As anyone from the San Francisco Bay Area is aware, the City-by-the-Bay has up until now had a district attorney that was stunningly ineffective as a prosecutor—enjoying the worst trial conviction rate of any prosecutor in California—that is when she did not simply dismiss serious felony charges outright or deal them down to a month or two in jail. And as a staunch opponent of the death penalty, Kamala Harris refused to seek the death penalty in San Francisco—even for cop killers.Therefore, when Kamala Harris ran in November for California Attorney General she did not get our vote, and when she won the office by a narrow margin, we cringed.
Of course, as a longtime resident of the City and County of San Francisco—where trespassing homeless people just laugh at property owners who threaten to call the police, and serious repeat offenders suffer the briefest of brief detentions—we also realize that California’s loss is San Francisco’s gain. We are well rid of the worst prosecutor in recent memory.
All of which sets the stage for this week's bombshell headline: Outgoing Mayor Gavin Newsom (who was elected in November as Lieutenant Governor) as just announced his replacement to fill the vacancy in the San Francisco District Attorney’s Office created by Harris’ recent departure.
Who did he appoint?
The (former) incumbent San Francisco Chief of Police George Gascón (who happens to be a licensed attorney) is now San Francisco’s newest district attorney.
In view of the dismal state of San Francisco law enforcement, and the negative effect that has had on quality of life and safety issues for all San Franciscans, we applaud this “outside the box” appointment by outgoing Mayor Newsom.
As far as we know, no sitting police chief has ever become a district attorney anywhere in the country.
But San Franciscans are in dire need of a top prosecutor who will enforce the law, and San Francisco’s finest need to know that if they make an arrest, they are not wasting their time.
It would appear that George Gascón fills the bill.
Read more.
7 comments:
No matter what, Los Angeles county still has the worse prosecutor ever. Hopefully, when his term is expired, Cooley will just go away.
The reality is that Cooley could jump to any number of silk stalking law firms in LA at an annual compensation nort of $1 million and no doubt will the minuute he leaves office.
I hope he does jump to one of those "silk stalking law firms". As long as he stops "stalking" the medical marijuana dispensaries and its owners, patients, and staff, I'd be happy with that.
Sorry to see you leave InSessions.
Truc Do—who is far less known in Los Angeles has already tripled her salary with a move to a private firm.
The only logical move for Cooley unless he runs again to prevent the City Attorney from running in opposition to Cooley’s anointed candidate, a black supervisor in his office in charge of 400 attorneys (which is a complex little piece of political chicken) is land a cush “of counsel” position with an LA mega firm who pays him $1 million a year to handle a fairly light litigation caseload and to otherwise play golf and leverage his notoriety and political connections to bring work to the firm.
The politically formidable O'Melveny & Myers comes to mind as a logical next step.
SINCE YOU BROUGHT IT UP, our second foray into the IS Phil Spector appeal thread following the full briefing of the appeal ended with us requesting admin and Coldwater to delete our account.
Ironically, with a board where you can be banned at the drop of a hat, ostensibly for what a thousand other posters do day in and day out without sanction, at the whim of Coldwater—IT TOOK THREE REQUESTS to admin to close our account and delete all of my posts. Ha! (One gets the feeling my request was a first.)
We were wasting our time and knowledge base there—where the lowest common denominator always seems to prevail, and the majority of members (not all, but a majority) are not only ignorant about fundamental legal principles but WISH TO REMAIN SO, and view an educated, professional person as some kind of an affront.
There are not that many lawyers out there on the net willing to spend hours looking up definitive answers for strangers at no charge or who are willing to craft thought out several hundred word answers to questions about how the system operates behind the scenes, and we have better things to do with our time to than to give the ignorant, hostile, and bigoted majority over at IS the further time of day.
Thank you though, for the kind words.
We believe that the who emphasis on the 420 isssue by Cooley was simply his political strategy to "run tio the right" during the primary election to satisfy his Republican base in aid of winning the nomination.
Who do you appeal election losses to?
Does Bush vs. Gore ring a bell?
http://supreme.justia.com/us/531/98/case.html
Good Morning!
Regarding Steve Cooley and the 420 issue. I do believe his war on mmj dispensaries was politically motivated. He scared me when I heard him debate Ms. Harris, because he seemed so disinterested in the will of the people.
He seems bitter having lost the race, and seems to have directed his angst at law abiding mmj dispensary owners, including Joe Grumbine, who is now facing felony charges stemming from one of Cooley's military style raids a year ago. After one year, Cooley felt it necessary to hold Mr. Grumbine on a $300,000.00 bail hold. You already know, that kidnappers, rapists, and the like don't have bail set that high.
Anyway, Joe could use some free legal help if you are interested. The next court date in Feb 7. My mom always told me it never hurts to ask. : )
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