All Episodes

December 13, 2020 • 59 mins
Cece Woods interview
Mark as Played
Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
This is the FCB Radio Network,Real Talk worldwide online at FCB radio dot
com. Kick the tires and lightthe fires, go riding when everything else

(00:53):
sounds wrong. This is Sounds Rightwith Jen and Scott. Welcome back to
another EPI episode of Sounds Right withJen and Scott. I am Jen van
Laar and over there in his hilltop, wind blown bunker is Scott Haunsel.
How are you today, Scott?Oh, it's morning, Yeah, but
who knows when these people are goingto listen to it? You shouldn't really

(01:15):
say that. I for me,and that's all that matters. I mean,
that's that's pretty much that everyone canyou can be listening to at eight
o'clock at night. I'm sorry,guys, it's morning for me. Male
privilege, yes, male privilege,White male privilege. So today, jeez,

(01:36):
today we're talking about a subject that'snear and dear to both Scott's in
my heart because we've both experienced theintense corruption in Los Angeles, and um,
we found kind of a kindred spiritwho also likes to expose this corruption
going on within the city of angelsand that is CC Woods and she'll be

(01:57):
on in just a minute. Butwhat we're gonna talk about today is this
guy Phil Washington, who's the CEOof Metro. He happens to be the
head of allegedly President elect Joe Biden'stransportation transition team, And just like so
many people in California, we reallydon't want their terrible ideas to go national,

(02:19):
and unfortunately the Biden camp seems intentto do that. But there's some
things that really everyone should know aboutWashington's leadership at Metro. In CC has
been at the forefront of exposing this. She is the publisher of both the
Local Malibu and the Current Report.Over at the Local Malibu, she's exposed

(02:40):
a cover up of a bunch ofshootings in the Malibu Creek State Park that
kind of have plagued that area,and so check out the Local Malibu to
read more about that. But theCurrent Report she has exposed another cover up
over at Metro, one that's ledto the deaths of some Metro employees during
the pandemic. Welcome Cecie, andthank you so much for joining us today.

(03:06):
Good morning. Can you hear me? Yes? Okay? Not clear
okay, and I've been accused ofbeing loud and clear anyway, Good morning
night. So tell us a littlebit about this about Phil Washington and kind
of the thumbnail of how you foundout about this corruption and cover up that
was happening and exactly what it ledto. Well, a few months ago,

(03:30):
I believe it was the beginning ofOctober, or actually it was at
the end of September, I receiveda phone call from a whistleblower at Metro
who was doing some digging around onthe internet and found my article on DA
Alan Yokelson, who's the head ofthe Public Integrity Division at the DA's office,

(03:54):
Jackie Lacy, and or at leastuntil the end of the year.
So he gave me a call andjust said, hey, I saw your
article and this is what's going onin Metro. Do you want to cover
it? And I'm like, sure, you know, bring it on.
So apparently he had tried to exposethis cover up through other big sources,

(04:21):
especially you know, mainstream media sources, and had no luck. They just
they didn't even want to touch it, not with a ten football. And
it was because they all have theirrelationships with the Board of Supervisors or LA
City Council or the governor or whoever. And I really didn't give a crop.

(04:44):
And that's being mild and nice.I don't have a boss. I'm
my own boss, and I believein truth and integrity and journalism, and
I'm like, whatever it is,give it to me. As long as
I have evidence, facts, photos, right up, what's being written,
I'll write anything, so exactly.Yeah. So, and that's really where

(05:11):
where I come from. It's likeI will never ever publish something. I
look at some articles and I'm like, how are you just publishing that?
And like people are believing it?All right? So what were they covering
up? What did they do?The very first article that I exposed was
the counterfeit masks that they were givingto their employees, including bus drivers,

(05:33):
and yes, including bus drivers.And this was like really early on in
the pandemic, and by April,an employee had already discovered this and had
notified the head of their safety operations, and from there, Philip Washington knew

(05:56):
about it, and they just prettymuch ignored it. I didn't care about
it. The frustration that I wouldhave with something like that is because the
fact that, like, obviously it'stwofold one where we're told that any face
covering is supposed to save us fromthe COVID virus. So why would counterfeit
or not counterfeit matter? But ontop of that, if it does matter,

(06:19):
how incompetent are our leaders that they'rethat they're that they don't understand how
to identify uh, you know,the correct masks, especially when we're talking
about essential employees like uh, bustingmetro metro employees or metro metro train drivers.
Well, and I think the biggestthing for me was the fact that

(06:43):
they were distributing counterfeit masks, givingthis false sense of security to people and
their mindset is like unprotected, whetheryou believe in COVID or not, their
mindset was and being protected. Myemployers are protecting me with this PPE,
And that was not the case,like not even close. So, And

(07:06):
you know, especially bust drivers whoare subjected to so many people throughout the
day and people whose hygiene are notthe best and all that dirt and germs
and all that other stuff. Youknow, you would think that that when
somebody lets you know that there arecounterfeit masks in your PPE, supply you're

(07:30):
going to take them out of there. So what I'm hearing was the reason
why they didn't take them out ofthere is because there was a severe shortage
of PPE in the beginning. Butat least address it, don't hide it,
don't stuff it under the rug,don't act like you don't care,
because all of those things were happening, right Like, let people know and

(07:53):
let them make the choice, becauseeven if it's a quote counterfeit mask,
it's still a mask. It doesn'tdo what the end ninety's not certified as
an N ninety five or K andninety five masks, but it still is
probably at least as effective as thelittle face coverings you buy at Target.
Yeah, so then these people knowthat, and let them make the choice.
Not only let them make the choice, but even if you were going

