Last May, Sheriff Joe Arpaio enjoyed a rare victory over attorney Michael Manning who has made a good living suing the county for wrongful deaths in the sheriff’s jail system.
“We’re tired of settling,” Arpaio said at the time. “We’re going to fight every case that we can. We’re going to insist on it.”
Well, that didn’t last long.
Earlier this week the county settled another one with Manning for $2 million. The case involved a blind, mentally disabled man who died after an altercation with a sheriff’s detention officer.
Manning’s account of what happened just plain turns your stomach. A 40-year-old blind guy is picked up on charges of shop-lifting and dies before he gets his day in court.
The fighting words of a few months ago notwithstanding, Arpaio avoided his day in court on this one and the county left taxpayers to pick up the tab.
Are you OK with that?
Here’s a link to the story.
