In Riverside, California, residents are beginning to grow tired of the amount of homelessness that is taking over the city and impacting the surrounding businesses and employees by driving customers away. From 2022 to 2023, the population of the unhoused has increased an overall 12 percent throughout Riverside County.

When working her morning shift at Bakers in August 2021, Arianna Roybal was approached by a homeless man during her shift and then assaulted her by trying to drag her into the restroom. She luckily fought him off and then called the police who then located and arrested the suspect. Although the authorities helped with her specific situation, the homeless people continue to roam around, and she has to always be on high alert.

“I was always on the lookout and more protective over my little sisters. I had no sense of ease or relief whenever we’re out doing anything because there’s homeless everywhere… It took me awhile to be able to go out on my own like just to the store or to run errands,” Roybal states as she explains how the situation has impacted her life socially.

With a majority of the homeless population struggling with substance abuse or mental illness, they are at higher risk of becoming a danger to either themselves or, unfortunately, a risk to the public. Another business that had struggled with being in a center that the unhoused had decided to reside in.

I spoke with Annalize Ortega who had previously worked at May’s Flowers, a local flower shop, and she told us that because of the homeless surrounding the business, customers were always complaining to her or her coworkers about how unsafe it felt to even just walk through the entrance. There were times where they would come in to harass the workers.

“Homeless would even come into the store and yell at us workers… sometimes we would have homeless outside the store nude from the waist down,” shared Ortega. “We did have to call the police a few times unfortunately because we didn’t have security in the plaza that we worked in.”

Just four miles west of May’s Flowers, we have the Galleria at Tyler, which is more likely known as Tyler Mall where Bryan Salazar was working for Zumiez located inside the mall. When asked to describe how the homeless effected his day on the clock, he said he was affected greatly because it would cause a strain on his abilities to complete his daily tasks.

“Having homeless people in the store made store operations difficult… I had a lot of daily tasks to do throughout the day and often and had to pause because there would be homeless people either disrupting customers or attempting to steal,” Salazar states. “Some would be on drugs and make people uncomfortable,” he adds. With these occurrences happening three to four times a week, security would be called but nothing ever was done to prevent it from happening again.

With how high the homeless population has increased from the last reported count, it is becoming rather more difficult for businesses to continue operating as normal. Some residents find it difficult to continue their daily routine without fearing of what could possibly happen when it comes to homeless people invading the spaces where businesses reside and must continue day to day operations.

According to News Channel 3, in January of 2025, the channel covered the homeless count of 2025 which results are still pending for and spoke to Chief Andy Mills of Palm Springs Police Department, where he discussed the three potential outcomes when it comes to living on the streets.

“If you are going to live on the street you have three choices. You can use the navigation center or some other housing,” states Chief Mills. “Option number two is your welcomed to go home and we’ll help you get there to wherever you’re from… The third option is jail,” He adds.

When I asked my interviewees if there were any suggestions for improvement, Salazar and Roybal both believed that criminalizing the use of drugs in public the same way public intoxication with alcohol is criminalized could potentially be a solution to the ongoing problem.

The post Residents of Riverside County Frustrated with Homeless Population appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

The amount of drugs seized included 376 pounds of methamphetamine, 1.4 kilograms of cocaine, 37.4 pounds of fentanyl and 600,000 fentanyl tablets with the potential to provide  ingredients for nearly 10 million lethal doses and were worth an estimated $16 million. 

The news does not end there. These drugs were part of a Mexican cartel trafficking operation and the investigation also resulted in the arrest of 15 people. Unfortunately, the arrests included that of an allegedly corrupt Riverside County Sheriff’s deputy. 

Details of the deputy’s involvement were passed to the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department which led to the deputy’s arrest with 104 pounds of fentanyl pills in his possession.

Although Riverside County Sheriff Bianco may spin the story and point to the deputy’s arrest as proof his department is cleaning house, it begs a question regarding why the deputy was operating as a corrections officer in the first place, especially with all the attention placed on the department with the spike in incustody deaths in Riverside jails in 2022, where drug overdoses played a major role as recorded in a Black Voice News in a special report released in January. 

