Independent thoughts on the most important election in the history of Los Angeles

The City Attorney has sole responsibility for the prosecution of misdemeanor crimes committed in the City of Los Angeles.

The power to prosecute misdemeanor crimes is  every bit as serious as the prosecution of felonious conduct. It is essential that the elected City Attorney be a person of the utmost ethical standards and fully experienced in all aspects of the criminal justice system.

Carmen Trutanich was a Deputy District Attorney for 10 years before entering private practice. Carmen Trutanich started his career at the DA’s Office prosecuting misdemeanor crimes occurring outside the City’s borders. After gaining sufficient trial experience with misdemeanors, he then was assigned to prosecuting juvenile cases throughout the County of Los Angeles. He was then assigned to the Hardcore Gang Division that concentrates on serious gang crime. In the last three years of his career at the DA’s Office, Carmen Trutanich founded the Environmental Crimes Division where he pioneered prosecutions in this (then) new area of law.

Carmen Trutanich’s experience as a prosecutor as well as a respected defense attorney has earned him the approval and endorsement of almost every prosecutorial agency in and around Los Angeles.

Perhaps the most significant endorsement comes from the Los Angeles County District Attorney, Steve Cooley.

Depending on which figures you look at, there are anywhere between 80,000 and 100,000 active gang members in and around our City. LAPD has almost 10,000 sworn peace officers. The good guys are outnumbered 10 to 1, and the gangs know it.

Take a look at this photo taken outside Mens County Jail in Downtown Los Angeles. These gang members are not afraid of the cops - they get stronger every day while the Mayor and Chief Bratton try to convince us that Los Angeles is as safe today as it was in the 1950’s.

It’s not an “either or” question. You need it all.

Chief Bratton and Sheriff Baca both say “we can’t arrest our way out of this problem,” and to some extent that is true. However, what they should be saying is “We can’t just arrest our way out of this problem.”

Arresting and convicting gang members is an important part of the solution. Unfortunately, under the Mayor’s “hands off the gangs” policy, it’s the part that is ignored in favor of intervention and prevention.

There’s nothing wrong with intervention and prevention; those too are important parts of the solution. However, the Mayor controls a $165M budget that is being entirely directed to intervention and prevention with no additional resources to arrest and conviction.

What Los Angeles needs is all parts of the solution. By all means let’s have sensible gang intervention and prevention programs to give those few gang members a way out. Let’s also have prevention programs to give kids a viable alternative to the gangster lifestyle. But don’t ignore sound policing because it is too controversial.

Arrests and Convictions come from Proactive Policing, and that means not waiting for more drive-by shootings. Instead, we need sensible well-planned and focused probation/parole compliance sweeps. I’ve participated in countless sweeps, and I can assure you, we never came away without a number of gang members in custody, and a greater number of guns and narcotics in evidence.

Yes it ruffles feathers, and yes the gangs scream ‘civil rights violations,’ but there is nothing unconstitutional about checking on a probationer or a parolee’s compliance, and anyone with any experience will tell you that 90% of gang member probationers and parolees are not in compliance from the moment they’re let out on the streets.

When was the last time you heard about LAPD conducting any kind of “gang sweep?” Not for a long time. The Mayor has opposed such intervention as he sees it as ‘inflammatory’ to be proactive; that’s his ACLU background. His attitude is to wait for the crime to be committed, not prevent the crime from ever occurring. He has forced Chief Bratton to ‘follow the leader,’ and guess what? Gang crime is flourishing.

A strong independent City Attorney can be the voice of reason against this “politically correct” pandering to gang rights. Gangs have no more, and no less rights than anyone else, and they should be subject to regular, random compliance checks as part of any serious ant-gang strategy.

Despite Carmen Trutanich receiving the overwhelming approval of all the serious players in the fight against crime, LAPD Chief Bratton has declined to endorse the man that every other law enforcement agency has endorsed.

Instead, Bratton bowed to the Mayor’s command and endorsed the weakest candidate; Jack Weiss.

Jack Weiss was served briefly and unspectacularly as a federal prosecutor from 1994 to 2000. During his time as a prosecutor Weiss distinguished himself by doing relatively nothing. He allegedly conducting 8 jury trials (although only 2 can be verified). 

Having served sufficiently long enough as a prosecutor to give himself some “resume” value, he embarked on his true calling; a political career.

In a typically bitter and dirty campaign, Weiss achieved his political ambitions by running for Councilmember for Council District 5.

Jack Weiss’s political career has been distinguished as much by his record number of absences from the City Council Chamber as by the number of ethics complaints filed against him for accepting illegal campaign contributions.

His poor judgment led to the ridiculously one-sided “settlement” with billboard operators that led to the un-checked boom in billboards in the City.

Jack Weiss will not be an agent for change in the City. Gangs will continue to grow and gain strength because Weiss will not stand up to the Mayor (who is his campaign manager) and Weiss will not support any attempt to stifle the growth of gangs by proactive policing.

Jack Weiss has no recent, relevant or notable experience as a crime fighter. Instead he clings to photo-ops and press releases, claiming the credit for the hard work that others do.

When LAPD recently made an arrest in the ‘Bel Air Burglar’ case, Weiss was the first to claim credit for the arrest. “It’s DNA!” said Weiss, trying to link his deceitful and divisive manipulation of the LAPD’s DNA Rape Kit processing backlog to the arrest.

Few people realized just how disingenuous Weiss was being with his statement. DNA did play a role in the arrest of the suspect. However, it had nothing to do with Jack Weiss and his manipulation of the DNA Rape Kit backlog.

The true credit for the arrest belongs to Steve Cooley, the District Attorney. It was Steve Cooley who spearheaded and supported a new law that forces all persons arrested for felony crimes, and all persons convicted of misdemeanor crimes, to provide DNA samples.

Those DNA samples have led to the solution of many cases. However, civil libertarians like Jack Weiss and the ACLU, opposed Steve Cooley’s DNA law, claiming it was a violation of criminal’s rights.

Such duplicity by Jack Weiss is typical of a career politician who is too quick to pander to ‘hot button’ issues, and completely out of touch with the needs of modern policing.

If anyone knows what makes an effective leader in a prosecutorial agency, it’s Steve Cooley.

Now entering his third elected term as District Attorney, Steve Cooley has the trust and support of Los Angelenos. In his judgment Carmen Trutanich is the right man for the job.

Pictured above - typical results of proactive policing, all from cases I handled.

CITY ATTORNEY POWERS

IN THE FIGHT AGAINST
GANG CRIME

1. •Target the prosecution of crimes associated with gang activity
   

2. •Expand the Neighborhood Prosecutor Program
   

3. •Increase issuance and enforcement of Gang Injunctions
   

4. •Close working relationship with District Attorney to ensure felony prosecutions are initiated where appropriate
   

5. •Close working relationships with FBI, LAPD, Sheriffs Department, Parole, Probation, Housing Authority and School Police to ensure all agencies attack the problem from all sides

Weiss’s ethical failings revealed by NBC’s
investigative report “Laundered Elections”

Weiss’s overly close relationship with
Mayor Villariagosa - cause for concern.