Clinton Parish Acknowledges Some Accusations Baseless But Does Not Go Far Enough for His Opponent
On Wednesday, Clinton Parish, whose candidacy for judge in Yolo County can only be described as on life support, acknowledged that he failed to properly vet charges that were launched in his mailer.
According to the Sacramento Bee, the Yolo County Deputy District Attorney Parish admitted that he “did not verify claims in an attack mailer that alleged campaign rival Judge Dan Maguire was involved in corporate fraud and bribery while working at a Colorado law firm in the mid-1990s.”
However, the candidate stopped well short of recanting the claims altogether.
In a statement from incumbent Judge Dan Maguire, he said, “I’m pleased Clint Parish has decided to take responsibility for the false attack against me in a recent campaign mail piece. It was the right thing to do. However, he has yet to take responsibility for all the other untrue statements in the mailer.”
He added, “My reputation as a Judge is important to me, and I would like all of the mistruths in the mailer retracted.”
The Vanguard spoke to campaign spokesperson Kirby Wells on Monday afternoon. Mr. Wells at that time told the Vanguard that he had pieced together this history through a series of internet searches. He then emailed a series of links to the Vanguard and asked the Vanguard look into the allegations further.
However, the charges appeared flimsy at best. Judge Maguire pointed out, with respect to the corporate fraud and bribery charges, that he worked for the firm from 1993 to 1997, the case had just recently been ruled upon by a court, his old firm had over 200 lawyers at the time and he had no involvement in any of the facts of the case.
In fact, his old firm prevailed. The court ruled last year: “To summarize, this Court finds that Plaintiffs did not prove the existence of a contract, breach by the Defendants, resultant harm or causation or even, assuming all of that, the existence of any definable and established measure of damages.”
Kirby Wells appears to have been the instigator of these charges, as they have been flying around for several months, but that Clinton Parish would not verify them before approving the attack mailer is an appalling admission for an individual running for a judgeship that will require research and verification.
Interestingly enough, the Bee is reporting that the person who gave them the information is no longer with the campaign.
Writes the Bee: “Meanwhile, the Parish camp is retrenching and determining what to do with the deceptive information.”
“The new look of the campaign team is taking a look at that now,” Mr. Parish told the Bee. “We’re looking to see what we can do about it.”
He might want to start with repudiating the rest of the charges as well.
One of the key charges dealt with the decision by Governor Schwarzenegger to commute the sentence of Esteban Nunez, son of former Speaker Fabian Nunez – a move that angered many and that the former Governor acknowledged was a favor to a friend.
The flier attacks Dan Maguire, who was said to be “part of Arnold’s inner circle, Dan Maguire was part of Arnold’s legal team that made decisions including commuting the sentence of convicted murderer Esteban Nunez…” Later in the flier it said, “Dan Maguire received a political appointment (never elected) and took the bench only three weeks before Arnold’s last-day Commutation of Esteban Nunez’ sentence.”
When the Vanguard inquired about substantiation of this charge, Kirby Wells, campaign communications for Clinton Parish, pointed toward this YouTube video of the Santos Family, the victim’s parents.
The problem is that it appears that Dan Maguire was appointed to the bench of Yolo County on October 18, 2010 while the commutation occurred at the last minute on January 2, 2011.
For his part, Dan Maguire says he had no involvement in the decision to commute Mr. Nunez’s sentence and learned about it on TV.
When we attempted to ask Kirby Wells about this apparent discrepancy, we did not receive a response to our email.
Meanwhile, Mr. Parish, who has not responded to Vanguard requests for an interview, backed off the entire charge when he spoke to the Davis Enterprise, which paraphrased him saying “that the ads don’t claim that Maguire played a part in the reduced sentence.”
“The point is that he worked for the legal team that made that and other bad decisions,” he said. “It really goes to show, you are a product of the offices you work for. Right or wrong, it’s the truth, and people judge me based on what I and my office have done.”
That would appear to be a more difficult charge to repudiate, in that Clinton Parish himself seemed to back it.
Nevertheless, there appears to be no validity at all to any of the charges.
In the meantime, while Mr. Parish lost a key supporter in Sheriff Ed Prieto, his boss, District Attorney Jeff Reisig, is standing behind his deputy.
He told the Enterprise that he learned Monday of the flier’s release.
“I previously gave him my endorsement and I’m not going to change that,” Mr. Reisig said Tuesday. “But I don’t agree with the negative mail piece and I told him that.”
—David M. Greenwald reporting
“PARISH SHOWS HE’S UNFIT TO BE A JUDGE.”
The Bee got it right this morning, finally admitting something that David has been saying all along.
Now clinton parish is throwing an unnamed staffer under the bus, promising us a “new look campaign.” I say go for it. Don’t drop out of the race, big guy! Keep throwing your money away. We want to see MORE of what clinton parish is all about! (While you’re at it, don’t forget to mention Maguire’s connection to Willie Horton, JFK’s assassination, and the Lindburgh baby’s disappearance.)
We’ll never know whether clinton parish knowingly made this “phlegm” up out of whole cloth, or whether he allowed it to go out through his own negligence. Either way, he has demonstrated that is he not qualified to be judge; he is not even qualified to be a prosecutor. Both professions require honesty, integrity, intelligence, and accountability, none of which clinton parish has demonstrated through his career in the DA’s office or during this campaign.
Will Maguire ever get an apology from clinton parish for lying about him? Not a chance. Will we, the voters, ever get an apology from clinton parish for being lied to? Not a chance. Will clinton parish be elected to the bench? Not a chance.
And still, Reisig supports him. As the Bee states in this morning’s Op-Ed piece, “Yolo County voters should consider Reisig’s embrace of [p]arish if Reisig appears on the ballot again.”
Do everyone a favor, clinton parish. DON’T drop out of the race. Keep bumbling forward so we can see more of just what kind of person you really are.
He admits he failed to fully vet serious allegations. That’s disturbing given that vetting allegations is a primary job function of a Deputy District Attorney. How can voters possibly believe he’d competently perform the responsibilities of the job he’s seeking?
Wow. The most disturbing thing about this situation is that this failure to vet “information” and recklessness with the facts is so continuous with the DA Office’s track record. The Vanguard has been documenting case after case that the DA’s Office has run with that has turned out to be based on shoddy evidence. Many lives have been ruined by their overzealousness and negligence. I’m glad this sleazy DDA has shown his true colors – I hope this brings more attention to the sorry state of the DA’s Office at large.
When will someone run against Jeff Reisig?!?
Running against a sitting DA is almost impossible. Anyone from the outside doesn’t have sufficient criminal law experience. Anyone from the inside the office gets crushed, unless it’s the hand-picked successor. The DA always can run on “experience.” For what that’s worth….
Downtown,
I fear you are correct. Reisig has done an excellent job of insulating himself from direct criticism.
One way that he has insulated himself has been to have others act in his stead, through his Chief Deputy DA’s or lower level cronies like Jim Walker or clinton parish. Another way has been to attempt to destroy the reputations and careers of those who whom he sees as a threat, those who refused to give their complete and unquestioned loyalty or who dared to question his ethics, such as the numerous DDAs and criminal investigators that he’s run out of the office since being elected.
We can only hope that a viable candidate will step forward, and that, as the Bee put it, the voters in our county will”consider Reisig’s embrace of [p]arish if Reisig appears on the ballot again.”