Dennis L. “Pinky” Stout got the message

Today I am announcing my decision not to seek the Office of District Attorney of San Bernardino County.

From a very early age all I dreamed about was being a public prosecutor.  After 17 years as a Deputy District Attorney, I realized my ultimate dream in 1994 when I was elected District Attorney.  I ran unopposed in 1998 and was reelected to a second term. During those eight years we accomplished a complete rebuild of the office from the ground up. We implemented over 50 new programs.

We positioned the office so that it could become the best prosecutorial agency in the state.

Here comes “Pinky” for his final disgrace

[ Before making a big mistake, insist that “Pinky” Stout debate Mike Ramos in public and make a recording available on the Internet.  This jerk can hardly tie his shoes.  He was put into office by the military/prison-industrial complex mafia bosses, in an era of secrecy and censorship.  He was chosen for his ignorant obedience.  Let’s see how he looks when we can really see him. By the way, MID/PID scum:  You don’t run this county any more. ]

———————————————————————————————————————

SAN BERNARDINO – Former district attorney Dennis Stout says he’s ‘committed’ to winning back his old job.

Stout is determined to root out government corruption…

“During eight years that I was district attorney, we prosecuted over fifty major corruption cases. By the time I completed my second term, corruption in San Bernardino County was pretty much under control. But, during the last seven years, it has reared its ugly head again.”

Stout did not seek re-election in 2002 and was replaced by Mike Ramos.

Stout expects to make a formal campaign announcement within two weeks. (INT)

Story Date: January 6, 2010

Return of Stout a good thing?

[ As Mike Ramos cleans the house that this man helped to build, we suspect that his expressed interest in running again is little more than an advance defense against an investigation of him.  Follow Stout at the iePolitics blog.  The military- and prison-industrial complexes of this nation brought us 9/11, the hate of the world and the violation of our own people and their families.  Dennis Stout is their shill in San Bernardino County.  Don’t let him rape us again. ]

Stout needs to rethink strategy

Dennis Stout, San Bernardino County’s former district attorney, wants his old job back and says he will see whether he can rally enough enough support to run against District Attorney Michael A. Ramos.Over the next couple of months, Stout said, he will reach out to former supporters.

This page counted among his supporters in days past, but at this point we would urge him not to run for DA.

Not if he’s basing his run on what Stout called “politically motivated prosecutions and investigations into county corruption” by Ramos, referring to the district attorney’s investigations of the Assessor’s Office and the county’s 2006 lawsuit settlement with Rancho Cucamonga developer Colonies Partners LP.

Is that what Stout would base his campaign on? Is he saying it was OK for former Assessor Bill Postmus to hire his buddies and pay them taxpayer money to do political work instead of assessor work and to send them to run his personal errands and to clean his house, as is alleged? That it was OK for former Assistant Assessor Jim Erwin to accept a $13,000 watch and a trip to New York from a developer without reporting them as gifts, as is alleged?

If Stout were DA, would he drop the charges against Postmus, Erwin and other former Assessor’s Office figures because the charges are “politically motivated”?

The Postmus-Erwin camp is vigorously kicking up dirt on Ramos, impugning his motives and reputation, to try to deflect the prosecutions against them. Stout’s comments seem to validate their strategy.

Ramos may or may not have some of the alleged personal foibles, but if so they certainly do not negate the need for prosecution.

For Stout to assert that the prosecutions are “politically motivated” implies to us either that he has joined the Postmus-Erwin camp for some reason or that he will seize on anything that looks bad for Ramos in his zeal to get his old job back, even if it works against the interests of the taxpayers and citizens of San Bernardino County.

Those citizens and taxpayers deserve a full airing of various corrupt acts alleged in the Hueston report commissioned by county supervisors, in the 2008-9 Grand Jury report, and by the Public Integrity Unit of the District Attorney’s Office. That airing should come from vigorous criminal prosecution and from the county’s civil lawsuit against Postmus, Erwin and the others.

When Stout was district attorney, before he aborted his 2002 re-election bid under a cloud of his own, he used to tell service clubs how he decided when he was in grade school that he would become district attorney. We thought it, at the time, an endearing example of achieving one’s dream; but now we’re re-evaluating it in light of the way Stout announced his intention to explore another run for the office.

