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Santa Cruz, CA: Keepin' It Real? "Big Joe" Netro and Steve Schlicht Partner Up for Hate

by Peter Green
In Santa Cruz, the latest hate blog masquerading as a public safety blog is "Santa Cruz, CA: Keepin' It Real". Published on Facebook and Twitter, the blog has gradually been gaining followers since its founding in 2017 by an individual writing anonymously under the pen name "Big Joe 77". Big Joe 77's real name is Joe Netro, and he's a self-described "cop" retired from working 26 years as a correctional officer at Soledad state prison. The blog features reposted crime reports local to the Santa Cruz area, as well as regular "court watch" features in which Netro publishes information gathered from criminal court records. Netro also physically shows up to various defendants' court dates in Santa Cruz Superior Court. Recently, Netro has joined Take Back Santa Cruz member Steve Schlicht's "Santa Mierda Podcast Network", appearing on multiple podcasts.
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Netro, whose full name is Joseph H. Netro, is a homeowner in Santa Cruz who volunteers with the Santa Cruz Police Department. He served as a member of the 2016-17 Santa Cruz County Grand Jury, which issued a controversial, and some say biased, report critical of the county's Syringe Services Program.

Netro's court "reporting" is one-sided and extremely biased. He rarely (or never) reports on the legal arguments put forward by defendants and/or their attorneys. Many of his court reports begin with the same introduction:

"In the Criminal Justice System the people are represented by two separate, yet equally important groups. The police who investigate crime and the District Attorneys who prosecute the offenders. These are their stories."

When describing defendants generally, Netro has written that "no one is innocent", and he often chastises defendants for exercising their legal rights. "This shitbird fired his court appointed attorney today. Only in America", Netro wrote about one defendant.

When quoting court records and police reports, Netro often adds the mantra, "These are the facts. And they are undisputed."

When reporting about some individuals appearing in court, Netro titles the post, "Taking out the Garbage: In Court this Week".

Netro also advocates for long prison sentences. He believes defendants should receive the maximum allowable sentences in all cases. Netro believes that mass incarceration achieved through systemic maximum sentencing will solve what he perceives to be many of society's problems.

Netro has been accused of inaccurate reporting and outright defamation multiple times by readers of his blog.

Netro's blog is also a place were hate is fomented; Netro routinely creates bigoted posts that are overtly anti-homeless. He has created a number of racist posts, and the vigilante and/or violent comments made by his readers are left to remain on his sites. Netro openly refuses to remove hate comments.

Readers have left the following comments on photos Netro posted to his blog:

- "Someone should clean this place up. Brooms, shovels, baseball bats" (Comment made about the Heroes Camp)
- "Let the people take [care] of these two fucks. Long boat ride no more problem" (Comment left on a photo of a person accused of a crime)
- "I hope this guy meets an armed citizen that puts him where he belongs....in the ground" (Comment left on a photo of a person accused of a crime)

On Joe Netro's personal Facebook page, one of his friends asked a question about why "transients" couldn't be forcibly "transferred" back to their "place of origin".

Netro responded by posting a picture of a prison work camp, adding "this would work better".

In January, members of the San Lorenzo Valley/Scotts Valley Coalition Against Racism called out Netro for a racist post that has since been removed from the Santa Cruz, CA: Keepin' It Real blog.

In a post titled "Same Guy?", Netro posted photos of two individuals side by side and asked readers if they thought they were the "same guy". One photo was a booking photo of a person currently under probation for an ID theft conviction, and the other photo was of an unknown person being sought by Santa Cruz Police for allegedly placing a skimming device on a local ATM machine.

Readers took issue with the fact that the two individuals looked nothing like each other, and additionally the person in the booking photo was a person of color. Many accused Netro of racism.

One reader called Netro's post, "racial profiling at its best".

Another individual left a poor rating in the reviews section of Netro's blog, adding:

"We don’t need a hateful vigilante targeting people of color and falsely accusing people based solely off their past criminal record and his ignorant hunch of them committing future crimes. Bringing up Public Safety Committee Member criminal past (Drew Glover) as an attempt to slander his name and character is a all time low, coincidentally a person of color too. This coward and racist hides behind the alias name Big Joe 77."

