Supervisorial candidate Sarmiento’s family made their fortune with seedy bars

Santa Ana City Mayor Vince Sarmiento has taken to calling himself Vicente of late but have a look at his listing on the California State Bar Association and you will see his name is Vincent Flavio Sarmiento.

The sudden name change is part of Sarmiento’s attempt to refashion his image, which has included shifting hard to the left and embracing the Berniecrats – the most liberal wing of the Democratic Party.

Sarmiento has been on the Santa Ana City Council for 15 years, dating back to 2007. It is fair to ask what exactly Sarmiento has accomplished during those many years on the City Council? The City of Santa Ana is awash with homeless drug users and gangs continue to engage in drive by shootings and worse.

You also must ask how much of that crime is Sarmiento himself responsible for? While his family has tried to hide their ownership of various seedy bars in town, that is how Sarmiento has accrued his wealth. The bars include:

• El Carnaval Nightclub
• El Festival Hall
• Casa Del Rey
• El Nuevo Corral Night Club
• Club 500
• The Cave Sports Bar
• La Cabaña Bar
• Los Cristales
• El Stagecoach

Let’s take a look at the crime that happened around El Carnaval Nightclub this year from April to May:

The criminal incidents around El Carnaval included numerous assaults, a DUI, disturbing the peace, fights and burglaries. The DUI happened right at El Carnaval. All that took place in the Artesia Pilar Neighborhood.

Here is the crime that took place around El Festival, also form April to May:

Same deal – numerous disturbing the peace incidents, drug violations, vandalism, theft, and a vehicle theft too.

Here is one more – crime around El Nuevo Corral Bar from April to May:

Same deal – numerous disturbing the peace incidents, robberies, burglaries, thefts and a weapons charge.

Look up any of these bars on crimemapping.com and all you will find is crime, crime and more crime, courtesy of the Sarmiento family!

No wonder Sarmiento has positioned himself against the Santa Ana police, but don’t forget that when push came to shove he voted for the huge pay increase for those police.

Remember that Sarmiento is trying to position himself as the champion of the poor and the immigrants. But what does all that alcohol do to these folks?

According to a study in 2014:

• 43 percent of first-generation immigrants struggled with alcohol abuse
• 86 percent of second-generation immigrants reported alcohol abuse

Alcohol abuses can also escalate or fuel an already violent person – increasing domestic violence in particular, in a city awash with such crimes.

As if all that was not bad enough Sarmiento is now making money by peddling himself as a marijuana attorney, to cities throughout Southern California.

What can marijuana use do to undocumented immigrants? If a non-citizen admits to an immigration official that he or she has ever possessed marijuana, the person can face very serious immigration problems – if he or she applies for a green card, applies for U.S. citizenship, travels outside the United States, or ICE just questions them on the street. This is true even if the person never was convicted of a crime, just used marijuana at home, and it was permitted under state law.

Marijuana also has a lot of negative health effects. And homicides have generally increased in pro-marijuana jurisdictions. In Denver, the homicide rate has steadily climbed from 36 in 2013 to a peak of 67 in 2018. Seattle had 19 homicides in 2013, then the rate increased every year except 2016, reaching a peak in 2018 of 31 cases. Even the District of Columbia has experienced a resurgence of violence — reaching 160 homicides in 2018 after seeing a historically low 116 homicide cases in 2017. Though too early in the year to make a meaningful projection, homicides spiked more than 100 percent in January 2019, as compared with January 2018.

To summarize, Sarmiento has been on the City Council since 2007 and has done nothing to improve his ward or our city. His family peddles massive quantities of alcohol to our poorest residents, increasing crime in our city. And now Sarmiento is out there pushing for more marijuana sales in Southern California, affecting public health and driving an increase in violent crime as well.

Don’t be fooled by Sarmiento’s massaged image. This is not the man we should be electing as our next Orange County Supervisor!

Art Pedroza Editor

Our Editor, Art Pedroza, worked at the O.C. Register and the OC Weekly and studied journalism at CSUF and UCI. He has lived in Santa Ana for over 30 years and has served on several city and county commissions. When he is not writing or editing Pedroza specializes in risk control and occupational safety. He also teaches part time at Cerritos College and CSUF. Pedroza has an MBA from Keller University.

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