Mendez should resign
Editorial
Issue date: 3/12/10 Section: Opinion
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Recently Trustee Mendez has become a rather hot topic both here on campus and in the surrounding community. Unfortunately for both Mendez and Rio Hondo it's not for anything particularly exemplary but for something quite the opposite.
As was reported in the Whittier Daily News last week as well as Rio Hondo's own El Paisano, Trustee Mendez was recently arrested after an incident at Maggie's Pub in Santa Fe Springs.
After being called to the pub, officers found the 40-year-old Trustee sitting in his car.
This is where the situation takes a twist. Apparently, after a consenting search of Mendez's person, officers found a spring-loaded knife in his pocket. At best the discovery is a misdemeanor and, while not a happy find, it's nothing to get worked up about.
The plot thickened following a procedural background check. Officers discovered Mendez had two warrants out for his arrest, the first warrant was given for driving with a suspended license and the second for failure to appear in court.
According to court records, Mendez was convicted of driving on a revoked or suspended license on Jan. 12, 1999, a total of 11 years prior to this recent arrest. Some of you may be asking "what's the big to-do?"
So far Mendez has committed a misdemeanor offense and apparently doesn't really care about traffic violations. That would be true, but for somebody who represents a whole community and is a figurehead for Rio Hondo, misdemeanor offenses or traffic violations are nothing to scoff at.
While anyone can run into problems, like forgetting to pay a traffic ticket, the everyday person will eventually run into a situation where they have to deal with the matter at hand.
Usually though, this would need to happen before a complete decade has passed. In all honesty to not have to face consequences you really have to go out of your way to avoid any kind of situation that might turn the warrant up.
Warrants aside, what we should really be concerned with is the situation that led up to this. Mendez had become enough of a problem that someone at Maggie's Pub had to actually call the police because as the Whittier Daily News reports he was refusing to leave.
This seems to be a habit for Mendez. Five years ago he was appointed board president only to have the title stripped from him by his fellow trustee members and then censured for his actions. The reason for this?
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