Netro eventually removed the post, replacing it with a thank you note to those who played along with his comparison game by taking guesses.

Netro has been accused of racism on social media for other questionable blog posts.

When Netro posted a photo of Santa Cruz City Council Members Chris Krohn and Drew Glover titled "Dumb and Dumber", one individual commented, "Wow, what a non helpful and rather racist post I would say. Hating people who have different experiences than you is not really a point." Council Member Glover, who is one of the first African Americans ever elected to the Santa Cruz City Council, has faced repeated vicious attacks on his character by Joe Netro and Steve Schlicht, and conversely their followers.

Since 2016, Netro has been personally promoting social media posts from the "Santa Mierda" page, which is an anti-homeless/crime blog that is penned anonymously by Steve Schlicht of Take Back Santa Cruz, using the name "Ben Dover". Mierda is Spanish for "shit" and the blog takes the view that daily life is shitty in Santa Cruz in large part due to homeless people. More recently, Netro has appeared on the Santa Mierda podcast, "Unfiltered", as well as other productions of the "Santa Mierda Podcast Network".

The Santa Mierda blog has been called a "rabid anti-homeless website" by one homeless advocate in Santa Cruz, and a hate blog by others. Besides being a member of Take Back Santa Cruz, Steve Schlicht is also one of the group's web designers. Schlicht and Take Back Santa Cruz have been associated with two other hate websites that were created anonymously to wage defamatory personal attacks against local homeless advocates.

Schlicht served for a short period of time on the Santa Cruz Public Safety Task Force, which was a public commission in the City of Santa Cruz. Schlicht is probably best known locally for the statement he made during his time on the task force that he was "fine with junkies dying", which became a public scandal reported on by Indybay and the Santa Cruz Weekly.

Netro's partnership with Steve Schlicht appears to be an effort by the two of them to amplify their voices, which often times relies on for support only a small group of friends within the Take Back Santa Cruz circle. Time will tell what the partnership between Netro and Schlicht will fully entail; both individuals create highly discriminatory and sometimes racist posts to support their extreme political agendas.

Another partnership visible on the "Santa Cruz, CA: Keepin' It Real" blog is between Netro and other individuals who have worked in California's prison system.

Netro created a podcast on the Santa Mierda Podcast Network with Melissa Freebairn, a nurse currently employed at Soledad state prison who is also a resident of Santa Cruz. Freebairn shares some of Netro's discriminatory views in relation to the politics of crime and homelessness in Santa Cruz. Their podcast together was critical of the Syringe Services Program, a commonly addressed topic for both of them.

Other prison employees can be seen commenting on Netro's blog, including Frank Wong, who describes himself as a Correctional Lieutenant at the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

On Facebook, Joe Netro is connected to a number of Take Back Santa Cruz members, as well as two conservative former city council candidates Ashley Scontriano and Paige Concannon (both Republicans). Concannon is a regular commenter on Netro's blog, sometimes using both of her screen names on Facebook to praise him.

Netro publicly rejected the politics of Rochelle Noroyan during the 2018 election.

