watchpaul: Appalling

Tuesday, January 08, 2008

Appalling

Regarding the Child Abuse Services Team (CAST) statistics, Paul Gallegos asks in the email below '...why do we keep the stats we keep?..."

On the one hand, this is a clear example of why the Grand Jury (2004-2005) reported that it" is the unfortunate truth that the D.A. exhibits a limited understanding of how things are done in the department"

After five years in office, you'd think he'd know the answer to this question.

On the other hand, those stats are a HUGE embarrassment for him, and you can bet he'd rather they not be kept. Remember the last time the CAST stats were revealed, the data showed an alarming and precipitous decline in the number of CAST cases filed since Paul Gallegos took office. Things didn't get any better after Gallegos removed Maggie Flemming, the competent, qualified Senior DDA he had assigned to CAST and gave those responsibilities to Jeffrey "yougofree.com" Schwartz. Not only appointed Schwartz to head it up but paid him extra for it...

There are alot of questions Gallegos could be asking - about how to repair the CAST program that he has all but dismantled.

I realize the stats are embarrassing, BUT Gallegos should be figuring out how to fix the program, not how to hide the stats.

-----Original Message-----
From: Gallegos, Paul [mailto: PGallegos@co.humboldt.ca.us]
Sent: Friday, January 04, 2008 9:04 AM
To: Lewis, Melinda; Aaron Starcher; Angela Sundberg; BIG LAGOON
RANCHERIA; BLUE LAKE RANCHERIA; Bob Kane; Cassie Burgess (E-mail);
Cavinta, George; Chief TPD Ken Thrailkill; Crandall, Phillip; Damiano,
Bill; Daniel Pratt, Karuk Tribe; Dave Gunderson, Chief BLPD; Dave
Parris, Chief Yurok PD; Donna Johnson; Duncan, Jeannie; Eads, Stacey J;
Ed Guyer, Sgt. HVTPD; Fewell, Deana (June); Gomes, Jean; Graham Hill,
Chief RDPD; Heather Landreneaux; Hislop, Michael; Honsal, William; Howe,
Karla; Jean LaPietra; Jennifer Roberts; Jennifer Rose; Karen Cahill;
Kevin Lawson; Kris Kitna, Chief FoPD; Lewis, Beverly Morgan; Lonnie
Lawson, Chief FePD; Lynne Soderberg; Maryann Hayes Mariani; Moser,
Joyce; Neel, Kelly; Neil Hubbard, Detective EPD; Nord, Ben; Officer
Richardson, FoPD; Philp, Gary; Randy Mendosa; Rasines, Doug; Shoshani,
Michele; Steve Volow; Tom Chapman, Captain APD; Tom Dewey, Chief HSUPD;
Wendy Morris; Wheeler, Donna; William Hostler, Chief HVTPD
Cc: Neel, Kelly; Honsal, William
Subject: RE: CAST meeting agenda items?

I have a question I would like put on the agenda, why do we keep the stats we keep? What is the purpose? What is the goal? Is it something that came from another agency? I am curious what it is we are trying to measure or track.

Paul V. Gallegos
District Attorney

Office of the District Attorney, Humboldt County
825 Fifth Street
Eureka, CA 95501
(707) 445-7411
Fax: (707) 445-7416

