Pima County BOS District 4 signs show up in heap
On Sunday August 5, Pima County Sheriff’s deputies responded to a home in the 12000 block of East Wildhorse Corral Drive, in Vail, with regards to a violation of ARS 16-1019; a class 2 misdemeanor to “knowingly remove, alter, deface or cover any political sign of any candidate”. Upon arrival, deputies located 14 signs for Pima County Supervisor candidate Sean Collins, placed in the side yard with an estimated value of $420.
In an effort to avoid the unnecessary intervention of law enforcement, the Collins campaign ascertained for themselves that the anonymous tip they had received about the signs was accurate. They then contacted the authorities.
Deputies found only Collins’s campaign signs in the heap. Many of the signs still had the rebar posts attached, indicating that they had been ripped out of the ground intact. The signs had come from a fairly wide geographic area, indicating that they had been gathered deliberately.
Deputies contacted a resident at the address, Dallas Dukes III, age 19. Dukes told witnesses and deputies that his father, Dallas Dukes II, a director of rates at TEP, was out of town.
Dukes told deputies that the signs were randomly put in his front yard one night. He said he woke up early one morning to find all of the Sean Collins signs and told his Dad about them. His father instructed him to throw them on their trash heap in the side yard to later be taken to the trash dump.
Dukes speculated that it was a prank on him. However, neither father nor son contacted authorities or the campaign to report the signs. The campaign contact information, as per regulation, is clearly visible on the signs.
When advised of the crime, Senator Frank Antenori, author of ARS 16-1019, expressed outrage. “A ticket should be issued for every one of those signs. Every single theft is a separate violation of the law. Donor’s hard earned money, and volunteers sweat went into getting up those signs.”
The Sheriff’s Office has assigned a separate case number to this matter, from the case of the sign theft which was caught on camera the night of August 1, at approximately 10:00 p.m. In that case, a sign stealer was captured on film ripping a Collins sign out of the ground at mile post 47 ½ on State Route 83. They will combine the cases due to the fact that Collins is the victim in both cases.
The Sheriff’s Office, to avoid the appearance of any bias in this case, has asked the Tucson Police Department to investigate the case. The Pima County Deputy Sheriff’s Association and the Combined Law Enforcement Agency of Arizona has endorsed Sean Collins.
Dallas Dukes Jr. says he “never actually saw what kind of signs they were; second, my son never told me what kind of signs they were or that the signs were political or all Sean Collin’s signs (he’s 18 [not 19] and not politically involved – he simply told me there were signs left against our front door, on his car, in a bush and in the yard; Third, I told him to put them around the house and I would deal with them later (not take them to the dump) – in normal 18 year old kid fashion he tossed them in the back, rather than nicely stacking them; fourth, no one in the Dukes’ household knowingly, maliciously or at “ALL” had anything to do with the taking of these signs. “
I am not active with either political party and have not supported any candidate in any manner.
I understand how important these things are to Mr. Collins as it is a primary scope of his life presently; but I’m raising three sons and working hard and I just didn’t have time to give those signs my immediate focus. In my mind I thought it was just a teenage prank, with random signs – and at some point I would look at them and see about getting them back to their owners if pracitical. “
. I want to thank those officers for their professionalism and I apologize to Mr. Collin’s for not being more diligent in identifying and returning his signs. But no one in my family took the signs and no one in my family was going to take the signs to the dump. I simply had not looked at them or dealt with them yet. Life is busy!”
When asked, Sean Collins stated, “what is important is that people realize the tampering or stealing of political signs is against the law and it has been rampant against my campaign and many others in this election cycle. In addition, I applaud the Pima County Sheriff’s Department for the expediency of their response and their professional bearing in handling this matter.”
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