(08:13):
to make the choice for them,at least make sure that the non counterfeit
ones were on the employees that weresubjected to the highest risk, and then
the other ones, Hey, youcan buy your own, or we can
give you this one or whatever.And for the people who are set who
were sitting at their desks not exposedto anyone. Right well, there even

(08:35):
the fact that like for instances asfar as masks are concerned, and my
spouse is a government employee that theirdepartment produced cloth masks that had carbon filters
that you could insert, that youcould change, which, by the way,
are very very available. We're prettymuch always available. And again they

(08:56):
could be special orders. So Idon't understand how Metro, with the budget
that they have and the ability toget what they have, didn't do something
where they had like Metro masks,cloth masks that you could put carbon inserts
into or charcoal inserts into, uh, to be able to just to stop
a lot of this. I mean, this is this is again government government

(09:18):
incompetence at its best. Yeah,and Metro is well known for their incompetence
on so many different levels. Um, whether it's you know, they're they're
scandalous soul source contracts or you know, uh, discrimination or I mean there's
some pretty scandalous things going on overthere, and a lot more to expose.

(09:45):
I'll have some articles coming out inthe next few days. Yeah,
some good GC ones, trust me, really good GC ones. I just
didn't want to release it during youknow, this new lockdown phase because then
nobody's going to pay attention, andso I just want to make sure that
I got it out when people wereat home Boorge tears and wanted to soak
in some public corruption from La Metro. So the thing also, as I've

(10:09):
read your stories, and I actuallyI didn't read the update until a couple
of days ago, but even inyour original story when you tried to bring
this to their attention. So thiswhistle mark comes to you, gives you
pictures of this counterfeit mask, givesyou a link to where it Back in
what April, this West Virginia newspapershowed that that state was also distributing these

(10:31):
fake masks all that information. So, like you said, you're not a
journalist that just puts out supposition.Then you go to Metro. What happens
when you go to Metro with yourinformation? Uh? Well, I emailed
their PR person. Well, Iemailed a couple of people, and I
also emailed the union. Got nope, nope, no answer back from the

(10:54):
union, which was great union theydidn't want to protect their people. Yeah,
they did not even email me.Okay, did not even me back.
But the PR person wasn't very smart. She emailed me back, and
she emailed me back a blatant lie, not realizing that I'm the screenshot queen.
Okay and I'm gonna put that inthe article, so um that kind

(11:16):
of let's just put it this way. There were a lot of meetings scheduled
around little old me right after that. So so yeah, they just they
blatantly lied, even after I hadread receipts and I mean, you name
it. I had so much tojust stack against them, and they just

(11:37):
like thought they could get away withlying and nobody would pay attention. But
guess what, within twenty four hours, I had two federal agents calling me
from different agencies. Whoa oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah. So
even the little guy who may notbe a Fox News or an ABC or

(11:58):
a CBS, even little old mecan get the attention of federal agents and
open investigations on one try that.I mean, that's amazing that very few
journalists ever have something like that happened. So it just shows that you're really
over the target here. And soI have your article up so ANDed to

(12:18):
just read what they said the PRperson when you reached out to them and
you told them you were made awarethat counterfeit face masks were distributed unknowingly,
at least you gave them the benefitof the doubt, like, okay,
we know that at the beginning ofthe pandemic things were happening fast and furious.
You didn't intend to issue these,but then you were informed that they
were counterfeit and you asked what theydid directify the issue, and they said,

(12:43):
Metro has never had counterfeit masks aspart of its inventory. Okay,
Then you asked you, is thereare a notice sent out to employees who
were the counterfeit mask answered, becausethere were no counterfeit masks in inventory,
notice two employees was not needed.But yet the same day that your story
published, they put out in theirtheir daily email to their employees that they

(13:05):
have received an inquiry from the mediaabout any potential masks that were misrepresented on
the CDC website as being Niosh certified, and they said that they did not
use that vendor to purchase masks inthe masking question. We're never purchased like
not even not true that they neverpurchased them. And we hope this resolves

(13:28):
any confusion. I mean, thatshows me that they this is how they
tell their employees all the time.Yeah, okay, here's what happened.
We don't care what you heard,but here's what happened. And we hope
this resolves your confusion. Your confusionmeaning like that you might actually know the
truth. Good. So then rightafter that, I came out with a
second one. So yeah, sothen that Scott, before we go into

(13:54):
the second one, do you haveany thoughts before because there's a follow up
that gives more proof. So whatare your thoughts just hearing this the first
time? Scott? Scott? Areyou needed Scott? Did we lose your
scar? No? I'm right here, so okay, my clock decided to

(14:15):
chime right it. Uh so No, I think that I think that there's
a bit of this that really frustratesme is the fact that instead of hey,
we got caught in our incompetence,we're going to try to do better.
Here's what we suggest to make surethat this problem doesn't occur again in
the future, they just nope,where No, it didn't happen. Oh,

(14:39):
but here's here's the potential that itdid happen. I mean, at
some point they media has to holdthese people accountable beyond beyond the occasional,
uh, the occasional reporter who willactually take a look at it, whether

(15:00):
it's CC or Bill Milusion or whoeverit may be that actually goes in and
looks at these things. They needto be a little bit more accountable than
just the passive well we didn't wedon't know anything about it, or it
never happened, when you guys canclearly prove that it did. I mean,
it's right. These people soulless,is what the only way to describe

(15:22):
it. They You can't no matterwhat happens. If someone came to me
with something that's even you know,a problem for what I may deal with.
I'm more than willing to deal withthe truth and the facts behind the
matter before we before we discuss it. But I'm not about to go out
and sit there and say no bigdeal, move on, nothing happened,
because again, if the truth isgoing to go out there and or there's

(15:48):
facts out there that are going tocounter contradict what I've said, then that's
a huge problem. Well there wasconsequences, right TC, I mean,
how many people died and how manyinfections came have happened in metro sense,
Well they have to There are ongoinginvestigations right now, so they can't definitively
say one hundred percent that those masksled to the deaths or the infections.