The information contained in this email message is intended for the CONFIDENTIAL use of the addressees only. The information is protected under the attorney-client privilege and the work-product privilege. Recipients should not file copies of this email with publicly accessible documents. If you are not an addressee or an authorized agent responsible for delivering this email to a designated addressee, and you have received this email in error, THEN ANY FURTHER REVIEW, DISSEMINATION, DISTRIBUTION, COPYING OR FORWARDING of this email is STRICTLY PROHIBITED. If you receive this email in error, please notify the office of the Humboldt County District Attorney immediately at (707) 445-7411. Thank you in advance for your courtesy and cooperation in this matter.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Lewis, Melinda
> Sent: Friday, January 04, 2008 8:26 AM
> To: Aaron Starcher; Angela Sundberg; BIG LAGOON RANCHERIA; BLUE LAKE
RANCHERIA; Bob Kane; Cassie Burgess (E-mail); Cavinta, George; Chief TPD
Ken Thrailkill; Crandall, Phillip; Damiano, Bill; Daniel Pratt, Karuk
Tribe; Dave Gunderson, Chief BLPD; Dave Parris, Chief Yurok PD; Donna
Johnson; Duncan, Jeannie; Eads, Stacey J; Ed Guyer, Sgt. HVTPD; Fewell,
Deana (June); Gallegos, Paul; Gomes, Jean; Graham Hill, Chief RDPD;
Heather Landreneaux; Hislop, Michael; Honsal, William; Howe, Karla; Jean
LaPietra; Jennifer Roberts; Jennifer Rose; Karen Cahill; Kevin Lawson;
Kris Kitna, Chief FoPD; Lewis, Beverly Morgan; Lewis, Melinda; Lonnie
Lawson, Chief FePD; Lynne Soderberg; Maryann Hayes Mariani; Moser,
Joyce; Neel, Kelly; Neil Hubbard, Detective EPD; Nord, Ben; Officer
Richardson, FoPD; Philp, Gary; Randy Mendosa; Rasines, Doug; Shoshani,
Michele; Steve Volow; Tom Chapman, Captain APD; Tom Dewey, Chief HSUPD;
Wendy Morris; Wheeler, Donna; William Hostler, Chief HVTPD
> Subject: CAST meeting agenda items?
>
> If anyone has anything they want added to the agenda for next week's meeting, please let me know.
>
> Thank you,
> Melinda Lewis
> CAST Office Coordinator
***

I can answer this one for ya, Paul. The stats are kept so that any granting agency can know whether the terms of their grants are being met. The stats are kept so that we, the public, can know if we are getting our money's worth and, in this case, so that we can know the extent to which you are failing the children of Humboldt County.

Related:
ER - Former deputy DA speaks out
Be sure to look at the statistics chart
ER - Candidates spar over child abuse team
ER - DA's Office yet to respond to request for child abuse records
ER - CAST established with child victims in mind
ER - CAST needs support Gallegos is not providing
A matter of priorities
Paul Gallegos - Paying More for Less re: Schwartz January 2, 2007
PUBLIC RECORDS ACT REQUEST re: CAST May 8, 2007
In addition I have filed Public Records Act Requests for the CAST agendas. minutes and attendance sheets - Gallegos claims such documents are "evidentiary" in nature and therefore refuses to release them.

9 comments:

Anonymous1/09/2008 7:59 AM
And where, pray tell, are the stats and the other documents requested oh so long ago, once deemed confidential and since then apparently lost in night and fog?
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Wollf Howlsatmoon1/09/2008 8:05 AM
It's quite simply a shame that the Office of District Attorney, the Office which is instituted to uphold the Rights of the Law abiding Citizenry is a Political office.

The prime mandate for the elected official then becomes assuring that he will have a job in the next term.

I'm not even speaking of Gallegos here. It's the same Bravo Sierra all over.

Should be a two year, appointed position.....keep Justice for the Citizenry as the P.D., and keep the careerists out of it.

Just sayin'......
Wollf
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Rose1/09/2008 10:35 AM
Well, the previous DA served for 17 years. He had his share of detractors, as any elected official does, but nothing along the lines of what we have here. Whether you liked Terry farmer or not, he built a dynamite team of prosecutors which have almost all been lost, fired, or driven off by Gallegos... he put together programs like CAST and Victim Witness which were models for the State and made sure they worked to better serve victims of crime.

