Does the Public Want Criminal Justice to Become More Lenient?
In a word, no. This is the unambiguous finding of a new Gallup poll featured on Sentencing Law and Policy. But of course the spin is very different.
Court: Brutal Murderer Cannot be Tried as Adult
A unanimous panel of California’s First District Court of Appeal has ruled that a murderer who stabbed a woman 38 times and tried to burn her body cannot be tried in adult court. Evidence introduced at a pretrial hearing indicates On July 16, 2018, 17-year-old Kevin P. visited the apartment of 38-year-old Kishana Harley allegedly to smoke marijuana with her. Once inside, he produced a knife and stabbed the woman to death. He then tried to burn the woman’s body, before taking her cell phone and her car. The defendant’s DNA was found on the murder weapon along with the victim’s blood.
Defunding the Police, Minneapolis Edition
While, as Mike notes, other cities are making ready to defund their police, Minneapolis has a head start. Here are the results, as reported by none other than the Washington Post. Its headline is, “Minneapolis violence surges as police officers leave department in droves.” The story underneath the headline doesn’t get any better; instead, it gets considerably worse. Continue reading . . .
LA Begins Defunding Police
Bowing to the police reform movement spurred by Black Lives Matter, the City of Los Angeles has announced its plans for cutting $150 million from its police department. Joel Fox has this piece in California Political Review detailing what cuts will be made. Among them will be a reduction of roughly 400 officers, cuts in air support (helicopters), robbery homicide, narcotics and gang divisions. Desks at police stations will only be staffed on weekdays. Investigations of automobile accidents will end, and those involved will be required to report them online. This includes accidents with injuries.
The Biden Plan for Criminal Justice
In her piece in today’s City Journal , Manhattan Institute scholar Heather MacDonald breaks down the Biden/Harris plan for reforming criminal justice. She notes that the plan reads like a “Black Lives Matter wish list.” Items on the list include re-instituting the Obama era requirement that police departments under consent decrees report weekly to a federal judge justifying that their efforts to enforce the law are not racist. Under Biden/Harris the requirement also extends to the charging decisions of District Attorneys. The goal is to “strip police officers and prosecutors of their discretion regarding whom to arrest and whom and how to charge.”
The End for Court Packing and Defunding the Police
In the wake of last week’s election, Republicans currently have 50 Senate seats and Democrats have 48. Depending on the results of two special elections to be held in Georgia on January 5, Democrats could conceivably get to a 50-50 tie, with VP-elect Harris holding the tie-breaking vote. That could mean the passage of radical measures such as defunding the police or packing the federal courts, in particular the Supreme Court. But we now know that, regardless of the outcome of the special elections, those things will not be happening in the upcoming Congress.
Severability
Severability is a question that comes up regularly in criminal cases. If one provision of a law is unconstitutional, should the whole law be declared void? In my view, the correct answer is nearly always no. Some years back, the New York Court of Appeals effectively abolished the death penalty in that state with a non-severability holding that, in my view, was clearly wrong.
Today’s Supreme Court arguments in the Obamacare cases, Texas v. California, No. 19-1019 and California v. Texas, No. 19-840, have nothing to do with criminal law, but they may produce an important precedent on severability. Continue reading . . .
CA Law Makes Serial Rapist Eligible for Parole
A serial rapist who sexually assaulted five young women in the Southern California community of Del Mar in the 1990s will be eligible for parole next year. Teri Figueroa of the Los Angeles Times reports that although Robert Rustad was sentenced to 326-years-to-life for the assaults, because he was under 23-years-old when the committed the crimes, he will eligible for parole after serving first 25 years of his sentence in 2021. The law in question, SB 394 was signed by Governor Jerry Brown in 2017. That same year, Brown signed another law (AB 1308) which raised a defendant’s age to 25 when the crimes were committed to be eligible.
Pardoning at the End of a President’s Term
With Joe Biden’s now having won the election, the question arises whether and how President Trump will exercise his pardon power as his term comes to an end. Presidents traditionally issue many if not most of their pardons at that time, thus — very unfortunately in my view — avoiding political accountability for them. One reason this is so bad is that political accountability is the only kind there is. Pardons cannot be reviewed or changed by either of the other branches of government.
Buying the Los Angeles District Attorney
While there are still several hundred thousand votes yet to be counted, it appears that former San Francisco District Attorney George Gascón has defeated incumbent Jackie Lacey in the race for Los Angeles County District Attorney. Last year, Gascón resigned his post in San Francisco supposedly to take care of his mother in Los Angeles, then almost immediately announced he would challenge Lacey. His record in San Francisco had been abysmal. The city became the property crime capitol of America last year, and homicides increased dramatically under Gascón’s progressive anti-law enforcement leadership. Even ultra-liberal SF Mayor London Breed endorsed Lacey. Yet Gascón won the LA vote by a margin of 7.5%. How did this happen?
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