(16:12):
But hello, their comfit masks andhello, their at work all day.
So I mean there, it doesn'tmatter. The fact of the matter is
is there are federal investigations that areongoing right now about this and whether they
did definitively lead to these people gettingsick and or die. So, but

(16:34):
the thing is is the reason whyI'm able to even dig deeper into this
and I already know how these agencieswork like that, like Metro and how
they lie, is because of myexperience in the Malbu Creek State Park shootings.
I was shocked that, you know, they were covering up the shootings

(16:59):
that led to the murder of aman laying next to his two young kids
at at a beautiful, you know, camping facility near Malibu. How do
you how do you cover up shootingsand not tell the public about it?
You know, how do you putthem in danger? And the more I
got into it, the more Isaw how easy it is for people to

(17:21):
cover it up. And there wasan election coming and for the Sheriff's department,
for for sheriff la kind of sheriff, and part of that cover up
was because he didn't want to losethe election, and so you know it's
these cover ups are all obviously politicallymotivated. But once you're called out like

(17:47):
Metro was, and after even theshootings were, you'd think they'd come clean
and go, oops, we messedup, we need to clean this up.
But instead they continue to lie more. It's crazy. Well, Scott,
should we go to a break andthen come back and talk some more
about this second whistle blower that cameforward to CC. Let's go ahead and

(18:10):
do that. So we're gonna takea quick break right now and we'll be
right back in just after these wordsfrom our sponsors with more sounds right which
end? Scott. Hi, I'mKiara Davis, host of Just Listen to
Yourself. Do you love hot chocolate, fake snow and cheesey Hallmark movies,
then You're going to love the latestpodcast from FCB Radio, a very Merry

(18:33):
podcast. Join me and co hostAmelia Hamilton Hallmark super Fans as we break
down the best and the worst,but mostly the best of the Hallmark Christmas
Universe all season long. Will ourprotagonists fall in love and discover the true
meaning of Christmas? There's only oneway to find out. Come celebrate the
happiest place on TV with a verymerry podcast every week through New Year's and

(18:57):
don't forget the mistletoe. This soundsright with Jen and Scott being Radio Network,
Welcome back to U sounds right withJen and Scott. We're here with

(19:18):
Ceci Woods, who is a fantasticinterview investigative reporter. She's dealing with a
lot of issues down in the Malibuarea with the sheriff station and talking about
the corruption within La County, alsowith the with the Metro board um going
on with uh we We originally talkedin the first segment with about masks,

(19:40):
So there's more. That's the storyhere, Jen, you want to pick
it up, sure, So Ithink what strikes me cec is right why
they won't say I just made amistake and and we should have let our
employees know or something like that.To me, I think that there's probably
and I can't prove this at Also, this is supposition probably some kind of
incentive for Metro to where they havesourced these masks, just like with Gavin

(20:04):
Newsom with the billion dollars he sentto China for masks that half of them
ended up not ever being certified asgenuine or whatever through Niosh, that's just
my working theory of it. Butyou had after your original post, you
had someone else, the whole entirelyseparate whistle er come forward in the days

(20:25):
after that original post. So canyou tell us about that. Yeah,
as soon as my article came out, I had received many calls about how
up in arms Metro employees were andthey had no idea and they were really

(20:48):
frightened. And I guess it couldbe because a lot of them are part
of the demographic that is that issusceptible in a more or more vulnerable to
COVID and um, so so thatthat demographic ends up, you know,

(21:14):
uh, just like in fear nowthat they have not been wearing masks and
numbers are rising and so um asecond whistle blower came forward and said,
you know, I just want youto know. Um I also uh found
uh counterfeit masks, alerted my boss, and my boss didn't care. And

(21:37):
so so it was happening in multipleareas around Metro. Which is was this
the same mask, the same modelnumber or was this a different one?
No, it was a different one. And I did put the photos in
the second article Wow. So youhave two employees and two separate verticals basically
of Metro who have followed the procedure, gone to the UH supervisor, Hey,

(22:02):
I found this thing that it couldbe harming my co workers and myself,
and and the supervisor said, yeah, exactly, that's exactly what happened.
And UM and this one was inthe UM bus operations UM which is
even worse. So um it.It just gets more and more alarming as

(22:29):
you get into it. And asyou can see that these employees, specifically
management UM are just trained to shovethings under the rug. They're not they're
not there. They're not there toactually you know, be proactive. They're
there to cover it up. AndI mean it's just it's astounding the amount

(22:55):
of corruption at La Metro. Likethere's there's there's stories for days and days
and days and days like you know, there's not and I know I'm going
to get the day to get throughyou know, even part of it,
right. Yeah, you'll get tothem. I'm sure you will get into
them. That. You know whatalso strikes me these they have these employees
and the management and a lot ofthese government agencies likes to think that they're

