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April 2, 2005

Posted 1:00 AM Eastern
NewsWithViews.com

With allegations of a cover-up, Josephine County Sheriff Dave Daniel faces the next hurdle in his career as Sheriff.

The Josephine County Sheriff Deputy who shot Michael James Murray on Savage Creek Road on February 20th was arrested early Friday morning for assaulting his 19 year old fianc�e. The Deputy, Sean Valdez, was released an hour later after posting bail.

Currently he faces a misdemeanor charge of fourth-degree assault but there is an on-going investigation by Oregon State Police to see if the incident happened in the presence of a child, in which case Valdez could face a felony charge. He was also placed on paid administrative leave Friday, his second paid leave this year. The first was the shooting incident on Feb. 20th and a grand jury has convened to hear evidence and possibly hand Valdez an indictment.

The Friday morning incident, however, didn't surface to the media as most criminal cases do. The lack of a filed police log in the case is stated as being the reason there was no record on the police arrest log that is handed to the media. According to Sheriff Daniel, "Certainly there was no intent to cover up."

To some, however, this is just another reason why Sheriff Daniel should be removed from his position.

"Come on, the County just had to pay off some deputies he (Daniel) let go in a settlement which cost Josephine County taxpayers approximately three hundred and thirty thousand dollars, then he has the whole chicken caper where he sends, I don't remember how many, deputies out to arrest a 60 year old diabetic in the middle of the night.

That case, just recently dropped by the new DA, has cost the taxpayers a huge amount of money. Now we have a routine thing like filing a police report on an arrest made, just mysteriously not happening when it is one of their own. It just doesn't happen unless they were told," said Lorraine Tillman, a Josephine County resident, after reading both the Daily Courier and Medford Mail Tribune articles on the Valdez arrest.

Editor In Chief of the US~Observer, Ed Snook stated, "This is just one more in a long line of factual examples that Sheriff Daniel is a poor administrator and a liar. He says there was no cover-up in the Valdez case, well we have sources that say there was. Sheriff Daniel, in his protection of a few bad deputies, is spoiling the reputations of the many great civil servants that are working under his misguided leadership."

With such strong evidence of past wrongdoings by Sheriff Daniel you can bet NewsWithViews.com will be looking into the allegations of collusion by the Sheriff's Department in trying to keep the Valdez arrest a secret. Look for continued reports to be made available.

Sheriff Daniel can be reached at (541) 474-5123

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That case, just recently dropped by the new DA, has cost the taxpayers a huge amount of money. Now we have a routine thing like filing a police report on an arrest made, just mysteriously not happening when it is one of their own.