None of that can be said about this abject failure, Paul Gallegos. There is not one single thing that he has done to improve the office.
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Anonymous1/09/2008 11:04 AM
Well....Schwartz is gone. But not by Paul's doing....that we know of....
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Anonymous1/09/2008 8:22 PM
His job "performance" is malpractice at best, criminal at worst.
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Anonymous1/11/2008 8:07 AM
we conclude the State’s evidence, even if credited, would not justify its
prevailing at trial. Further, we conclude the State has failed to prove, on its third try, a
reasonable possibility that the operative pleading’s defect can be cured by amendment.
(Blank, supra, 39 Cal.3d at p. 318.) THAT'S APPELLATE COURT FOR "YOU SIR, ARE A MORON".
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Anonymous1/11/2008 3:30 PM
I can imagine this thought bubble above Gallegos's head as he wrote this email: "These statistics are really, really inconvenient for my political career because people then have empirical evidence of how badly this office is doing, and that doesn't really jibe with my 'Crime Figher' slogan. So....unless anybody can come up with a really compelling reason otherwise, I think I'll just quit keeping records of my terrible track record, so that people like that annoying Rose can't request them anymore. No statistics, no proof of incompetence...problem solved."
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Anonymous1/12/2008 2:04 PM
Ok, but what happened to the CAST minutes, etc. Let's see what led up to this mess. The claim that these items were "investigatory" is rubbish. Investigatory means the investigation is ongoing. Which, given the state of CAST, is
more than mildly amusing. Moreover, you just blank out the names of the active cases. It's not investigatory to see what agencies were participating, whether the DA's CAST people were attending, what issues were being discussed, what problems resolved.
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Rose1/12/2008 2:18 PM
I agree, and I have been remiss in resubmitting my request. Agendas, minutes and attendance are not investigatory no matter how broadly a prosecutor is allowed to define that.

The point was to find out if Gallegos or Schwartz attended ANY of the meetings.

They obviously do NOT want us to know the answer. That alone speaks volumes.

I do intend to refile. I hesitated because doing so most likely means litigation, and I HATE, HATE, HATE litigation.

But - sometimes, even I have to admit it is necessary.

The law is clear, he will (the County will) have to pay all of my attorney's fees on this one.

I am working on my request.

It's time to end this charade.
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Paul Gallegos

The Humboldt County Grand Jury found that "Weak leadership and poor managerial practices" have undermined the office... Implicit in all evidence gathered by the Grand Jury - including interviews with the D.A. (Paul Gallegos) - is the unfortunate truth that the D.A. (Paul Gallegos) exhibits a limited understanding of how things are done in the department" Gallegos "lacks the global perspective needed to keep the department operating efficiently," and quotes an unnamed staff member as saying, "The D.A. (Paul Gallegos) does not fully understand the functionality of many of the things we do here" - Years later, in his own words: "I’m not an administrator, they didn’t elect me to be an administrator, they elected me to make sure this office runs..."

Douglas & Zanotti

CASE TOSSED The district attorney misrepresented the law and failed to provide evidence of former Eureka Police Chief David Douglas' and Lt. Tony Zanotti's innocence during a criminal grand jury inquiry into the 2006 shooting death of Cheri Lyn Moore, defense attorneys argued in court documents filed Thursday... ”Our judicial system stands as a real and necessary check on the grand jury indictment process,” one of the documents states. “This court has the authority and the means by which to halt this prosecution, which is justified neither by the undisputed facts, nor by the law.”

Gallegos has taken what was "arguably the state's best small DA's office, with a cutting edge CAST program that "trained the trainers"... into a bunch of time serving bureaucratic wannabee brown nosers, lightly sprinkled with a couple of earnest learners who are sure to split as soon as possible.

One weeps for Max Cardoza who won Angellel, and for Maggie Fleming who won so many impossible victories. Mired in Humboldt for personal reasons, they have to suffer the ignominy of working for Paul, with Yougo, yes, yougo who has freed more people as a prosecutor than he did as a defense attorney. As has Paul. Anonymous comment

Gallegos has answers for everything. I’ve never met anyone whose answers came so quickly, with such polish - except about his law school(s). He likely sounded the same way when promising to get prosecutors off their anachronistic “at will” status and onto civil service status. It never happened. Indeed, he told them, “Disloyalty will not be tolerated” – a real morale builder.