(23:17):
so much smarter than their rank andfile employees. Yet these rank and file
employees are the ones who are goingout and finding out, oh hey,
look like doing the research to findout that the ppee that they're wearing hasn't
been certified for the use that they'reusing it for, and but the people
above them are not even curious enoughto do that. It's that That's one

(23:40):
thing that strikes me. I thinkpart of the reason why these supervisors um
um and uh, the leadership atLA Metro, if you can even call
them that, are I feel soempowered to cover things up is because they

(24:03):
know that their political relationships are aregoing to supersede any type I think they're
above the law, let's just putit that way. And also and also
because of the board, the countyboarder supervisors, I mean the LA County
Boarder supervisors, the Metro board,which is made up of quite a few

(24:25):
Ala County Border supervisors. Because ofthat political the political relationships between those boards
and LA politicians, along with theirrelationships with the media, which they absolutely
manipulate beyond belief. They they hadbuilt this false sense of empowerment to to

(24:56):
be corrupt and they will get introuble for it, and that's not what's
going to happen anymore, because socialmedia and the little guys who are not
afraid to speak up are going toexpose these people. And you know what,
the bets they like these kind ofcases. So yeah, because you
do enough work for them that they'reable to open a case and get subpoenas

(25:18):
where they maybe couldn't have before.But the things that you've published given them
enough ammunition and even the screenshot sothat they can go to a judge and
say, hey, we should beinvestigating this, we should have a subpoena.
I was even talking to one ofthose investigators and they're like, wow,
you, like you really gave usa lot of great stuff. And
I'm like, just say the word. I'll get you more whatever it takes,

(25:41):
you know. Yeah, And Idon't even get paid for this,
Like this is my passion. Okay, it's not my day job, but
you need to Yeah, someone needsto hire you with an investigative reporter.
But yeah, Also, like yousaid about the board of supervisors, I
don't get why one of the boardof supervisors needs to be on the Metro
board because that to me seems liketoo much overlap and too much as we've

(26:02):
seen ability for corruption, like Sheilacoul that she who was just busted dining
at will Fourno is the board ofsupervisors member at the Metro and Scott Pipe
up here because this attitude, Ithink goes into a story that you published
earlier this week at Red State aboutKule's response to a constituent about that restaurant.

(26:26):
Right. The fact is is thatit comes down to the fact that
that the amount of power that's heldby the La County Border Supervisors, regardless
of who the supervisor is, isa problem. I mean, the end
going to let's just talk about thefact that like they can just shut down
business like yeah, willy nilly,Uh, We're going to decide what can

(26:47):
and can't be open, all onthe advice of not a doctor Barbara Ferrer.
Uh. And then furthermore, whenthey're called out about stuff, they
they react in a way that's that'spoor. I mean, Sheila got a
got a very polite email. Theemails that I published were very polite,

(27:08):
saying that they were disappointed that shewould go out and violate the very rules
she had just voted on. AndI really are you know, we're really
disappointed, and Sheila's either Sheila orSheila's people responded kind of very flippantly like,
well, it's too bad, notreally caring that you're that you're so
disappointed and uh and so bad thatyou won't be e emailing us anymore,

(27:32):
which makes us makes me think thatthey're going to block that email. Yeah,
it's like they sarcastically said something likewell, I'm so um, but
basically like I'm so sad that you'redisappointed or something like that. Right,
Oh, well, if it's anyif it's any consolation, the red flairs
go off in their office when myemails come into and they don't answer them

(27:53):
anymore. Well, um, itgoes beyond just not responding to them or
any the rest of it. Iused to work in an elected office,
and specifically, my my responsibilities wereconstituent communications. I dealt with responding to
constituent emails, phone calls, andeven visits the office. I know that

(28:15):
my boss would have sawed my headoff if I ever responded to an email
with so sorry you're disappointed, yeah, like he I would have. I
would have been fired on the spot. Yeah, it is. It is
really disrespectful. I mean, andagain it goes back to this self importance,
this empowerment that they have. Youknow, this perfect example the board

(28:41):
of Supervisors actually manipulating the public tothink that they can take our rights away
to vote for La County sheriff.They're actually trying to figure out a way
to take out to take away ourrights to vote for the sheriff. I
mean, how how crazy is that? Who are they to take away our

(29:03):
right to vote for law enforcement,for the head of lament, especially when
there is a perfectly legal and constitutionalmethod to take it to the voters,
if that's what they so desire.Yes, if you really think that he's
that much of a problem, firefive four and pay for a recall,
okay. And and let's also gointo that incestuous, and and and just

(29:29):
narcissistic group that they are. It'slike there's not enough words to describe them.
Because when when the sheriff was removed, when they removed the sheriff who
held the position at the EOC okayfor decades, Uh, they remove him,

(29:51):
and what did they do? Theyput in their little puppet, Sachi
Hmai, the county CEO. Okay, So the sheriff during the pandemic,
during the civil uprising. They werenot briefing him at all. He was
not involved in any of the emergencymeetings, nada, nothing. Can you

(30:15):
imagine. That's that's the kind ofpower that they take away from somebody whose
job it is to protect the public, okay, and public safety, and
somebody who's got a doctorate in publicadministration and take he has more qualified than
Barbara Ferrar. Okay, that's whatI was just thinking. He's more qualified

(30:38):
than Barbara Ferrar to actually take onthat, probably than any other sheriff before
him. Okay. So meanwhile theyreplace, they replace him, they shame
him, replace him, and theyput SARChI Ami in. So a few
months later, when she retires,they hander it check for one point five

