Trump-pardoned sheriff celebrates birthday with 'scuzzy' cast of has-beens: report

When pardoned former Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio throws a birthday bash, the Phoenix New Times says it will be attended by precisely the oily kind of assembly you could expect.

“Highlights of the evening included an Elvis impersonator … ,” reports Phoenix New Times writer Stephen Lemons. “There was also an appearance by wizened mob enforcer and serial killer Sammy ‘The Bull’ Gravano, who gifted Arpaio a bronze bull statuette and made the sheriff an honorary member of the mafia.”

The group also included “disgraced former politicos — including former Rep. Trent Franks and former state legislator David Stringer, both with troubling sex allegations hanging over their heads.”

And then there was Arpaio himself, of course — all 94 years of him.

“Looking frail and scarecrow-thin, his voice whispery and hoarse at times, former … Arpaio sat onstage in a gold lamé empire-style chair. And he remained there for most of Friday evening at the Fountain Hills Community Center as several hundred fellow alter kockers and rogues of all stripes ate a free meal of pasta with meatballs ...”

Arpaio was found guilty in 2013 of widespread racial profiling and placed under the watch of a court-appointed monitor, whose oversight continues to this day.

Lemons said Arpaio stood to accept mob stoolie Gravano’s gift, and he praised Lemons for turning state’s evidence back in the day to help convict his mentor in crime, John Gotti. Gravano then assured the crowd that the 19 murders credited to him were “the same thing to me as being in the military, same thing as being a cop.”

“He got a round of applause when he announced that, despite the hits, he was now a Christian and knew that Jesus had forgiven him for his homicidal transgressions,” Lemons reports.

At some point during the festivities Gravano made a point to white to the Phoenix New Times reporter about an article concerning a sexual harassment lawsuit filed by one of Gravano’s former employees, who “claims Gravano forced his tongue down her throat without her consent and made jokes about his penis.”

“Arpaio also took to his feet to croak out a version of Frank Sinatra’s ‘My Way’ in a duet with an unknown woman who, unlike Arpaio, could actually carry a tune,” reports Lemons. “Arpaio also accepted a letter of birthday congrats from President Donald Trump, who pardoned Arpaio in 2017 for a criminal contempt-of-court conviction in the ongoing Melendres civil rights lawsuit, which has cost Maricopa County taxpayers more than $250 million at last count.”