Letters to the Editor: ‘Measure A (for Alex?)’ — Sheriff Villanueva’s legacy in L.A. County
April 23, 2013, 10:23PM
04/23/2013
How about a measure that reflects what we mean by “justice”?
In a small measure, Alex Villanueva, an elected Los Angeles County Sheriff who is now on trial for conspiring to cover-up his use of taxpayer money to purchase his luxury, high-rise home on Long Beach Boulevard, passed his last test this week.
In a larger measure, he’s going away.
If you’re an American trying to make a living, or any citizen for that matter, you know that freedom of press is critical, especially when there are so many things you don’t want the public to know about the people that pay your salary every day. And with so many people in power in our country — be it a President, a Governor, a local politician — they don’t want even the media knowing what they do.
Not Alex. He decided to hold back the truth, even from his own son.
We don’t know the extent to which the son has been affected by this case — we’re still awaiting the results of the son’s psychiatric evaluation. We don’t know how he’s feeling, what he’s thinking, if he’s still angry with his father. But we’re confident that if the son was to come to his senses by the time this trial is over, the son would be in favor of his father being released back into the community.
What we do know is his father did not commit perjury, nor was his motive to commit perjury to be a way to protect his son. He is being charged with perjury only because he told the truth to an official with a legal obligation to report his activities to the government. He is not a victim of a system out to destroy those who are trying to get ahead — he is the victim of a system out to destroy those who are already ahead.
In his statement to the grand jury he said,