(31:00):
million dollars and say it's Alex's fault. Blame it on the sheriff. We
had to pay her one point fivemillion dollars because he was harassing her.
Okay. There was no mediation,there was no legal process, there were
no lawyers involved, and the checkwas cut written with no evidence to support
it in eleven days. Wow.That that in itself, I mean,

(31:26):
I'll be writing a story about itjust haven't had time. But I'm going
to get I had heard about asettlement thing, but I had not heard
all like those details because there's somany things in the New specle it's hard
to keep up, yeah, witheverything, but I'm glad. I mean
that's stunning, Yes, stunned,stunning. It's stunning, but I'm going
to couple it with more stunning corruptstuff, so it looks even more stunning

(31:49):
when when I put it in witheverything else after a year. No,
no, this, okay, thishappened. Yeah, I'm talking about since
COVID. I think it's there.He was on the yak and then and
then they removed him from the yak. And then they their reasoning for removing
the sheriff from the emergency operations whatCounty Emergency Operations, was because they did

(32:16):
a uh they did a quote studyon the Wolsey fire, paid for by
their own uh they picked their ownpeople to do their own BS study.
Okay, they came back and said, oh, the sheriff messed up.
Well, isn't that interesting because itwas Jim McDonald, who was an office

(32:38):
guess guess who is an expert onthe Wolsey fire me. I was on
the ground. I got over halfa million hits on one platform because I
was the only source for news onthe ground um in Malibu, and I
saw everything that went on, Iknow. And I also we also did
a very in depth investigative report onthe Wolsey fire or else, talking to

(33:00):
many state officials anyway, So theyuse this BS report sorry, with a
bunch of nothing in it. Andthen so and they crafted that because Sheila
had known all along that she wantedto remove the sheriff from the emergency operations.

(33:24):
So she wants to take as muchpower away from him. Meanwhile,
part of that reason is so thatshe can distance herself and her corrupt little
friends from the sheriff's over site.That's what she's trying to do, Okay,
So she brings in Sachiami, thecounty CEO. No emergency experience.

(33:45):
She's a freaking accountant. People,an accountant has no business overseeing emergency operations
during a pandemic, pandemic, aglobal pandemic. And then again civil upright
saying okay, So most people don'tunderstand too that it's the sheriff who calls
in the National Guard. He hasfive stars he is over chief more Okay,

(34:09):
he's the one who calls in theNational Guard in La County. So
so this was supposed to be atemporary position for Hamai and literally when she
was set to retire, which wasat the end of August, that's when
Sheila decided that she deserved a onepoint five million dollar bonus. But she

(34:31):
wanted to use Alex as the scapeboatin the Scapegoat and say blame it on
him, blame it on him harassingher. And I mean the the rumors
and the ridiculous smoking mirrors and thestory that she conjured up to back up

(34:57):
whatever she thought she needed to gether a one point five million dollar check.
Is is it's astounding. I meanI have the written proof. I
have like the written proof that there'sno evidence, how many days, no
legal process, no nothing. Sothe woman was already set to retire in
August of this year, regardless,she was tire even earlier and came back

(35:22):
on okay at the request of Kuelfor another three months during well they probably
didn't think she would need to bethere more than three months. And then
during the time she is supposedly thehead of the EOC you know civil uprising.
I mean just you know, historicalevents happened in public safety, and

(35:44):
here we have an accountant who issupposedly overseeing public safety, and the sheriff
has absolutely no idea what's going on. He's literally functioning on whatever knowledge he
can get from other areas. SoI mean, I'll be perfectly honest.
I've had my disagreements with the sheriffand had some some very staunch criticisms.

(36:07):
For instance, when he closed thegun stores or attempted to close the gun
stores after COVID started. I obviouslywas very critical of that. However,
if I also didn't feel that thereshould be unconstitutional or illegal means to remove
him from office, Yeah, andthat's always been my my my statement on

(36:30):
this is fine if you feel likehe's done something wrong, and I had,
and I do, and I mayI would mind even vote for a
different candidate if there was a recall. However, the way that Vienueva has
been standing up to the Board ofSupervisors as of late has impressed me.

(36:51):
I have been very very thrilled tosee him say no, this is not
cool, this is not how thishas ever worked in the past. Why
do you think it's going to workthis way. Now I'm not down with
this. We've got to figure somethingelse out. Well, I do have
to tell you, I do haveto tell you. Sorry, Jen,
I didn't mean to cut you off. I tell you that that. You
know, most people don't understand thatthe sheriff isn't he's pretty much a moderate.

(37:17):
Like I have a lot of conservativefriends who are really shocked by how
moderate he really is because they thoughthe was going to be this, you
know, uber democratic sheriff. Buthe is in law enforcement, and he
is educated. He's not perfect,but he is learning, and in his
first two years he's accomplished so muchthat people don't get to really understand how

(37:44):
far he's come because of the manipulationby local media at the hands of the
Board of Supervisors. And now,thank god for Bill Malusian who totally called
her out on the the eight dollarsand by the next contract, that contract,
that pay to play contract is stilleffective. It's still running right now

(38:07):
and it's with Metro. So that'sanother thing that Phil Washington knew about.
Another you know, I'm going tobe covering that at Red State too,
but Bill already covered it. SoI guess he's getting paid on that,
Patty Ghiggins, Look, buddy,and guess what. Patty Giggins is the
head of the Civilian Oversight Commission thatis skewering the Sheriff Okay Police Commission and