No matter how you slice it, ongoing reports about the antics of Riverside County deputies is bad and getting worse. 

When news broke of this most recent arrest of another Riverside County deputy for their role in illegal activities, it appeared as just another day in an agency that more and more seems rife with malfeasance.  Has the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department become a team of lawless, law enforcement officers who are currently being led by a sheriff with questionable performance as the county’s top law enforcement leader?

I am not challenging what Bianco’s capabilities were as a deputy, etc. while he worked his way up the law enforcement ladder before running for sheriff. We have no way of knowing how he performed as a corrections officer at the Robert Presley Detention Center or while on patrol or working narcotics in the City of Lake Elsinore. Nor can I criticize his performance in his various administrative positions, supervisory or management roles over the years. 

What I will say, however, is that since pinning on the badge of county sheriff, Bianco’s ability to effectively lead an agency with oversight responsibility tor five jail facilities, six court buildings, a civil bureau, the Coroner’s Bureau, Public Administrator’s Office, nearly 20  contract cities, about 4,000 employees and an operating budget of nearly a billion dollars, again and again his leadership acumen is called into question. 

Bianco has remained a lightning rod since he took office in 2019, sparked by a laundry list of curious mishaps that include everything from having to be ordered by a judge during the peak of the COVID-19 crisis to protect people in custody in Riverside County jails to refusing the state vaccine mandate for Sheriff Department employees to having to defend his membership in the now, seditious conspiracy, involved Oath Keepers  to being investigated by the CA Attorney General for alleged Civil Rights violations—the list of his questionable actions has continued to expand.

The infamous list above does not include what appears to be rampant lawlessness by Riverside County sheriff deputies on his watch. 

We can begin by recalling that last September, seven women who had spent time in a Riverside County jail filed federal cases against Riverside County that alleged liability for sexual abuse admitted by correctional deputy, Christian Heidecker, who pleaded guilty to 11 felonies Feb. 23, and was sentenced to five years in prison.  

Also, last September, two Riverside County deputies were arrested and charged with drug possession — Brent Bishop Turnwall, 22, and Jorge Oceguera-Rocha, 25. Although neither were accused of distribution drugs in the jails, Turnwall was arrested while at work at Cois M. Byrd Detention Center. He was charged with being under the influence. 

That same month, another deputy, Oceguera-Rocha, a corrections officer at Larry D. Smith Correctional Facility, was charged with possession of narcotics for sale and transporting it for sale. At the time of his arrest, he purportedly had about 100 pounds of packaged fentanyl pills in his vehicle. 

During an interview with Black Voice News last year, Bianco spoke about the 2022 increase in drug overdoses in the jails stating, “There is a market to purposely smuggle drugs into jail,” he said, claiming that people get arrested so they can bring drugs into the facilities. “They swallow it, they insert it, they’re underneath their fingernails, their toenails. They do everything they can to try and get it in, and unfortunately, sometimes they make it.”

Bianco also acknowledged that the deaths were unfortunate and then went on to say, “but it certainly wasn’t at the hands of our deputies.”  Well, maybe not, but who can say with certainty, because one thing we know for sure is that some of his deputies/corrections officers do not appear to have clean hands.

As rumors began to surface that Bianco is now considering a bid for governor, it leaves one to wonder whether or not this man has any self awareness. Why would we consider electing someone like him to serve as governor when he continues to demonstrate the limits of his leadership skills and abilities to lead the Sheriff’s Department? 

We can not wait to see whether rumors of his run for governor come true. We should act now to spread the word regarding his short comings. This is important because his campaign is certain to be well funded by police unions and other like minded individuals. 

For this reason, it is important that we educate our family, friends and neighbors about the works of Bianco and deputies under his stewardship, so that when, and if, a Bianco campaign for governor is launched, they are well informed and do not believe the hype that is certain to come. 

Of course, this is just my opinion. I’m keeping it real.

The post Keeping it Real: A Culture of Lawlessness in Riverside County Sheriff’s Department appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.