SF DA Publicly Criticizes Judges

by · Feb 12, 2025 6:45 pm

San Francisco DA Brooke Jenkins has been publicly criticizing judges there for excessively lenient sentences. Not surprisingly, she has been getting blowback for that. But it is an important public issue, worthy of public debate. Bob Egelko has this story in the SF Chronicle.

In one recent statement, Jenkins said, “The majority of (San Francisco) judges do not treat drug dealing as a serious crime despite repeat offenses, and the grave consequences visited upon our communities, and the drug dealers therefore do not fear incarceration, or any significant consequence.”

Here are a few specific cases of overly lenient sentences: Continue reading . . .

California Probation Dept. Unable to Supervise Violent Ex-Cons

by · Feb 11, 2025 2:38 pm

Fourteen years after Governor Jerry Brown signed AB 109, so called “Public Safety Realignment,” into law and began dumping ex-cons and thousands of new felons on county probation departments, LA County is no longer able to handle the volume of serious offenders. Louis Casiano of Fox News reports that the state Probation Chief recently sent an urgent request to the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services asking for an additional 150 police officers to take over supervision of both adult and juvenile offenders sentenced to probation, rather than jail or prison. Adding to the shortage of officers, on January 1 dozens of officers were suspended at the county’s Juvenile Hall due to alleged offenses.

Continue reading . . .

Counterman Follow-Up: Prosecuting Stalkers

by · Feb 7, 2025 4:00 pm

Two years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court decided in Counterman v. Colorado that if a stalker is prosecuted on the ground that his communications are threats, the prosecution must show a mental state of at least recklessness regarding the threatening nature of the communications. At the time, I thought it was unfortunate that the case went up as a “threats” case because there was a much better basis available. See this post. With stalkers, it is usually not so much the threatening content of the communication that is the problem, but rather the extreme persistence even after they have been told to buzz off. A long series of cases gives the government much more latitude to regulate the “time, place, and manner” of speech. The failure of the majority opinion to address this raised a danger that stalkers could get off when the case cannot be made that the speech amounts to a threat and the stalker knows or should know that.

Sure enough, this happened in Colorado, with the trial judge acquitting the stalker. But in Colorado the prosecution can ask the Court of Appeals to disapprove the trial court’s ruling for future cases, even though this perpetrator cannot be retried. Continue reading . . .

Sacramento DA Joins Fight to Block Early Releases of Violent Criminals

by · Feb 7, 2025 10:56 am

The Sacramento County District Attorney’s office has filed argument in support of a lawsuit brought by the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation to block the Newsom administration’s illegal early release of violent criminals from prison.

In 2017, Governor Jerry Brown authorized the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) to adopt new regulations increasing sentence reduction credits (called “good time” credits) for inmates that it determined had behaved well and participated in rehabilitation programs. The Governor believed that Proposition 57, adopted by voters a year earlier, empowered the CDCR to award these credits without limits in order to shorten the sentences of inmates. In 2021 Governor Gavin Newsom directed CDCR to increase the number of inmates eligible for credits and the number of credits awarded to further expedite early releases.

Continue reading . . .

As Crime Rises San Francisco Doubles Down on Sanctuary Policy

by · Feb 5, 2025 11:41 am

With the latest data showing that violent crime is increasing and property crime remains the highest of any California county, San Francisco leaders emphasized last week that it would continue to be a sanctuary city. Chase DiFeliciantonio, and Molly Burke of SF Gate report that at a rally last week,

“Officials including Mayor Daniel Lurie, City Attorney David Chiu, District Attorney Brooke Jenkins, union leaders and the entire Board of Supervisors took turns reiterating their commitment to San Francisco’s sanctuary policy, which restricts the city’s cooperation with federal immigration authorities. The policy is intended to afford people the confidence to interact with city police and other public safety agencies without fear of their immigration status being called into question.”

The rally, called by Service Employees International Union (SEIU) leader Olga Miranda, in response to an attempt by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents to enter a city government building with a warrant to arrest an illegal alien, either charged with a crime or with one or more prior criminal convictions.

Continue reading . . .

Bondi Nomination Moves Forward

by · Feb 3, 2025 5:21 pm

The U.S. Senate voted this evening to break the filibuster on the nomination of Pamela Bondi to be U.S. Attorney General. The vote was 52-46. Senators Graham and Fetterman did not vote. It is not clear whether they were present. Ms. Bondi should be confirmed when the substantive vote is taken.

Update: Pamela Bondi was confirmed as Attorney General on February 4 by a 54-46 vote.

Illegal Deported 10 Times Before Killing Girlfriend

by · Feb 3, 2025 3:30 pm

California’s sanctuary policy and Los Angeles County’s former soft-on-crime DA George Gascón enabled an illegal alien from El Salvador to murder his girlfriend in front of her 3-year-old daughter last month. Norma Riveiro and Lorena Bourdevaire-Casillas of NBC News San Diego report that police identified Herbert Nixon Flores as the person who shot 35-year-old Karen Ruiz in the Pacoima suburb of Los Angeles County on January 8. Flores had committed multiple crimes since entering California illegally in 1990, including drug trafficking, theft, illegal possession of firearms and identify theft. He had been deported 10 times. Flores was arrested last August for severely beating Ruiz, but under Gascón’s policy of not holding criminals charged with assault, he was released days after his arrest. Under California’s SB 54, a 2017 law called the California Trust Act, local police are forbidden from holding arrestees like Flores for deportation by federal authorities.

Continue reading . . .

Biden’s Commutations Hurt Crime Victims

by · Feb 3, 2025 10:34 am

Danielle Sassoon, interim U.S. attorney for New York, has this op-ed in the WSJ with the above title. The subhead is “Despite his claims, the former president ordered many violent offenders released.”

One senseless decision involved Raheem Davis, who was convicted in my district of narcotics trafficking in 2006, and also separately convicted for his role in a 2005 drug robbery where he opened fire, murdered one person, and permanently crippled another. While awaiting trial in the robbery case, Davis assaulted a corrections officer by repeatedly stabbing him in the head and neck with a shank. In imposing a lengthy sentence meant to incapacitate Davis, the judge described Davis as “out of control” and “violent” and warned that if “he’s out on the street, it is only a matter of time until more people die at his hands.” Davis will now be out of prison this year, rather than in 2043. Continue reading . . .

Alabama Murderer Faces February 6 Execution

by · Jan 28, 2025 3:41 pm

A Michigan man convicted of the 1991 rape, robbery and murder of 40-year-old Pauline Brown in her Birmingham, Alabama apartment is challenging his death sentence set for February 6. The facts presented at trial and multiple appeals indicate that on the night of November 27, 1991, Demetrius Frazier noticed a light on in Brown’s ground-floor apartment. He entered the apartment through a window and found $10 in cash. He then went to another room, where he found Brown asleep. After waking her up, Frazier demanded more money, and she gave him $80. Frazier then threatened her with a gun, and raped her as she begged for her life. When he was finished he shot her in the back of the head.  After confirming that nobody heard the shot, Frazier made sure that Brown was dead, searched the apartment for more money, ate two bananas and left, throwing his gun in a ditch. Ralph Chapoco of the Alabama Reflector reports that attorneys for Frazier are petitioning in Federal District Court for a stay of execution claiming that the state’s use of nitrogen gas will cause him to suffer, in violation of the Eighth Amendment bar against cruel and unusual punishment. If the execution is carried out, Frazier will be the fourth condemned murderer dispatched by nitrogen gas.  UPDATE:  Frazier’s execution was carried out without incident on the morning of February 6.

Continue reading . . .