(38:35):
the things that they're doing exactly.But but I mean, hello, can
you be more incestuous? I meanreally, I mean come on, so,
um, it's it's it's it's areally uh, it's a really scary
circle. So and wouldn't Giggins herher group, wouldn't they stand to be

(38:57):
possibly a group that can benefit fromany defund efforts, like maybe those moneys
redirected to her a little nonprofit.Actually, interesting that you do say that.
So I do have a breakdown ofwhere the money is going to go
from the defunding efforts. And yes, the board is redirecting it to their

(39:17):
own charities wherever they wanted to gowith their people that sit on the board
is where it's gonna go. Imean, that's exactly the thing that's happening
with the LA Police Commission too.One of the ladies just resigned from that
because her group is going to geta bunch of defund money, right right,
So, so you know. Imean it's but just the other day

(39:40):
on the Sheriff's Facebook Live he announcedthat commicide is up thirty one point five
eight percent and aggravated assault is atnine point nine five percent and defunding hasn't
even kicked in yet. Yeah.Hey, so with all these criminals like

(40:02):
Philip Washington and Sheila Cool and companythat are running Elliot County, we are
circling the drain like fast fast.Oh well, we need to take another
break. But I wanted to addreal quick before we do that. The
thing that strikes me and I don'tknow if Sheriff Illinueva will would like this

(40:25):
comparison or not, but in away, he reminds me of Trump because
he has to use his Facebook liveor his or Twitter or his direct links
to the people to get his messageout because the media will not cover what
he says, and if they do, they'll cherry pick quotes to make it

(40:45):
look like he's saying something he's not. And I loved when he was on
John Phillips radio show and challenge LebronJames to donate to that fund for the
deputies that were ambushed and shot.That was awesome. It totally needs to
happen. And yeah, and hereally is. You know, it doesn't

(41:05):
It shows that he's on the rightside of whatever right is supposed to be.
Yeah, and you'll never I meanthe reason he kind of, I
guess, is standing out as sucha divisive character is because things have been
status quo for so long in LAlaw enforcement and he's changing that status quo
and the people who have benefited fromthat status quo don't like it. But

(41:28):
we all here. I am hopingyou guys embrace him more and give him
more of an opportunity to continue toshow that really he is. He can
get this job done, but probablybetter than anybody else. And he is
a very honest and he's a compassionate, honest leader, and you don't get

(41:52):
compassion in many men who are atthe head of the largest sheriff's department in
the country. So true, Andwe'll dive into more that on the other
side of this break. Hi,I'm Kia Davis, host of Just Listen
to Yourself. Do you love hotchocolate, fake snow and cheesy Hallmark movies,

(42:13):
then you're going to love the latestpodcast from FCB Radio, a very
merry podcast. Join me and cohost Amelia Hamilton Hallmark super Fans as we
break down the best and the worst, but mostly the best of the Hallmark
Christmas Universe all season long. Willour protagonists fall in love and discover the
true meaning of Christmas? There's onlyone way to find out. Come celebrate

(42:37):
the happiest place on TV with avery merry podcast every week through New Year's
and don't forget the mistletoe. ThisIt Sounds Right with Jen and Scott being
Radio Network. Welcome back to ourthird segment here on Sounds Right with Jen

(43:06):
and Scott. Uh. So,we have been with here again with h
with Ceci talking more about the ongoingUH issues with Eli County Board of Supervisors
and they're kind of in fighting withthe Elle County Sheriff UH and talking about
how the means that they're going tothat is the Ely County Board of Supervisors

(43:27):
in um in kind of sidelining thesheriff again. And I've and I've said
this before, I'm all, I'mall about checks and balances. I think
that the government should have a naturalset of tech checks and balances in there,
but that checks and balances doesn't meanunmetered Uh, support for UM.

(43:51):
It's not unme or it's not unmeteredpower to do whatever you want in the
in the case of checks and balances. Uh, you can't just willy nilly
remove someone from office or remove theirpowers just because you don't like what they're
doing, and saying again, I'vehad my disagreements with the sheriff. I

(44:12):
think that there's been things that he'sdone. As of late this morning,
he issued issued a response to thenew stay at home order and said I'm
not enforcing it, So kudos.That's where I will. You're gonna get
me on team vienneueva Is by sayingthat out of control government regulation and government
power isn't isn't good. So,I mean, there's there are good things

(44:37):
that I've found in his in himbeing sheriff, But I guess that there's
more to the story and there's moreto talk about. So Jen, do
you want to pick it up?Yeah, So this one isn't necessarily a
story that CC broke, but she'scovered part of it too, showing that
Phil Washington is under two federal investigations right now and Metro UM basically for

(45:02):
corruption, and the second one hasto do with supervisor Sheila Kule, who's
also been in the news with herhypocrisy and just the way that she's terrible
to constituents who call her out.So the second one is about this eight
dollars a call thing that we referencedin the prior segment. But in case

(45:22):
our listeners aren't sure or don't knowwhat that is about, UM, can
you kind of give us a thumbnailCC about that? Um? Yeah,
So the Piece over Violence contract wasarranged, excuse me, the Piece over
Violence contract was arranged by Sheila Kule, who is a Metro board member.

