Law and Order Reimagined

A powerful exploration of law enforcement and public safety in LA's criminal justice system. 

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction and Background
• 0:43 The Impact of Leadership in Law Enforcement
• 3:33 The Future of Criminal Justice in LA

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

up from a trial deputy, just like me. I was actually on the same grade four list as she was when she got her grade four way back when when we were just youngins, I guess and so she also endorsed you.

Speaker 2: 0:15

You know Jackie is an amazing story. She grew up in Crenshaw. Her father actually was shot in his front yard by gang members. You know she went to law school. She went right to the DA's office, was there over 30 years, held most positions in that DA's office until she finally became the first African-American woman to hold the position. Interestingly, you know, on the. You know Jackie is a Democrat, steve Cooley is a Republican. Those US attorneys are Democrats and Republicans. And a point that Jackie made, what I thought was a very important point for this election she says it's not about politics, it's not about Democrats versus Republicans, because I know we've got a very polarized society, we've got a presidential election coming up. But she says the DA's election is unique. It's a nonpartisan race so you're not going to see even party affiliation next to our names on the ballots.

Speaker 1: 1:13

And it really is about who has the experience, who has the blueprint, who can keep you and your family safe for the next four years, and that's why I thought it was so surprising to have Gascon run against Jackie four years ago, because she was an African-American woman who was progressive and she was making changes. Apparently. It just wasn't fast enough for them and so they brought in Gascon from San Francisco to, I guess, accelerate those changes. But they were being done already. And so when you say it's not politics, it's like there were two Democrats running against each other in that election and it just. It made, to me personally, no sense.

Speaker 1: 2:00

Jackie was, I believe, this close to actually winning it in the primary when the Black Lives Matter showed up at her house at 4.30 in the morning and her husband, who was the nicest man ever. I worked with him on a number of cases. He was a forensic auditor for the DA's office and when I was in consumer protection, doing cases with hundreds of thousands of victims, he helped analyze the evidence's office. And when I was in consumer protection, you know, doing cases with hundreds of thousands of victims, he helped analyze the evidence for me. So and he, david, went down and answered the door with a gun and ultimately was charged, and that's what I think ultimately kept her from being able to be reelected. And so now we've had this four years of this experiment which has failed horribly, and it's frustrating to see what has happened, but you give us hope that there is going to be a change. Thank you.

Speaker 2: 2:59

Thank you very much. You know, again, jackie ran in a very unusual situation that summer, the summer of 2020. That was the George Floyd summer the defund, the police, the riots and protests in the streets, you know, and George Gascon comes in with promises, a lot of promises. I can fix all the problems in the LA criminal justice system and I guarantee you that I can bring more safety to the streets rather than less. Well, he hasn't fixed the problems in the system and he's basically taken our safety into the abyss safety into the abyss. The California Department of Justice just came out recently with the statistics of the violent crimes and property crimes and hate crimes over the last four years. They're all up double digits with George Gascon. In fact, shoplifting was up 133%.

Speaker 1: 3:51

And yet he says that his policies are working to reduce it, because crime is down.

Speaker 2: 3:56

Well, they are working for criminals. If you're a criminal right now, if you don't vote for George Gascon, wow, you are voting against your interest, Because he is. If anything, he's brought in the dawn of the golden age of criminals, which I hope to bring its sunset come November 5th.

Speaker 1: 4:20

It's sunset come November 5th. It's going to be a process because it's going to take a while for the mindset of the criminals, I think, to get back to hey, we can't do this Because I think they're thinking they can get away with it and in fact they brag about it 100%.

Speaker 2: 4:30

You know we don't need to shoot for the 1960s or the 1970s for the target of safety that we're looking for. We only have to go back 10 years to 2014. 2014 was considered our safest year in the last 50 years. And what was going right? Well, you had a DA doing her job. That was Jackie Lacey. You had the police understand the DA's office was now their partner, so they were doing their job. You had victims know that if you dialed 911, someone would not only pick up the phone, but the DA's office and law enforcement would help bring justice to the harm you suffered. And, as importantly to your point, criminals understood that there were lines in the sand. Those lines were our laws. They were being consistently, fairly and impartially enforced, but there were real consequences on the other side of the line. So in that year, a historic number for the last 50 years of criminals weren't committing crimes. Deterrence was working, and that is the true goal. That is the true test of the ineffective criminal justice system. Not how many people you can put in jail. It's how many people you can deter from committing the crimes in the first place.

Speaker 2: 5:40

Walking to your car in a parking lot I was at an event about two weeks ago and a woman comes up to me and she says look, I'm 82. I used to walk around my neighborhood. I'm afraid I don't walk around my neighborhood anymore. And she says I don't know how many more years I have, but you got to fix this. This is unacceptable. She cause she's not, she can't leave, she's got everything invested in that house and all her friends, so she's not going anywhere. She said you got to fix this. You got to win. You got to get rid of Gascon. You got to get LA County back on track. I said, ma'am, I will do everything in my power to make that happen. You