I wonder if that’s a bulletproof kefi

Last week, I told you about how Steven Seagal would be teaming up with Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio to train “a posse” on how to respond to school shootings. This was of obvious interest to us, because the idea of an overweight zen master who Joe Arpaio once allowed to ride in a tank to bust up an alleged cockfighting ring, which resulted in the arrest of one sleeping Mexican dude and the death of 115 chickens and a puppy, training others how to respond during a real crisis, is easily the worst idea that anyone has ever had, and anyone who thinks it’s a good one should never be allowed near a gun or a child and should probably be sterilized. But comedy and tragedy are kissing cousins, so now let us put away our earnest reservations to laugh at Steven Seagal and his dumb scarf.

Seagal, a burly martial arts expert turned actor, guided 48 volunteers through various aspects of responding to a shooting, including room-to-room searches, and critiqued their work.

“I am here to try to teach the posse firearms and martial arts to try to help them learn how to respond quicker and help protect our children,” Seagal said.

Arpaio’s volunteers, some trained and qualified to carry the same guns as deputies, can intervene if there is an imminent threat to life. To add realism to the training event, guns firing non-lethal rounds that leave a color mark were used.

Or, to put it another way, Steven Seagal showed up and they shot each other with paintball guns while people cheered. Do they do bachelor parties? That sounds fun.

Arpaio’s 3,450-strong posse of unpaid men and women has for years helped the sheriff target drunken drivers and illegal immigrants, and chase down fathers who are behind on child support.

Last year, Arpaio sent posse members to Hawaii to investigate the authenticity of Obama’s birth certificate at the request of local Tea Party activists, a key Arpaio constituency. [Reuters]

Well I feel safer knowing there are 3500 Arizona birthers armed to the teeth ready to shoot anything brown, don’t you? Arizona is like Florida’s unemployed cousin who orders knives out of the back of Soldier of Fortune.

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Joe Arpaio, the Maricopa County (Arizona) Sheriff who somehow still has a job, is teaming up with his best buddy Steven Seagal to train a posse of first responders to deal with school shootings. Arpaio and Seagal are an almost too-perfect team for such a task, considering the last time they first responded to something, they brought four armored vehicles and an actual goddamned tank to break up a supposed cockfighting ring that turned out to be one dude named Jesus. He was home alone when the SWAT team burst in and killed 115 of his chickens and shot a puppy. So will Seagal and Arpaio be training responders in the art of puppy killing? This is like the Three Stooges if the consequences were real and Mo was a molesty, 300-pound Zen master in a bulletproof kimono.

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio is planning a training exercise aimed at helping his volunteer posse members respond to school shootings.
Arpaio’s exercise Saturday at a closed school site in suburban Fountain Hills will simulate scenarios for posse members who volunteered for patrols that the sheriff launched last month just outside schools to guard against shootings.
Action-film star and posse member Steven Seagal will serve as an instructor at the event.
The sheriff hopes to have as many as 400 posse members and another 100 volunteers known as reserve deputies participate in the patrols.
Officers will portray gunmen during the training, while 25 teenagers will play the part of students.
Non-lethal projectile guns will be used in the exercise. [ABC15 via BAD]

Any idiot who lets Steven Seagal shoot him with a beanbag rifle deserves what he gets. I just hope Joe Arpaio is there to take over for Seagal when training those folks in the ever-important keeping-track-of-space-and-time element of first responding. With his famous inability to keep track of space and time, I like to imagine Steven Seagal getting a 911 call and then showing up to prehistoric Eurasia saying “I heard there’s been a shooting,” to a giant lizard.

“Listen, lizard, I know the truth about who killed the dinosaurs, but I’m not here to talk about that.”

Back in March, I told you about how Steven Seagal (filming for Steven Seagal: Lawman) was on hand for a raid in which Arizona police brought the SWAT team, four armored vehicles, and a tank (in which Seagal was riding) to break up a suspected cockfighting ring. If it seems like a slight case of overkill, call it a rare lapse in good judgment for the department who deputized an overweight former actor with a unique physiological reaction to arousal who can’t keep track of space and time. At the time, Seagal told local news, “Animal cruelty is one of my pet peeves.”

Well sure. I bet it’s right up there with mortality and light mayo. Unfortunately, the raid was a disaster. The suspect, Jesus Sanchez Llovera, was home alone and unarmed at the time, and 115 chickens had to be euthanized on the spot (whether by front kick or otherwise, it’s still unclear). Now Sanchez says he’s innocent, and that he was only raising the chickens for show (mm hmm, show chickens, sure, buddy). He claims his 11-month-old puppy was shot and killed during the raid, and wants $100,000 from Seagal and the Maricopa County Sheriff’s department run by Joe Arpaio.

The notice of claim is the first step towards a lawsuit — and Jesus’ lawyer tells us his client is demanding $100,000 for the damage and he wants Seagal to issue a “formal written apology” to his children “for the death of their 11-month old puppy, a beloved family pet.” [TMZ]

New York Post-ready headline? STEVEN SEAGAL KILLS JESUS’S PUPPY. Eat your heart out, Chuck Norris facts.