Journalists’ Roundtable: Judd’s sentencing and other political issues

It’s Friday, which means it’s time for another edition of Journalists’ Roundtable. This week, we were joined by Mary Jo Pitzl of “The Arizona Republic” and azcentral.com, Jim Small of The Arizona Mirror and Camryn Sanchez of KJZZ Radio.

This week’s Journalists’ Roundtable topics included:

• Peggy Judd sentencing
• Arrest in Democrat office shooting
• HighGround poll: Trump, Gallego lead
• Trump, Biden, Clinton visit Arizona
• Water regulations in Willcox?

Peggy Judd sentencing

Mary Jo Pitzl: “Peggy Judd is one of the newest entrants into the probation world. She’s one of the three members of the Cochise County Board of Supervisors, and she’s made headlines because in 2022 after the election, she balked at certifying the election results, saying they needed more information. That brought on a lawsuit against her and another supervisor, Tom Crosby, and ultimately they were forced to certify the election results, but the case was pursued against her and Crosby, and she took the plea. The plea knocked the felony down to a misdemeanor, but that’s still probation.”

Camryn Sanchez: “And so now it’s her, and the question is, will her fellow Republican supervisor Tom Crosby also want to take a plea deal at some point. It’s not clear. I think his attorney made it clear that they didn’t want to apologize, but you can still take a plea deal.”

Arrest in Democrat office shooting

Pitzl: “His name is Jeff Kelly, and he lives in Ahwatukee, and apparently he has a reputation for making his own hand painted signs. What he did earlier this week is he made some new signs, nailed them up to palm trees, which apparently, I’m told, has been his practice in the past. He lines them with razor blades, like the kind that you would put into a box cutter, and attached these little baggies of a white substance, powdery substance, you know, with some warnings saying, ‘You don’t want to breathe too deeply around here.’ He was also taking pot shots at a Democratic field office in Tempe around three times.”

Jim Small: “What the police said is that they believe that he was planning a mass casualty event, that this is someone who is being charged with terrorism charges right now, and that’s not related to those signs. It’s all related to the shooting. They found 120 guns, 250,000 rounds of ammunition in his house and a grenade launcher.”