(45:43):
And so what does that contract do? Um, it's it's it's for a
hotline, and I believe it's fora hotline that that is for domestic violence.
And yeah, our for sexual ifyou if you experienced yeah, if
you've experienced sexual harassment on a Metrobus train whatever, they have this hotline

(46:05):
you can call, like instead ofcalling nine one one or something. Right.
So, so Bill Millusion is theone who broke this story, and
I am in contact with the samewhistleblowers and um so so, but you
know, this is part of thesoul Source contract article that I'm going to
end up doing which is they basicallydon't put out an RFPA Request for proposal

(46:32):
and they just hand the contracts overto their friends. And this is one
of those contracts. Sorry, Idon't know why my computers going off anyway,
So um so, but there's somuch corruption involved in this one contract
that the FEDS did end up gettinginvolved. And um so, even as

(46:57):
of I think as of last month, the hot I'm await the oh so
the piece over violence contract has notbeen canceled even though it's not in use.
Last month, the hotline only gottwo calls, is what might notes
say? So yeah, so,so we're still paying you know, money

(47:20):
out So this contract they got,they were operating their entire own like call
center, but didn't I think thatBill Malusian's stories showed that a lot of
the they were reporting call numbers toback to Metro, saying we answered X
number of calls, But it turnedout the vast majority of those calls were
either hang ups or wrong number ornot really even related. So that it

(47:42):
ended up that this group got paideight thousand dollars per actual call. Yes,
over what a two or three yearperiod? Yes? Yes, And
the people their employee told Yeah,their employee told them, don't renew this,
like you can just have them callthe Metro office for this number of
calls up. There's not enough callsto warrant this contract, clearly, right,

(48:04):
And then they didn't. They theythen extended it for two years for
like four hundred and fifty thousand dollarsor something like that. Yep, yep,
just so you looking keep that potty, you know, sitting pretty and
um again you go back to andit's a no big contract too, right,
And so some Metro executives knew thatthis was going on, and they

(48:29):
just said many contracts, by theway, one of many contracts to piece
over violence. There no big contractsin general, No big contracts in general.
Yeah. Yeah, so so,I mean one of the reasons,
you know why Metro had to makesignificant cuts and stuff is because they had
so many fraudulent contracts and you know, they could cancel them but you know

(48:53):
if they wanted to, but theydidn't, and so you know, they
basically just handed money to people,to their BFFs and then they cut staff
instead. So basically like this thecounty government is a big money laundering operation.
Yeah, it would seem so soI mean, I know that's a

(49:15):
that's like a very rhetorical or dramaticway to put it, but it's just
fresh, like if we got ridof all this stuff, that they have
plenty of money to do the thingsthat government should do. Yeah, yeah,
yeah, and they're not. Andso if we don't, if we
don't hold them accountable, if thereif if if the little guy like us

(49:39):
is not out there doing you know, well, you guys are bigger than
I am. But you know,if if if there aren't people like us
out there doing this type of investigativereporting and actually just pressing the published button,
okay, with verifiable evidence that cansupport that this criminal activity is a

(50:00):
going on, then you know what, we're just going to be living in
a world of criminals and and nobody'sgoing to know about it, and they're
just gonna get you know, you'regonna want to Basically, you're teaching our
next generation that becoming a politician isreally the way to become rich, okay,
and and by stuffing money in yourback pockets, and that you don't

(50:23):
get published, you don't get punishedfor for criminal activity. That if you
become a politician, you're safe andthat's super. They sent this to the
LA Times, right, they said, Times, Spectrum News, uh,
all the local all the local stations, and pretty much everybody passed on it

(50:45):
except for Bill did not pass onthe eight thousand, eight thousand dollars per
call um. That was one hewas able to get through because you know,
Bill has Bill has brosses too,you know so well. And you
know also, I mean, Iknow that I get to all the time
and I want the tips, butat the same time, I can't look
at all of them. I'm oneperson, Yeah, and so there's sometimes

(51:07):
times where I just don't get tosomething because I'm working on so many things.
But it's also sorting through It's alsosorting through the cuckoo and and finding
and then finding the real stuff.I mean. The the issue that I
have is that the political class andthe media class in Los Angeles is so

(51:30):
cozy with one another that they wouldnever be critical of one another in the
case that there needs to be somethingto be critical. The LA Times,
for instance, will never be criticalof anyone within any office at any well,
yes, but but they because butthat's because the political class is is

(51:51):
opposed to Sheriffinueva I think that,like I said, you have this,
you have this this idea that we'resupposed to have fair and reliable UM third
parties to oversee our our political system, and that when that isn't in check,

(52:15):
the media will call them out onit. But the Los Angeles Times
is in every major political politicians inLos Angeles, they would never say anything
critical of them. And even whenthey do, I mean, how many
times did they pass on that storyabout um about the mayor's the mayor's assistant,

(52:37):
Yeah, who was like grabbing?How many times? How many times
the LA Times pass on that?Yeah? I mean I don't have any
faith in the LA Times at all. M that goes way back, that
goes well. No them specifically,I have a real issue with. I
mean, during the Malibu Creek StatePark shootings is when I really started to

(52:58):
understand how manipulation did the media wasby politicians. And I was new to
this, like I had just becomelike that. I just become an investigative
reporter, like it was dropped inmy lap and it's like, here's the
job, you're going to do.It keep going. And then I really
learned how much they suppressed from thepublic. Or alright or outright published fault.

