I used to work in the same building where he has his office. I worked on 17, he’s on 25. I used to see him all the time walking around with his bodyguards. Our building was constantly beseiged by Arapio and anti-immigrant protesters shouting at each other.
One day, I got in an elevator and he and his bodyguards got in with me, filling up the rest of the elevator. I was squashed against a side wall facing Arapio (who is actually shorter than you think when you meet him in person.) So, I was looking straight ahead which just happened to be in the direction of him.
He turned to me and said, “Hey - what’s your problem?” at which point all of his thugs turned and glared at me. I immediately looked away and said, “No problem, sir” and nervously awaited my floor. When I went to step out, it was very hard getting around his jackboots which wouldn’t step aside to let me pass.
Arapio is a completely paranoid, bigotted tool that thinks he’s John Wayne. I hate the fucker…
From the wiki “list of Missouri countys”
“The city of St. Louis is an independent city, and is not within the limits of a county. Its residents voted to secede from St. Louis County in 1876. Throughout the United States, St. Louis is one of three independent cities outside the state of Virginia (the other two are Baltimore, Maryland and Carson City, Nevada).”
Continuing the hijack, there are actually four relationships between cities and counties that occur in the US:
Cities contained within counties, like Cook County, which contains Chicago and multiple other suburban towns.
Cities independent of counties, like the Virginia cities and the other three mentioned.
Cities coextensive with counties, like Philadelphia, where the City of Philadelphia and the County of Philadelphia are the same geographic entity, and there is no independent county government.
Multiple counties contained within a city, specifically, New York City, which contains five separate counties: New York County (Manhattan), Kings County (Brooklyn), Queens County, Bronx County and Richmond County (Staten Island).
When I and a fellow worker at our company met him, we just looked at each other and said “senile.”
Back story. My company sponsored an event that benefited one of Joe’s “charities.” We didn’t care about the charity, but the event was near a new retail location we’d opened, and we wanted to be part of it. Street fair.
So as a thank you to all of the sponsors, the group that set up the event had “Lunch with Sheriff Joe.” My co-worker & I didn’t particularly want to go, but were urged by the event organizer so we could pick up a “award.”
So we’re in the front room of the cop union building in Phoenix, and in he comes. And yes, bodyguards, I think 3, although 1 of them turned out to be more of a handler. My co-worker and I had decided to wear our little used company uniforms that day for photos or whatever. Joe walks up to us, points to the logo on my buddy’s chest, and says “BJR Company. What the hell is that?” (made up company name) So we explained what we did, and it’s nothing trick or esoteric, perfectly ordinary function. So we said (making up again) “Drapery” “What the hell is drapery, I never heard of any thing like that, are you really supposed to be here, this is crazy talk” and he went on and on as we shrunk against the wall in shock and I guess fear.
The event organizer came over to us, and hearing part of this diatribe, says “Oh, Joe, this is Pete and Daisy and they helped us with the event and we raised a lot of money blah blah.” Didn’t stop old Joe, he started to advance on us. She (organizer) THREW herself in front of us, flinging her arms out to the side as if to protect us, and yelled “JOE STOP, THESE ARE THE GOOD GUYS, THEY HELP US RAISE MONEY!”
At that point the handler rushed over and removed the senile old fart.
Next was lunch. Great. We’re all in the usual buffet line and Joe is just acting like your senile Uncle Morty, picking up a spoon from a dish, examining it closely and then throwing it back in the dish. and making a total scene when he couldn’t find the butter for his roll.
Then he gave a rambling self-aggrandizing profane (safe territory-cop shop, no press) speech that made no sense whatsoever. We could see the handler tugging on his sleeve the whole time.
Yes and no. In the west, those cities are usually their own county like Denver or San Francisco. As a former resident of Phoenix, it is most definately part of Maricopa County.
I never personally met Arpaio, but I was around him at a National Sheriff Association convention. He stood out as having a gigantic ego even among the other sheriffs. They are not, as a group, particularly shy or retiring people. He also stood out as not, apparently, being particularly well-liked by the other sheriffs. Part of it might have been that he had his entourage following him everywhere he went, something I didn’t notice any of the others doing. Andy Griffith was the keynote speaker at the banquet and he didn’t have an entourage, ffs.
