November 17, 2022 02:12 PM UTC

New Aurora PD Chief: History of Misconduct and InfoWars Visits

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• by: Heidi Beedle

(Speechless in Aurora. CLICK HERE for more background — Promoted by Colorado Pols)

Aurora’s newly appointed interim police chief, Art Acevedo, in addition to recently being fired by the city of Miami, has a history of misconduct and was a frequent guest on InfoWars, founded by conspiracist Alex Jones, who was ordered by a Connecticut court last month to pay hundreds of millions to Sandy Hook families for falsely saying the 2012 school massacre was a hoax.

Acevedo began his career in law enforcement as part of the California Highway Patrol (CHP). In 2004 the Los Angeles Times reported that Acevedo “has been investigated recently for allegedly showing nude photographs of a fellow CHP officer to other high-ranking officers while on duty. Assistant Chief Art Acevedo is the subject of a $5-million civil claim involving the woman with whom he allegedly had an affair in 1995.”

According to the Times, claims filed with three state agencies alleged that Acevedo kept sexually explicit Polaroid photographs of the woman in the glove box of his state-issued car and showed them to other supervisors after the affair ended. Two CHP captains allegedly said Acevedo showed them the pictures, including one in which the woman is performing a sexual act on him. Acevedo denied showing the photos to other officers to the Sacramento Bee.

In 2007, Acevedo was hired as chief of the Austin Police Department. In 2016, the Austin American Statesman reported that Acevedo was “reprimanded, stripped of five days’ pay and warned his job is in jeopardy after his boss said he didn’t follow orders to stop discussing the controversial police shooting of an unarmed teen in February. At the center of the penalty against the chief, City Manager Marc Ott said Acevedo had been insubordinate.”

While serving as the Austin PD chief, Acevedo was a regular guest on Alex Jones’ InfoWars program. In October, Jones was ordered to pay nearly $1 billion in damages to families of victims of the Sandy Hook School shooting, for falsely claiming they were actors who staged the shooting as part of a government plot to seize Americans’ guns. Jones was recently ordered to pay an additional $473 million in punitive damages.

In November, 2016, Acevedo was hired as chief of the Houston Police Department. In January, 2019, Houston police executed a no-knock raid and killed two homeowners, Regina Nicholas and Dennis Tuttle. The raid was based on false information that the individuals were heroin dealers. Acevedo initially refused to publicly release an audit of the Houston PD’s narcotics division which “found policy violations due to ‘administrative errors committed by Narcotics case agents and supervisors,’ and found that officers didn’t follow policies related to ‘warrant services, operations planning, and handling of confidential informants,’” according to reporting from the Houston Chronicle.

Acevedo was hired by the Miami Police Department in March, 2021, but then fired in October, after claiming the “Cuban mafia” was running the police department.

Acevedo has been consulting with Aurora Police Department on its consent decree when the city asked if he would apply for the interim position. Aurora PD has come under scrutiny for a number of scandals, including multiple DUIs involving officers, both on- and off-duty, and claims of racist policing and inappropriate use of force. Last year, three Aurora PD officers were arrested for the 2019 death of Elijah McClain.