NOW WILL JUDGE DAVID SANCHEZ RESIGN?

By Juan Montoya

Anywhere else, if you knew that your name was among those targeted by the federal government  investigating judicial and prosecutorial misconduct and corruption in the local courts, the honorable thing would be to resign.
The logic of shame goes thus: Why  subject yourself, your family and your relatives and friends to the ordeal of public scrutiny and verguenza when you know the proof is there if not to convict you, then to besmirch nay kind of reputation you might have built up over the years as a practicing attorney, and now a judge?
But this is not anywhere. This is Cameron County. This is where lawyers, judges and former prosecutors bite the bullet and hunker down stubbornly until they are dragged away from their positions kicking and screaming.
Last January we published a post on this blog that 444th District Judge David Sanchez might resign over his connections to disgrace former 404th District Judge Abel Limas and indicted DA Armando Villalobos. It didn't happen then, but the wheels of the gods do, indeed, grind slowly.
The first to resign over his role in the nefarious goings on  in the judicial wing of the Cameron County judicial wing was 357th District Judge Leonel Alejandro for being "friendly" to Limas and convicted Austin attorney Marc Rosenthal. Befoer the whole bushel of dirty laundry was aired, Alejandro stepped down.
Not so Sanchez, the brother of would-be county judge and current Pct. 4 commissioner Dan Sanchez.
But, as usual, the Valley Morning Star's Emma Perez-Treviño, digging through the cesspool of federal indictments and supplements, uncovered the germ of alleged misconduct attributed to the judge.

According to federal prosecutors (and Emma's reporting), "Villalobos hired Justin Ramos, a campaign worker who he had known in political circles, to work in the DA’s office in the spring of 2005, and had DA investigator Joe Lopez, who now is a city commissioner in Rio Hondo, issue Ramos an investigator’s badge.
Ramos, according to public records, was prevented from carrying a firearm as a result of a criminal record.
Federal prosecutors say Ramos made two cash payments to Villalobos totaling $3,000 to $4,000 to have charges against him resolved or reduced. One case was dismissed, and Ramos received probation in the other case.Prosecutors further allege that Villalobos prepared the necessary documents, or had them prepared, to expunge Ramos’ conviction, and arranged 'directly through the clerk’s office to have the expungement petition land in Abel Limas’ court,” according to court records.
Villalobos also appointed Sanchez, a practicing lawyer at the time, as a special prosecutor to handle the case.
“Ramos met with Limas in chambers, and Limas agreed to sign off on the expungement as long as state officials did not ‘fight it,’” prosecutors state.
“Ramos paid Sanchez $1,000 directly so Sanchez would not contest the expungement as special prosecutor,” federal prosecutors allege, adding that Ramos paid Villalobos $3,000 to facilitate the process for the expungement.
Prosecutors also state that Ramos used drug trafficking money to pay Sanchez and Villalobos, and Ramos would testify that Villalobos knew Ramos was involved in drug trafficking while Ramos was employed by the District Attorney’s Office.
“State officials in Austin objected to the effort to expunge Ramos’ conviction, and the effort eventually failed,” federal prosecutors state.
The prosecutors further noted that Ramos would testify that Villalobos told him they both could make money by referring civil and criminal cases to Lucio."
Well, there you have it. Ramos will testify that Sanchez took $1,000 in drug money and agreed with Villalobos not to contest the expungement of Ramos' cases while entrusted by the state to fulfill his duties to the public as special prosecutor.