He sounds great. What progressive doesn’t want to believe in him? But it’s a myth. He’s an intellectual lightweight and self-aggrandizer who tries to please everybody with glib answers. Jim Fahey for The Arcata Eye

The Humboldt County DA's office is one of the most exciting prosecutorial
offices in California.

Its District Attorney, Paul Gallegos, is willing to charge anyone who commits
wrongdoing--no matter how wealthy, sacrosanct, or ruthless. He believes in total equality before the law. He also plans to be innovative in promoting programs of prevention and treatment. He wants to make it the best prosecutorial office of its size in the nation.... Gallegos' Help Wanted ad

Gallegos' OWN Quotes

★ ...District Attorney Paul Gallegos said he believes the statute of limitations clock, even on misdemeanors, doesn't start running until law enforcement knows or reasonably should have known of the offense. In this case, Gallegos said, that means the statute of limitations would not run out at least until Feb. 8, 2009, or one year after Gundersen's arrest and the discovery of the photographs in question...

★ "...some people actually molest out of different feelings, some times out of feelings of love....” DA Gallegos explaining why Child Abuse prosecutions were down

★ “I never said that the information was not available under the Freedom of Information Act. Quite the contrary, I informed you that our use of force policy is not a public record.” Paul Gallegos to the Times Standard 5/25/07

★ ...“One is that I do everything to make people happy which means I don’t stand for anything except for just something,” he said. “The other is I stand for something and I try to be a leader and take some people, a group of people, a community someplace and I say guess what folks, this is who I am. I stand for your beliefs. We share these beliefs or we don’t. You get the option to judge that. This is who I am and I am committed to leading us this place, wherever it is...." Eureka Reporter Gallegos defends record, looks ahead 7/3/2005

★ Note the difference between what he SAID, and what he DOES..."...So what are these issues? Top on Gallegos' list is the proliferation of "garbage cases," small-time crimes and overcharged cases that he said are clogging up the court system.

Garbage cases, said Gallegos, come in two forms: Cases that would lose if actually brought to trial and cases that are overcharged for the crimes committed. The idea behind filing both kinds of garbage, he said, is to get the defendant to plead guilty, netting a conviction without having to go into court.

Again, the IRONY is astounding! Look at what he SAYS, and then think about what he DOES! "Probably 95 percent of the cases that are filed plead guilty. In fact, there are a lot of cases that are filed on the assumption they will plead guilty, because of the time and expense involved in defending them. But these cases shouldn't even be filed in the first place, because if they were challenged, they would lose," Gallegos said. Better yet: If they weren't filed at all, it would save the county time and money...." North Coast Journal 2/21/02 Too bad he didn't take his own advice.

★ “Tim’s a stud,” he said. “He really is; anyone would be stoked to have him.” Gallegos on his second in command right hand man Assistant District Attorney Tim Stoen. (Former second in command right hand man to Jim Jones/People's Temple.)

NOTE:

"Helping Crush Progressivism" - ie: exposing the predatory litigious orgs and those who seek power for power's sake.... The original purpose of watchpaul is to post important documents relating to Humboldt County District Attorney Paul Gallegos and his handlers who seek to gain power through the acquisition of political offices. This includes, but is not limited to, the manipulations of "Humboldt Watershed Council," "EPIC," "Baykeeper," and other activist groups - the unregulated orgs. It also includes the master manipulators, such as Richard Salzman and Ken Miller.

Links to key stories and documents are also included in the sidebar, so that you do not have to try to scroll back through what has become a lengthy series of posts. I encourage you to use the Search and Labels features as well.

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Tuesday, January 08, 2008

Appalling

9 comments: