenue Mesa, AZ 85206
Safe Kids Summer - Glendale Main Library Thursday, June 6 6:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m. Glendale Main Library 5959 West Brown Street Glendale, AZ 85302
Safe Kids Summer - Mesa Carson Aquatics Center Friday, June 7 4:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m. Mesa Carson Aquatics Center 525 North Westwood Mesa, AZ 85201
Safe Kids Summer - Glendale Velma Teague LibraryWednesday, June 12 12:00 p.m. – 2:00 p.m. Glendale Velma Teague Library 7010 North 58th Avenue Glendale, AZ 85301
Safe Kids Summer - Glendale Foothills Branch LibraryMonday, June 17 12:00 p.m. – 2:00 p.m. Glendale Foothills Branch Library 19055 North 57th Avenue Glendale, AZ 85308
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Cases of Community Interest
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Christopher Redondo Sentenced to Life for the Murder of Gilbert Police Lieutenant Eric Shuhandler
Christopher Redondo was sentenced to life in the Department of Corrections for the 2010 murder of Gilbert Police Lieutenant Eric Shuhandler, which occurred during a traffic stop. Sentencing for additional charges including five counts of aggravated assault and one count of drive-by shooting took place on May 17, 2019.
“Nine years ago, the defendant callously killed a police officer in cold blood, and then endangered the lives of many others during a lengthy pursuit. Lieutenant Shuhandler’s loved ones have waited a long time to see this day,” said County Attorney Bill Montgomery. “Though it may not provide closure, I want to thank those who have worked and persevered to seek justice for this heinous act.” » View Full Story «
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Baseball Coach Richard Gallegos Sentenced to 25 Years for Sexual Conduct with Minor Victims
Richard Gallegos was sentenced to 25 years in the Department of Corrections after pleading guilty to two counts of sexual conduct with a minor, one count of attempted sexual conduct with a minor, and one count of attempted molestation of a child.
“This sentencing is fitting for an individual who used his position of trust and power as an opportunity to harm a child,” said Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery. “The bravery of these victims to speak out against their coach’s predatory actions have no doubt served to protect others in the community.” » View Full Story «
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Kodi Bowe Sentenced For Murder of 21-Year-Old Taylorlyn Nelson
Kodi Bowe was sentenced to 27 years in the Department of Corrections after pleading guilty to second degree murder for the death of 21-year-old Taylorlyn Nelson and an additional, charge of aggravated assault. Maxx Bowe was sentenced on April 12, 2019 to 10 years for hindering prosecution related to dumping Nelson’s body in a lake.
“This sentencing was fitting for a defendant who showed a complete lack of regard for a fellow human being and those who loved her,” said Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery. “The defendant’s senseless act and sole focus on attempting to hide his criminal actions and avoid accountability has earned him time in prison.” » View Full Story «
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