Monday, May 27, 2013

Gifts to Republicans for Taxpayers Association Banquet and ADL dinner

Dirty dancing for supper
By Matt Potter
San Diego Reader
April 17, 2013

It’s almost time for the San Diego County Taxpayers Association’s annual “Golden Fleece” banquet, famous of late on YouTube for its promotional video featuring GOP San Diego city attorney Jan Goldsmith, dressed up as a chorus boy and dancing behind someone dressed as a junkyard dog. The lobbyist group’s blow-out is particularly popular among city-council staffers and their politician bosses, who are treated to drinks, food, and a video floor show by various special interests that buy tables and hand out tickets for free to those they seek to influence.

The group itself is a registered lobbyist ­— backing privatization measures, among other big-business-friendly issues — and its board is heavily populated by some of the city’s biggest influence-peddlers, always in the market to rub shoulders with the city council powerful and their minions.

Last year, for instance, Job Nelson, chief of staff for Republican city councilwoman Lorie Zapf, attended courtesy of the association itself, as did Alexandra Bell, another Zapf staffer, according to their annual statements of economic interests filed earlier this month. Katie Hansen, chief of staff for GOP councilman Kevin Faulconer, got into the bash thanks to a $160 freebie from controversial private-school operator Bridgepoint Education.

In addition to the taxpayers association’s dinner, Hansen also enjoyed the hospitality of the Biocom Pac, run by lobbyists for the local pharmaceutical industry, getting a ticket worth $50 to a Biocom reception in August. Evans Hotels, the homegrown San Diego hotel empire — whose president Bill Evans was one of those behind the lawsuit against Democratic mayor Bob Filner in an attempt to get him to sign a funding deal negotiated by previous GOP mayor Jerry Sanders — gave Hansen a $100 ticket to an “ADL dinner” in October.

She also went to the “Manta Launch Event” at SeaWorld, courtesy of the aquatic and amusement park, an admission worth $146.

Thursday, May 16, 2013

Grand Jury creates false report regarding deaths at San Diego County jails

City Beat has done a high-profile in-depth series on jail deaths. Is it possible that not a single grand jury member bothered to Google the subject before signing off on a false report? No. The members couldn't all be that incompetent. They were chosen for the grand jury because they're all "team players". So what's the point of having a grand jury?

This story reminds me of a Los Angeles Times story about the "know-nothing" Medical Board of California.

Grave error: San Diego County Grand Jury reports incorrect jail-mortality figures
By Dave Maass
City Beat
May 14, 2013

The San Diego County Grand Jury issued its annual inspection reports for the regional jail system, praising the San Diego County Sheriff for its "efficiency and dedication of the staff at each of the county detention facilities."

But would those remarks glow so brightly if the Grand Jury—a body of 19 citizens empaneled to investigate complaints against public officials and inspect detention facilities—had received accurate information about deaths in the county’s jails?

According to the report, the Grand Jury noted that there were four deaths—including two suicides—at the facility between July 1, 2011, and Aug. 1, 2012. Those numbers are severely inaccurate.

Fact: During that period, 11 inmates died in county jails; five of them were suicides. That’s according to records obtained by CityBeat from the San Diego County Medical Examiner and the Sheriff’s Department through the California Public Records Act.

In “60 Dead Inmates,” an investigative series published during the last two months, CityBeat found that San Diego’s five adult detention facilities collectively had the highest mortality rate of California’s 10 largest jail systems. The Grand Jury received the information directly from the Sheriff’s Department; we have now provided the Grand Jury foreman with copies of the records substantiating the number of deaths.

“The numbers reported were based on information received from the Sheriff’s Department. In reconfirming the information with the Sherriff’s [sic] Department it was determined that the figures previously reported were incorrect. Based on the new information received the Grand Jury will be issuing an amended report to reflect the correct statistics,” Grand Jury Foreman Paul C. Christian wrote in a brief email to CityBeat.

The Sheriff’s Department did not respond to emailed questions.

Two of the inmates CityBeat profiled in its investigative died during the 13-month period examined by the Grand Jury. Shane Hipfel, a bipolar inmate who died after attempting to drown himself in a toilet in the Central Jail’s psychiatric unit, was mentioned in the report, but not by name. A homicide that occurred in jail was not referenced: Russell Hartsaw, a senior citizen who was beaten to death by other inmates at the George Bailey Detention Facility.

It’s possible that the Sheriff’s Department provided the Grand Jury only with statistics from the San Diego County Central Jail, where four deaths did occur. Three of them were suicides, one was natural.

If the sheriff did provide inaccurate statistics, it would not be the first time. In 2010, the Sheriff’s Department told the Citizens Law Enforcement Review Board (CLERB)—which is charged with investigating jail deaths and complaints against county law-enforcement officers—that only four inmates had committed suicide in the county jails. The number was used to justify the sheriff’s decision not to implement CLERB recommendations that would’ve addressed suicides in jail.

The accurate number of suicides during those two years is six.

Six is also the number of inmates who have died so far in 2013 in San Diego County jails, including three by suicide and two by drug overdose. The cause of death in the sixth case is unknown. CityBeat is awaiting the Sheriff’s response to a public-records request.

The Grand Jury report makes no mention of CityBeat’s reporting on jail deaths; nor do the inspection reports of juvenile facilities include information on the overuse of pepper spray, which CityBeat reported on in May 2012.