San Bernardino County government has plenty of officeholders and appointees who put their own interests above those of the people they’re supposed to serve. If Dennis Stout puts his own desire to be DA ahead of the good of the people – and ahead of the need to prosecute corruption – we don’t need him to seek office again.

Former Corrupt San Bernardino County DA says he may run against Ramos

Former San Bernardino County District Attorney Dennis Stout announced Wednesday that he is considering running for his old job in 2010 — challenging District Attorney Mike Ramos, who defeated him in 2002.

Stout, who served as the county’s top prosecutor for eight years, said he believes political corruption is worse than when he left office and that Ramos spends too much time on politics.

He accused Ramos of inserting himself into the criminal probes of five former assessor’s officials and jeopardizing the cases.

Jerry Eaves case backfires on top prosecutor

Disgraced former District Attorney Dennis Stout

While local and federal authorities were investigating Supervisor Jerry Eaves in 2000, the District Attorney’s Office came under fire for top officials’ interactions with a political opponent of the embattled county supervisor.San Bernardino County District Attorney Dennis Stout and two of his top lieutenants discussed their investigation into Eaves with Rialto City Councilman Ed Scott, who ran unsuccessfully against Eaves in that year’s supervisorial election.

Scott told other members of the corruption task force that he was concerned he was receiving confidential investigative information and agreed to wear a wire.

Scott recorded phone conversations between himself and Stout, Chief District Attorney Investigator Barry Bruins and Assistant District Attorney Dan Lough in which the investigation was discussed.

Transcripts of the conversations were later made public, and while no charges were ever filed against Stout or his aides, Stout apologized and demoted Lough and Bruins.

Truth & consequences

Investigators bold enough to take on corruption in San Bernardino County have themselves seldom escaped controversy.Some have been criticized by the same leaders who hired them. For others, the stakes have been even higher.

Former District Attorney Dennis Stout, 61, says his political career was upended in large part because he lost support from power brokers when he went after corrupt county officials.

He sees a distinct pattern of county officials bashing the people they commission to clean up corruption.

“It’s not just the way these investigators are attacked, it’s the politics of this county,” Stout said. “It’s a bloody knife fight.”

Stout prosecuted former Supervisor Jerry Eaves on bribery charges before the case was handed over to the state Attorney General’s Office when it was discovered that Stout and two of his top aides discussed their investigation into Eaves with one of his political foes.

The District Attorney’s Office was cleared of acting illegally, but Stout bowed out of a 2002 re-election bid when he fell behind his opponent, then-Deputy District Attorney Michael Ramos.

The scandal surrounding the Eaves investigation and a wrongful termination lawsuit filed against Stout were big contributors to his downfall, he said.

Web of corruption

The county’s most extensively documented scandal, and the one that many consider to be one of the most egregious abuses of power in the county’s history, began in the 1990s and became public in 1998, when County Administrative Officer James Hlawek resigned and the Board of Supervisors announced the FBI was investigating him.Gary Ovitt, current chairman of the Board of Supervisors, said the Hlawek scandal was a watershed event for the county in that it served as the impetus for a complete overhaul of the county’s leadership team and the creation of a long list of reforms. It also prompted the county to greatly increase its transparency to the public.

“The scandal also branded the county as a place with deep-seated ethical problems, and every misstep that has occurred since has been viewed by the news media and the public through the prism of the Hlawek scandal,” Ovitt said. “Newspaper editorials habitually refer to the county as a place with a `history of scandal,’ based largely on the legacy of the Hlawek scandal. This has served to make the county all the more vigilant to prevent ethical lapses and corruption whenever possible and quickly address issues as they arise.”

For SB DA Dennis Stout: Freedom Funds Falter

Dennis Stout knows great things don’t happen overnight, and one of those great things is the Freedom’s Flame monument. Freedom’s Flame Foundation, a Rancho Cucamonga nonprofit formed in 2002, designed bicoastal sculptures depicting the attack on New York’s World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, with the figures of more than 30 civilians and rescue workers. More on Stout

DA Dennis Stout Admits Errors, Drops Role in Probe

San Bernardino County Dist. Atty. Dennis Stout acknowledged Wednesday that he violated his own ethical standards and made “errors in judgment” when he secretly aided the political opponent of a county supervisor he was investigating.