As far as partisan politics goes, Netro calls himself a "lifelong Democrat". He endorsed and voted for a Republican for a seat in the state assembly in 2018, however.
§Joe Netro aka Big Joe 77
by Peter Green
big_joe_77_netro_santa_cruz_ca_keepin_it_real.jpg
Photo: Excerpt from Santa Cruz Police Department Volunteers group photo
http://santacruzpolice.blogspot.com/2018/09/we-are-looking-for-volunteers.html
§Joe Netro aka Big Joe 77
by Peter Green
joe_netro-big-joe-77_santa_cruz_ca_keepin_it_real.jpg
Photo: Excerpt from 2016-7 Santa Cruz County Grand Jury group photo
http://www.co.santa-cruz.ca.us/Portals/0/County/GrandJury/GJ2017_final/FinalReport2016-17.pdf
§Discriminatory Court Watch
by Peter Green
sm_discriminatory_court-watch_santa-cruz.jpg
§Heroes Camp Anti-Homeless Reference
by Peter Green
joe_netro_heroes_camp_bums_homeless_ross_camp_santa_cruz.jpg
§Work camps for homeless people?
by Peter Green
sm_joe-netro-homeless-work-camp-santa-cruz-ca-keepin-it-real.jpg
§"Same Guy?" Post
by Peter Green
sm_same_guy.jpg
sm_santa-cruz-ca-keepin-it-real-slander-libel-defamation-joe-netro-racism.jpg
sm_santa-cruz-ca-keepin-it-real-joe-netro-racism.jpg
§"False accusations and slander"
by Peter Green
sm_santa-cruz-ca-keepin-it-real-slander-libel-defamation-joe-netro.jpg
§"Our" Weekly Dump
by Peter Green
sm_joe_netro_santa_cruz_ca_keepin_it_real_santa_mierda_weekly_dump_steve_schlicht.jpg
§Vigilante Comment from Reader Left to Remain
by Peter Green
sm_rob-gunrunner-santa-cruz-ca-keepin-it-real-vigilante.jpg
§Vigilante Comment from Reader Left to Remain
by Peter Green
sm_john-green-vigilante-joe-netro-santa-cruz-ca-keepin-it-real-big-77.jpg
§Vigilante Comment from Reader Left to Remain
by Peter Green
sm_vigilante_santa_cruz.jpg
§Vigilante Comment from Reader Left to Remain
by Peter Green
sm_santa-cruz-vigilante.jpg
§Rejection of Richelle Noroyan's Candidacy
by Peter Green
sm_joe-netro-richelle-noroyan-santa-cruz-ca-keepin-it-real-big-77.jpg
sm_joe_netro-big_joe_77-santa-cruz-ca-keepin-it-real-melissa-freebairn.jpg
Joe Netro Promotes Himself, Melissa Freebairn, and Santa Mierda in the Third Person
§Yes for Concannon/No on Noroyan
by Peter Green
sm_joe_netro_paige_concannon_richelle_noroyan_big_joe_77_rkeepin_eal_santa_cruz.jpg
Another Republican (Paige Concannon) Joe Netro has endorsed for office.
§Netro References Strip-Searching an Inmate at Soledad
by Peter Green
sm_joe-netro-soledad-prison-cdcr-ctf-strip-search-big-joe-77-santa-cruz-keepin-it-real.jpg
"I once caught an inmate at CTF smuggling garlic cloves concealed in his butt cheeks. I let him go with it, and didn’t tell his cellie."
§SCPD Investigating Officer’s Racial Facebook Comment
by Lauren Hepler, Good Times
Officer Chris Galli first drew attention for a January post on a conservative Facebook page called “Santa Cruz, CA: Keepin’ It Real” when screenshots of his commentary about an African-American resident of the homeless encampment behind the Ross department store were published on left-leaning news site Indybay. In the exchange, Galli, posting as “Chris Meriekuh,” referred to camp resident and unofficial spokesman Michael Sweatt as, “Good ‘ol dindunuffin Mr. Sweatt”—a phrase used on Reddit and elsewhere after the 2014 Ferguson police brutality protests to mock African-American people who deny committing crimes.

“Yes, it has been brought to my attention, and we have initiated an Internal Affairs investigation into the matter,” Santa Cruz Police Chief Andrew Mills tells GT. “I can’t comment on the personnel investigation, but I can tell you that we take all those matters seriously.”

The investigation comes as local online political groups, a microcosm of a chaotic national political environment, continue to splinter into increasingly insular corners of the Internet. If and how local law enforcement or other employers will respond to the polarizing rhetoric is the question now confronting Mills and his department.

The “Santa Cruz, CA: Keepin’ It Real” Facebook page is billed as “a humble attempt to make sense of the chaos that is daily life in the city of Santa Cruz.” It consists mostly of detailed crime and court reports compiled by moderator “Big Joe 77,” plus Law & Order-inspired slideshows of mugshots and often-vitriolic comments about people accused of crimes. City spending on homeless services is a frequent target of posters who call Santa Cruz and its elected officials a “shitshow,” and sometimes bestow a “Jackass of the Day” award.

...