(53:23):
Yes, I mean, yes particularcase. In this particular case,
I myself have been through a giantfight with the La Times. I'm still
involved with one where they just theyprinted something that was flat out incorrect.
I went back to them and said, here's the here's the evidence that this
is flat out incorrect. And theirresponse to me was, well, I've

(53:43):
got a bigger bullhorn than yous togo screw yourself. And that is exactly
what happened the second Sheriffee and Hubbatook office and the whole Carl Mandoane thing.
So they had their plan of whatthey were going to put out and
why, and let me tell youhow a nip lit of The Times was,
Oh my goodness, gracious, Iknow a lot of stuff about that

(54:04):
Mandoian story, Okay, a lotof inside stuff, and to see how
they manipulated that story to work forthem, like he was just hiring back,
you know, a wife beater isjust so not what the story was,
and at some point that it'll comeout. But but it look if
they have somebody in their sights,no matter who it is, whether it's

(54:25):
Sheriffian Webb or somebody else they aregoing to twist, manipulate, and they
are not They are not truthful journalists. Okay, I'll give you another perfect
example. So, so the agendawhen when So the LA Times is very
much involved with the Board of Supervisors. I mean they're like just you know,

(54:49):
they're joined at the hip. Sothere was a recent article, I
think it was last week about adeputy that was just charged with the rape
Jackie Lacey's office. Did you seethat article? I did. Okay,
So Richard Winton, who's supposed tobe their crime reporter right anyway, Yeah,

(55:14):
and I dealt with him during MalibuCreek State Park shooting. So in
the beginning, he was like veryopen to me because I was a new
little source and he didn't think Iwas like gonna start printing the truth.
He thought that he yeah, hethought that he could wow you with his
professionalism and kind of keep you inline. Yes, yes, and then
he starts to see who the realCecy was and oops, now he doesn't

(55:36):
talk to me anymore. He followsme, but he doesn't talk to me
anyway. So so when that storycame out, you know, the people
who know that I have a relationshipwith the sheriff, and I know the
sheriff, and I know what's reallygoing on at the Sheriff's department. Sent
me this link and I hadn't evenseen it yet, and it what what
Winton tried to make it seem likewas that this deputy had just committed the

(56:00):
right um and did not explain thatthis happened under McDonald. Okay, that
it like, here's another foe.Sorry, here's another hope you can believe
that. Sorry, here's a here, here's another big, you know,

(56:22):
mistake made by deputy under sheriff youNueva. So I had to go back
and kind of clean that mess upbefore even though actually I didn't have to
do that. I I contacted thesheriff and I said, um, can
you put out a statement um thatclarifies what happened with this deputy. Well,

(56:44):
as it turned out, when thisdeputy um committed this act um the
second sheriff being it happened in Octoberto eighteen, So the second one sheriff
in Aueva got into office by January, he had all ready investigated the case
and sent it to the DA forprosecution. He was on it. Wow

(57:06):
and and Lacy. But you wouldn'tknow that. You wouldn't know that he
got in there, took the bullby the horns and made it happen okay,
and he will absolutely not have thatconduct inside his sheriff's department. So
what happened, Lacy sat on itfor two years, two years, didn't

(57:27):
do anything with it until she isjust about ready to bounce out of the
DA's office. And why, tome, they're just trying to continue to
make him look bad, to manipulatethe storyline too. It's there's there's just
examples of this all the time.Look at all the stuff that happened under
Jim McDonald. Did you ever seereally anything come out about him? No?

(57:50):
Of course, not right. Butthey know that this this member of
law enforcement is going to watch whatthey're doing, and if they're doing something
criminal, he's gonna handle it okay, and he's gonna make an example of
them. And they know that.Well, it's a good thing that they

(58:12):
are. And I mean, we'vecome to the time where we're gonna be
wrapping up this episode and there's obviouslyjust so much more corruption. Hopefully the
people that are not in Los Angelescan maybe start to understand why things are
so screwed up here. It's notjust the voters continuing to vote for the
same John because the information that thevoters get is just heavily controlled. But

(58:34):
can you tell us CC I giveus the websites and you're on Twitter handle
where people can find you. Yes, So if you want to follow more
public corruption at Metro when everywhere elsein La County, I can be found
on Twitter at ce ce s asin sam Woods Woods or at the Current

(59:00):
Report UM. I guess it wouldbe at t h E c U R
R NT Report UM and the CurrentReport dot com. Really just go there.
Awesome. Thank you so much forbeing with us today and I look
forward to having you back on whenyou have some more big stories about all

(59:21):
the corruption in Los Angeles. Alsoawesome and until next time everyone, Bye
bye. BFCB Radio Network, firstclass broadcasting worldwide
Advertise With Us

Popular Podcasts

Stuff You Should Know
My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark

My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark

My Favorite Murder is a true crime comedy podcast hosted by Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark. Each week, Karen and Georgia share compelling true crimes and hometown stories from friends and listeners. Since MFM launched in January of 2016, Karen and Georgia have shared their lifelong interest in true crime and have covered stories of infamous serial killers like the Night Stalker, mysterious cold cases, captivating cults, incredible survivor stories and important events from history like the Tulsa race massacre of 1921. My Favorite Murder is part of the Exactly Right podcast network that provides a platform for bold, creative voices to bring to life provocative, entertaining and relatable stories for audiences everywhere. The Exactly Right roster of podcasts covers a variety of topics including historic true crime, comedic interviews and news, science, pop culture and more. Podcasts on the network include Buried Bones with Kate Winkler Dawson and Paul Holes, That's Messed Up: An SVU Podcast, This Podcast Will Kill You, Bananas and more.

The Joe Rogan Experience

The Joe Rogan Experience

The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.

Music, radio and podcasts, all free. Listen online or download the iHeart App.

Connect

© 2025 iHeartMedia, Inc.