AWOL MAGISTRATE (PADILLA) STILL MILKING THE COUNTY

By Juan Montoya
Sometime back, a relative a a U.S. Customs agent was stopped by the Texas Department of Public Safety (los zorillos) near La Feria after he was clocked a few miles above the speed limit as he hurried back home to Brownsville from his job near Edinburg.
When the state trooper had him roll down his window he caught a whiff of the unmistakable odor of burning cannabis.
The DPS troopers forgive nothing, not even a small pipe full of pot and the twentysomething-year-old was led in handcuffs to the Rucker-Carrizales Detention Center in Olmito and charged with simple possession.
When his relatives learned that he was awaiting arraignment at the jail and that since it was Saturday and the Labor Day holiday long weekend approached, it might be until Tuesday that a magistrate would be available to set bond on him. With him scheduled to show up for work, they were desperate to have him released. Not showing up could have meant his firing once his boss found out that he had been busted with pot, even if he was a first offender.
Alas, no bondsman (though they have the magistrates' cell phone numbers) could get hold of either one of them  (Adolfo E. Cordova and Alfredo Padilla) so that the defendant could be released to await his trial on the possession charges.
In desperation, through their law enforcement contacts, they turned to Cameron County Sheriff Omar Lucio to see if he could help.
But not even Lucio could get hold of them and he had his staff try to get hold of a justice of the peace to set bond.
Fortunately for the young man, one of them (former JP Erin Garcia) did answer and drove from South Padre Island to set bond on the man.
Remember our post on the sweet deal that the two magistrates out at Rucker-Carrizales have worked out so that they rotate so they can spend the minimum amount of time at the calaboose and yet rack in an hourly rate of more than $425 per hour?
At the princely sum of $42,500 a piece for a grand total of  $85,000 a year for both, their hourly rate based upon the actual time when they punch in and out, taxpayers are [paying the two more like $426 per hour.
And that's not all. Not only do these two magistrates (Adolfo E. Cordova and Alfredo Padilla) punch in as little as seven minutes a day (Padilla, April 13) but they also apparently worked out a system where both of them don't have to be there at the same time. On a day when Padilla shows up to do the heavy lifting, Cordova didn't show. Vice versa, when Cordova showed up, Padilla didn't. Pretty sweet, uh?
In fact, both are paid full-time and end up working 26 weeks of the 52 annually.
When Cordova was confronted with this evidence, he complained to the commissioners that since he was on call during the time when he wasn't at Rucker-Carrizales, he was "sacrificing on his golf game and his fishing" to answer the calls.
It gets sweeter.
Padilla and Cordova are also working as attorneys, the magistrate gig is something they do on the side.
In the case of Padilla, during the hearing on county employees salaries, it was revealed that since January to the end of August, 2014, he had racked $41,427 in ad litem fees, payments made to attorneys assigned by judges to represent indigent defendants.
And a cursory look at the printout presented to commissioners indicates that when he comes to the table, he serves himself well. On at least six dates during that time span, he racked up as many as six ad litem assignments in the courts in one day.
 On May 13, for example, he received checks for his six assignments of $205, $3,536, $150, $1,100, $210, and $430. That's $5,631 for one day's work.
On another day, June 28, he drew a sweet $4,295.
This July 26, a midsummer's day dream, he got $7,843 to handle five ad litem cases.
Cordova, not as hungry as his counterpart, has only garnered $1,000 in such fees since 2012.
So on top of the $425 per hour that Padilla is racking up as a magistrate, he is also cleaning up on the ad litem appointments. No wonder he wasn't available this weekend to do a simple arraignment that would take a few minutes at most. Regardless of the defendant's innocence or guilt, he could have lost his job, suffered acute embarrassment with his family and friends, and cost the taxpayers extra if he had stayed in jail until the errant magistrates deigned to return to do their jobs and set bond on him.
Today, when commissioners had the item of the magistrates' pay on their agenda, neither of the gents showed up to explain their side gigs or tell their side of the story. However, commissioners did question Chief Deputy Gus Reyna on the subject and Reyna (somewhat on the curt side) simply said: "They never show up."
Well, will the commissioners' court do anything under the new Pete Sepulveda administrtion?