Tellez was put in charge of his own coverup

In late 2006 there was a scandal in the leadership of the APS (police force).  The Journal finally reported on it in early February 2007, link.

APS Chief of Police Gil Lovato was put on administrative leave in early January 2007 over allegations that he;

• misappropriated evidence (money) from the evidence room
• misused district resources
• harassed and intimidated employees
• showed favoritism toward employees, and
• engaged in an extramarital relationship with a fellow employee

Lovato never made it to court.  By keeping him on leave rather than firing him, APS was spared the airing of a bunch of dirty laundry in court.  Having been the Chief of Police for 17 years, Lovato had quite a body map.  He and his lawyer claimed, if they ever got to court, there wouldn't be a single APS senior administrator left standing.

Lovato was never fired; he remained on administrative leave until his contract expired and was not renewed.  In the interim, he was on full pay collecting around $35K for doing nothing.

There were additional allegations of the misuse of a federal criminal database.

The misappropriation of funds is a felony under state law.  The misuse of the NCIC database is a felony under federal law.  No one, not one single person, has ever been charged with a crime.

Steve Tellez was appointed Acting Chief on the day Lovato was put on administrative leave.

Bill Reed became APS Police Chief in October 2007.

In the ten month interval, Tellez remained Acting Chief.  He was in charge of the supposed "investigation" of criminal misconduct in his own department.

The conflict of interest is bone crushing, but satisfied the interests of the leadership of the APS.  No outside agency of law enforcement was ever asked to investigate the misconduct, though that would have been an easy and straightforward solution to the appearance of a conflict of interests.

Reed took over cover up

The APS "investigation" continued for more than three years, until statutes of limitation had expired on felony criminal misconduct by APS senior administrators.

The results of their investigation, and the results of at least two other investigations, are still secret from public knowledge.

Tellez now claims; the investigation "went away" when Bill Reed resigned in August 2010.  Tellez was later promoted in secret, to Chief.  If you search APS' award winning website for any mention of Tellez being made Chief, you will find none.   If they were so proud of their selection, why hide it?

APS Supt Winston Brooks admitted in his sworn deposition that he made the decision to promote Tellez without considering any other candidates, though there were a number of (qualified)  people who had expressed their interest in being considered for the job and who were not fruit of the corruption filled tree.

Nearly simultaneously with the Journal's last investigation and exposure of the ethics and accountability scandal in the leadership of the APS, I first began asking for the public records of the findings of what would become at least three investigations into the scandal.

Unbeknownst to me at the time, I was asking Tellez himself to hand over the public records of his incompetence and corruption in failing to expose the criminal misconduct before it came out in a lawsuit filed against him personally.

Tellez was Chief and responsible for investigating his own failure to report the scandal before it was exposed.

It was a bad time for me to be asking for the records which will destroy him.  I mean they must be hiding the record for a reason, right?  You don't go to all this effort and expense to hide the truth unless it really, really needs hiding.

Since I wasn't doing anything I didn't have a Constitutionally protected human right to do, Tellez took it upon himself to make sure nobody was listening to me.  Tellez began a years long effort to defame me with malicious slander and libel in an effort to keep me from finding and reporting on the truth.

Tellez doesn't want the truth to get out, nor does he want me anywhere near where it is being hidden, nor anywhere close to the people who are hiding it.

One of the reasons APS School Board President Marty Esquivel cites in his effort to justify banning me from public forum, is because I have insisted "too many times" at public forum, that Winston Brooks tell the truth about the scandal in the police department and the subsequent cover up.

Tellez has defamed me massively with his slander and libel, and all the time, he wasn't protecting the board from me, he was and still is protecting his public record from me, and immediate public knowledge.

Tellez admitted under oath, that the responsibility to set up a meeting between him, Esquivel and me was his responsibility, though he and his lawyers would rather have the judge believe it was I who dropped the ball.

Why would he not set up the meeting except that he did not want it to happen?  Why would he not want it to happen except that he is afraid that I might end up back at a public forum looking for the truth about his incompetence and corruption?

Expect Kent Walz to
continue his aid and abet.




photos Mark Bralley
Kent Walz is mine