Is it ignorance? No, "they" (the cowardly anonymous blogger pretending to be more than one) refer to the ◼ brain drain under Paul, but neglect to mention the secondary effect - because of the chaos of his office, Paul Gallegos was unable to replace the top-notch, experienced prosecutors (also known as Deputy DAs) that he "lost, fired, or drove away." The few he was able to hire were over-worked and had no mentoring to speak of. Attorneys and prosecutors throughout the state knew better than to apply here, and those that did often said "the guy with the moustache (Wes Keat) was cool, but that other guy (Gallegos) was one weird dude."
TE's referring to the fact that some of Paul's hires have decided to leave the DAs Office now, and inferring (pretending it's a question) that maybe Maggie Fleming is no better than Paul.
Nice try. It's certainly fair to ask the question, "Why are they leaving?" BUT...
That Office was in a shambles. No one reported it beyond the first Grand Jury report that identified the problems, but it continued to degrade every year since that report came out. Only in the last election was it acknowledged, once it was no longer necessary to protect the baby DA Gallegos, when EVERY SINGLE CANDIDATE in the race was talking about it. It was finally admitted that it was so bad it was going to take more than 4 years to fix it.
The problems go beyond staffing, but filling the vacancies alone is a herculean task. And, it was a given that some of Paul's hires were not going to make it.
Discussing the DAs Office without admitting to the history is both ignorant and laughable.
And, I say again, if you are going to go after someone, you owe it to them to USE YOUR NAME, stand behind your words.
◼ Chiv also responds, in more detail: Let's shed some facts on the latest NCJ article about the sexually violent predator and Tuluwat's recent post questioning the current DA administration
What they're referencing:
◼ Free and Afraid: A flawed system, a prosecutor's error and a man who fears he will harm children again - North Coast Journal
◼ Kelly Neel leaving DA's office to work for Public Defender - John Chiv/Words Worth
◼ Deputy District Attorney Jason Sheets leaving Humboldt County District Attorney's office - John Chiv/Words Worth
◼ DDA Luke Brownfield to leave DA's Office
◼ Former DA Candidate Moves On - North Coast Journal
UPDATE:
◼ Newly hired DDA joins the Humboldt County District Attorney's office
...Dave Christensen.... has 11 years of experience as a prosecutor in his 20-year career, including work in the Inyo County and San Joaquin County DA’s offices as well as in Idaho. He will be assigned a felony caseload...
But Maggie went out of her way to be fairly non-critical of Paul during the election. She would merely say it is a young office and the DA's office needs a manager and not a trial attorney (Firpo said the same thing). Now she is apparently about to launch into the 2nd biggest (and definitely longest case) that the office has, because she has nobody to try the case, Jason Warren. Kelly Neel could probably have tried Warren. Doubt anybody else. It was Dollison and Klein who roundly criticized Paul during the election. They finished 3rd and 4th. So what does that tell you? Why hasn't Maggie hired lots more folks? The office has less attorneys now than when she took over (lost 4, hired 3). She has funding from Measure Z to hire 13 positions (granted they might not all be attorneys). She needs every last one of those positions, but is inexplicably dragging her feet. During the election she claimed she needed only 2 more. She is holding on to her retired buddies who violate the law if they work more than half a day. Maybe that is how that molester, SVP case got botched. The DA's office; an improvement, sure, but tiny and very incremental, and who would not be an improvement over Paul?
ReplyDelete"And who would not be an improvement over Paul?" That's the key question. And she definitely needs more than 2, I disagreed with that comment during the election also. We'll see. But there is no one else in that office qualified to handle the Warren case.
ReplyDeleteLook - Paul made a big deal out of the fact that he would try cases PLUS be DA whoo-hoo. As you can now see, that is a given, and should be expected from ANY DA. He didn't deserve all the praise Salzman threw his way over that.
You just have to hope that the rest of the state gets the message - it's safe to come back here, or, it's getting better and getting full-staffed will make it much better. Right now, with so few, the case-load is so high, it's likely people are still shying away.
Like I said all along, the damage is much worse than has been said, reporters have ignored it almost entirely. Kevin Hoover is the notable exception, he saw it early on, and did cover it.
It's still much worse than anyone stated during the election, it's nearly impossible to fix it. It would have been possible 4 years prior. Much harder now.
Actually hired 5. The funding just came through in June. You are in the know, which somewhat as a court insider you are but you don't get how politics, taxes and funding works.
ReplyDeleteMaybe she is taking her time. Should she follow the lead of Paul's hires. To you quantity seems quality.
She didnt lose 4, all 4 left for other jobs. Do you really want to shed light on why people left, assuming you know. Could be many reasons, private reasons.
You clearly have a bias in this case. I may even know you. The SVP case, if one is to assume NCJ got the whole story was a paperwork snafu.
I find it amusing in 12 years of Paul's watch, there wasn't such concern for the community and child molestors.
Paul's record and association harmed Elan. The Warren case would not be dragging 3 years Paul had a clue how to prosecute or lead.
One more point: Isaac and Keat can work half time. If they go over certain number of PAID hours, they lose some pension-ish thing... someone else can clarify, but they CAN volunteer time. There's nothing ILLEGAL about either.
ReplyDelete