News
of an FBI investigation of the Pima County Sheriff’s Department is rife with the
putrid smell of scandal.
Listen Below
.
Listen Below
.
I
am old enough to remember the last big scandal which engulfed the PCSO during
Sheriff Waldon V. Burr’s administration in the late 60’s and early 70’s. He
resigned to avoid prosecution .
The
problems at the sheriff’s office started a while ago. If you weren’t paying any
attention… during the last days of the Dupnik administration high ranking
members of his command staff were allowed to operate a cafe on county property
using government funds.
When
Dupnik retired in mid term (something voters should have understood he’d do when
they re elected him in 2012) he appointed his hand picked successor Chris Nanos
to succeed him.
Understanding
the impropriety of an operation which may have illegally been using official
funds and approved without proper bidding Sheriff Nanos could have and should
have halted the operation. He didn’t. He could have rode into the next election
as a reformer. He won’t.
What
is worse when the FBI announced they were investigating his department Nanos
lashed out against the FBI for doing so in a 19 minute televised tirade. The
smart thing to do would have been keep quiet and cooperate with the
investigators. His reaction leads some to believe that maybe there are more
problems in the sheriff’s office yet to be revealed.
The
PCSO has hundreds of honest and brave officers and personnel who serve our
county. It’s time for Sheriff Nanos to fess up and fix what’s gone wrong within
the command staff at The Pima County Sheriff’s office.
