Apparently Santa Ana Police Department Chief Paul Walters called voters, using a robo-call service, this week to warn them about mayoral candidate Alfredo Amezcua.

Amezcua and his Usual Suspect acolytes promptly came unglued.  Here is what Amezcua posted on his Facebook account:

The Santa Ana mayor has forced the police chief to make vicious, false allegations about me in a robo call. The mayor is again abusing public resources and trust to promote his interests – not ours. In a city with the worst crime rate in Orange County, our police chief should be working on improving public safety instead of being forced into a smear campaign by a desperate career politician fearful of losing his job.

Amezcua’s publicist forwarded this note to Usual Suspect Debbie McEwen, who is known for having been sued by the ACLU after she erected illegal traffic barriers in her French Park Neighborhood, to keep Mexicans out.  McEwen then posted it on the fading Santa Ana Citizens Yahoogroup.

Walters has good reason to warn voters about Amezcua.  Walters is dedicated to fighting crime in Santa Ana.  Amezcua represents the very worst criminals in our city, as a criminal defense lawyer.  He has actively pursued the worst cases, representing drug dealers, members of the Mexican Mafia, gang members, killers and rapists.  Amezcua also has allegedly received 19 traffic tickets, and as his own attorney he played games with the court records, changing his name from one ticket to the next, presumably to avoid messing up his driving record.

That Amezcua would react by maligning Chief Walters says a lot about him.  I guess he doesn’t know that Walters and his department received the U.S. Secretary of Defense Employer Support Freedom Award in 2009, according to a post by Sean Mill in the Orange Juice blog.  You can see Walters being congratulated by President Obama in the picture above this post.

Chief Walters graduated from Santiago High School in Garden Grove, CA. He attended Orange Coast College before his four-year (1966-1970) tour of duty with the United States Air Force during the Vietnam War. He was nominated for Airman of the Year in 1967.

While raising a family and working full time as a police officer, he attended night school and earned a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Criminal Justice from California State University Fullerton (CSUF), a Masters of Public Administration from the University of Southern California (USC) and a Doctor of Jurisprudence from American College of Law. He is also a graduate of the California Command College Class II and the Senior Management Institute for Police (SMIP) Class IV, Police Executive Research Forum (PERF), Washington D.C.

As a national innovator and leader in policing, he has trained and assisted numerous police executives and elected officials throughout the country on how to implement revolutionary policing strategies in their respective communities.  He has been recognized many times by the California Attorney General, the Governor of California and both the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate for his accomplishments.

He is currently on the Board of Directors for the California Police Chiefs’ Association and serves on the finance and political action committees.  He has been President and Secretary/Treasurer of the Orange County Chiefs and Sheriff’s Association.  The Santa Ana Police Department has been recognized since 1997 as a DOJ National Demonstration Site and Training Center for Community Policing and Problem Solving.

Click here to read more about Walter’s accomplishments, which are many.