As Humboldt County media reported in 2017, Mills took issue with a Humboldt Bay firefighter wearing a “Black Lives Matter” pin on his uniform, though Mills was captured in a photo wearing a “Police Lives Matter” bracelet while on duty.

read more:
sm_big-joe-netro_santa-cruz-keepin-it-real--good-times-comment.jpg
"Jim's comment should be considered. There are those, like the goodtimes, that wish to do harm."
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Joe Netro made another cannibalism reference today, along with a wish of death for a person accused of a crime:

"Chrissy Brown sorry I didn't get back to you earlier. I mentioned to my wife yesterday that there could only be two things Minson wanted to drag that kid back to the Ross Camp: pimp him out or eat him. I'm grateful niether happened. Now I want justice, not plea bargains. I want Minson in a f'n cage for the next 8+ years...or dead."
§Joe Netro aka Big Joe 77
by Peter Green
joe-netro_big-joe-77_santa-cruz-ca-keepin-it-real_soledad-prison-guard.jpg
Photo: Excerpt from Santa Cruz Police Department Volunteers group photo posted by Chief Andrew Mills
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=2182344568452790&set=a.155716017782332&type=3
§Joe Netro aka Big Joe 77
by Peter Green
big-joe-77-joe-netro-santa-cruz-ca-keepin-it-real-hate-blog.jpg
Photo: Netro speaking during the pubic comment period at the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors Meeting on May 14, 2019.

Video (Netro is the first speaker during the Public Comment period): https://santacruzcountyca.iqm2.com/Citizens/SplitView.aspx?Mode=Video&MeetingID=1718&MinutesID=1893&FileFormat=doc&Format=Minutes&MediaFileFormat=mpeg4
§Vigilante Comment from Reader Left to Remain
by Peter Green
sm_john-gollot-big-joe-77-netro-santa-cruz-ca-keepin-it-real.jpg
"There's a solution about 9mm in diameter"

Comment from May 2019
sm_police-chief-andrew-mills-joe-netro-big-joe-77-santa-cruz-ca-keepin-it-real.jpg
Chief Mills disregards the hate speech. He is a friend of Joe Netro's, as well an attentive reader of the Santa Cruz Ca: Keepin' It Real hate blog.

This comment by the Chief of Police was made on the hate blog in May of 2019.
sm_joe-netro---soledad_prison_wood-------racist-prison-slang-----big-joe-77_santa-mierda_santa-cruz-ca-keepin-it-real.jpg
Joe Netro often makes personal attacks and creates harassing posts that are politically motivated. In this comment left on the Santa Mierda hate-blog in June of 2019, Joe Netro uses the racist prison slang term "woods" to taunt an activist facing criminal charges in the judicial system in Santa Cruz. Wood can be used as a general term for a white prisoner, but some Nazi and white supremacist gangs also use the term to describe themselves. As a former Soledad prison guard, Netro often seems to approve of, and even gloat about, the harsh and torturous conditions endured by inmates in prison facilities.
§Homophobic/Discriminatory Statement
by Peter Green
sm_big-joe-netro-77-santa-cruz-ca-keepin-it-real-pitchin-catchin-soledad-prison-guard-slang.jpg
In support of the Santa Cruz recall, Joe Netro states, "in prison, it was called 'pitchin & catchin'," when speaking about Progressive Santa Cruz City Councilmembers Chris Krohn and Drew Glover.
§Joe Netro In Support of Harsh Sentencing
by Peter Green
sm_jacqueline-hopp-big-joe-netro-77-santa-cruz-ca-keepin-it-real-manditory-jail-rehab.jpg
Joe Netro left the comment "give them a choice: complete rehab or spend 6mos to a year in jail" on a post on his hate blog from June 25, 2019 about a woman who was arrested for possession of a meth pipe (and nothing else). Netro believes possession of meth pipe deserves this sentence.
§Joe Netro and Police Culture
by Peter Green
sm_big-joe-netro-77-country-wave-thin-blue-line-santa-cruz-ca-keepin-it-real-police-scpd.jpg
As a prison guard at Soledad, Netro was part of police culture and he refers to himself as a "cop".

In this quote from 2019 on the Santa Cruz Police Facebook page, Netro advocates for people to give a "country wave" to "our thin blue line" when they see police in public.
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