Immigrant rights activist drops lawsuit against Sheriff Arpaio
Aug 21, 2013, 2:01 PM | Updated: 2:03 pm
PHOENIX — The man who led a failed attempt to recall Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio earlier this year has dropped a lawsuit he filed against the sheriff.
The trial was set to start Tuesday, but Valley activist Randy Parraz dropped the lawsuit at the last minute.
Parraz, president of Citizens for a Better Arizona, had been arrested in 2008 for trespassing and disorderly conduct at a Maricopa County Board of Supervisors meeting. A judge dismissed those charges.
Parraz then filed a lawsuit against the sheriff, claiming that he was maliciously prosecuted.
Parraz said in a statement that the factors that led him to drop the lawsuit “shall remain confidential.” He described a press release issued by the sheriff’s office about the end of the lawsuit as a personal attack.
The sheriff’s release called Parraz’s behavior as that of a “scared little kid with a reckless disregard for taxpayers” and claimed that Parraz had been harassing and interfering with the sheriff’s daily responsibilities with “sophomoric actions that disrupted government.”
Those actions included sending live chickens to the office, claimed Arpaio.
Arpaio reiterated his claims about Parraz’s personal attacks on 92.3 KTAR. “I’d be glad to show anybody all of his garbage that he’s been going against me.”
Arpaio said he thinks he knows why Parraz dropped the lawsuit. “I just suspect that he knew that the jury that was about to be picked was going to come back in our favor,” Arpaio said.
