In our legal system equality is supposed to preside. Black or white. Rich or poor. Powerful or not. Yet, there is a belief that the elite, including politicians, can be above the law.
We’re about to find out, courtesy of the Scottsdale City Attorney’s Office. It is apparently deciding whether to charge embattled Paradise Valley Councilman Paul Dembow with a crime, after the Scottsdale Police Department found probable cause for charges, according to the Scottsdale Independent.
For any reader, or person in Paradise Valley, still unaware of Dembow’s decrepit behavior, allow us to remind. He was caught on video, apparently stealing a cross as part of a memorial established by a Paradise Valley family distraught over the death over their father. Howard Brown was killed by Dembow’s daughter in a tragic car accident and there have been legal and political fireworks ever since.
Putting aside who is right, and wrong, in the years-long fight, most all would agree that stealing such a memorial for Father’s Day is about as low as it gets.
Rather than admit he was drunk, stupid, angry or something else Dembow chose to deny it was he in the video, something Scottsdale Police are reported to have rejected.
A potential crime and then lying about it to voters and your colleagues. It doesn’t get much worse.
Dembow is now not just a laughingstock. He would surely be ranked today as Paradise Valley’s worst person. Despite his demise, the Scottsdale City Attorney’s Office, led by Sherry Scott, should not and cannot send a message that elected officials get to skate when they engage in such behavior. Failure to back up the Scottsdale Police Department’s investigation would do just that.
Many are watching this sordid chapter. It’s long past time for Dembow to resign rather than put Paradise Valley through the embarrassment and trauma. But it can end another way too, courtesy of the Scottsdale City Attorney’s Office.