Los Angeles County District Attorney
I want to address some policy changes that we are making in our office, which made the news earlier this week. I want to reaffirm my commitment to the core values I expressed when I took office. We do not believe that children should be tried as adults. We should treat kids like kids and give them every opportunity to grow and change. We also do not believe people should be sentenced to death in prison. People change and evolve – most often, for the better. For too long, our system operated without recognizing this fact, ignoring entirely the capacity people have for change. We must restore that underlying value into our justice system. While we maintain our commitment to these principles and will continue working to improve our system, there are some cases and situations that require a different response. We have made some adjustments to our policies to account for these exceptions.
Like every responsible office, we learn as we go, take feedback from the community, and make necessary adjustments based on our experiences and the complex nature of this work. That is the responsible way to govern. I have always been open to learning and growing in this work. When I started in policing 40 years ago, I believed that arresting and jailing people would bring us safety. However after several decades of work, it was clear to me that we needed a more nuanced approach. The same is true now. While I remain committed to the core values of our policies, I have seen a small number of cases that presented real challenges. As a result, we are making minor adjustments to our policies on juveniles and LWOP to allow for exceptions in the most extraordinary of cases.
Specifically, we learned a lot from the Hannah Tubbs case about the need for a policy safety valve. Rather than the usual case where a child is arrested close in time to their crime, police arrested Ms. Tubbs at 26 for a crime she committed as a juvenile. Ms. Tubbs had several charges in other counties after the juvenile offense but never received any services, which both her past behavior and that subsequent to her arrest demonstrates she clearly needs. After her sentencing in our case, I became aware of extremely troubling statements she made about her case, the resolution of it and the young girl that she harmed.
Unfortunately, our juvenile system in its current iteration does not provide adequate support to help someone at 26 with this level of challenges except through the adult system. While for most people several years of jail time is adequate, it may not be for Ms. Tubbs. If we knew about her disregard for the harm she caused we would have handled this case differently. The complex issues and facts of her particular case were unusual, and I should have treated them that way. This change in policy will allow us the space to do that moving forward.
We have now implemented policies to create a different pathway for outlier cases, while simultaneously creating protections to prevent these exceptions from becoming the rule. Any time a prosecutor wants to deviate from our core principles, they must put a request in writing. That request will then go to a committee, staffed by my most trusted advisors, who must evaluate the case and approve any requests to pursue an exception. This process ensures that only in the rarest of cases, where our system has failed, will we diverge from our principles.
We do not always get it right, as no one can, but we do believe that our fundamental beliefs are the right ones. Kids should be treated like kids. People should be given an opportunity to grow and change. Victims and survivors should be given support, and we should always provide every opportunity for all people in the criminal legal system to receive what they need to heal. We will continue to uphold these values.
Jason says
The BS is running deep now. That juvenile was two weeks shy of 18 when he sexually assaulted a 10 year old girl in a restaurant bathroom. They knew what they were doing was wrong but Gascon chose to treat him as a kid instead of the adult he was at the time of the crime. He didn’t identify as a woman until after he was arrested and he gamed the system. Nothing will change now, this is all just lip service to avoid being recalled
Tim Scott says
Username Jason suggests our usual Jason Zink, who has zero credibility. The commenting on a Gascon story suggests instead one of the organized ADAs trying to protect their gravy train. They have even less.
If I cared one way or the other I’d look into this even though it’s likely as not to be false, but I just don’t.
Jason says
Have no idea who you are talking about and definitely not an ADA.
His tenure as DA has been a giant cluster****. Violent criminals being given the shortest possible sentences, felons being caught with firearms and released the same day, him calling victims families uneducated and the list goes on.
This case is just another example of how big of a failure Gascons policies are.
Tim Scott says
Giant CF…yeah, probably. Anyone elected on a reform platform going into that nest of snakes was not going to have things go smoothly. That’s just an expected result.
The question is, where to next? Do we abandon the idea of reforms, elevate one of the severely bent ADAs into the office, and go back to “wealthy served here, if you can’t pay for justice you get none”? Personally I don’t favor that. We can see how that plays out just by looking at the sheriff’s department, where Baca went to prison and after a brief effort to clean up his department the voters were lead back into “situation normal, Villanueva perfectly fits Baca’s shoes.”
So, whatever. You can harp and cry about Gascon and sound like an ADA even if you are not one. I have no interest in debating the minutia of your complaints, though I still think most of them can be traced to hyperbole and outright lies spewed out of the ADA’s organized resistance to their new boss. If you have some idea other than “get back to the business of selling justice and forget all this reform stuff” please share it.
And I apologize for suggesting that you might be Jason Zink. He’s probably too busy intentionally spreading covid to be posting.
Jason says
Outright lies and hyperbole spewed by the ADAs? He’s on video telling a victims family member they are uneducated. Court records have shown multiple repeat violent offenders being given the shortest possible sentences. A gang member on parole for being an accessory to murder was charged with attempted murder for shooting someone while on parole and got less than five years. Another gang member for caught with a firearm and was released the same day only to be caught with another gun the very next day. There’s so many more examples that have been made public that it’s mind boggling.
I saw how his “reform” policies effected a family member who was a victim of DV. Basically they had to live in fear and eventually move out of state because of his policies towards criminals.
There’s a reason so many cities in the county have given him a vote of no confidence. His policies have led to higher, just like they did in San Francisco, but people ignored that for some reason. Just like they ignored how the mayor and city attorney refused to endorse him because they knew first hand what his policies would cause.
Failing to charge enhancements to get repeat violent offenders off the street isn’t reform, it’s plain stupidity and puts communities at risk. Some offenders need to be locked up. Look at some of the juvenile cases he’s failed to prosecute in adult courts. Doesn’t want to charge 17 year olds who have murdered people in adult court. He treats them like they are kids instead of the young adults they are. They know right from wrong but hey let’s give them a slap on the wrist. That will reform them
It all makes sense when you realize he has never spent a day in court as an attorney. What would a guy whose never spent a day in court know about the impact violent crimes have on victims and their families? Nothing. Just like his number chief of staff who’s tried one misdemeanor case in his career. Then he promotes someone with no prosecutorial experience to a level where it’s required because that person worked on his campaign. He appointed a defense attorney as a special prosecutor and signed a waiver for him to continue being a defense attorney which is a huge no no. The guy is a joke and decides what rules he wants to follow and which ones he doesn’t, all in the name of “reform”
Tim can STFU forever says
Great reply to Tim Jason I just usually say, Tim STFU when he starts babbling about killer cops and his favorite DA, if someone committed a violent crime against Tim he would show no mercy and want them locked up forever , I mean look how crazy he gets when you don’t agree with him. Also he will be the first to call the cops when he needs them. Libs are all the same. Champion hypocrites who cry about everything. Unhappiest group of weirdos there are.
Tim Scott says
No matter how many user names you use (and it’s sort of flattering that you are so obsessive about my name being part of them all) there will still be only one of you Mike…and in the dark of the night when you can’t sleep you know that I have offered to meet you one on one but you need that feeling like you have the numbers or you just hide. So, you can blather on or you can STFU yourself…either way, I’ll sleep fine while you cower.
Tim Scott says
Jason, like I said, the ADAs want to keep the gravy train rolling, and a lot of city governments rely on that same train. It’s no surprise at all that “many cities have withdrawn support” and even less of a surprise that Lancaster is front and center there. None of the ADAs are worth promoting, and the county would be better off if most of them were fired outright.
For every “victim family impacted by violent crime” there are THOUSANDS of people impacted by the corrupt “justice for dale” system that Gascon was hired to clean up. What do you propose?