California appeals court rebuffs Soros backed DA

 Washington Examiner:

As a matter of both law and good policy, the California State Court of Appeals well served the public by ruling on Thursday that left-wing Los Angeles District Attorney George Gascon actually must do his job.

Gascon, one of a bevy of district attorneys elected with financial support from radical financier George Soros or his affiliates, is turning Los Angeles into a crime-infested danger zone, with homicides at a 15-year high. This matches the experience of most Soros DAs and those who adopt similar policies, with murder rates or violent crime rates likewise rising in Philadelphia, St. Louis, Chicago, and elsewhere.

All these prosecutors openly boast that their goal is to cut incarceration numbers and sentence lengths in the name of mercy and “equity.” Never mind the lack of mercy for the victims of the increase in crime that naturally follows from letting hardened offenders walk free.

At issue for the California appeals court was a “special directive” announced by Gascon ordering deputy district attorneys not to follow the state’s “three strikes” law that mandates a prison sentence of 25 years to life for someone convicted of a third serious or violent felony. Californians enacted the law by a statewide referendum with the unambiguous language that the sentence "shall be" imprisonment for at least 25 years and that prosecutors "shall plead and prove all known prior serious or violent felony convictions." Nonetheless, directly and openly flouting that law, Gascon ordered a blanket policy of refusing to enter the prior convictions into the record.

When sued by the county’s Association of Deputy District Attorneys, Gascon made two arguments. He claimed the law violated his discretionary powers as a member of the executive branch of government and thus violated the separation of powers. He also argued, as a policy matter, that the reason he wanted discretion was that “there is no compelling evidence” that longer sentences “improved public safety,” but that they have “contributed to prison overcrowding … [and] exacerbated disparities in the justice system.”

The California appeals court made mincemeat of the constitutional separation-of-powers argument. It did so on the basis of California law, but its reasoning should apply nationwide. Amid a much lengthier (and entirely convincing) discussion of the issue, the court wrote that the district attorney “is an elected official who must comply with the law, not a sovereign with absolute, unreviewable discretion.”

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At least the appeals court in California has some common sense when it comes to the Soros-sponsored crime spree that has plagued the citizens of the state.  California voters need to wise up and vote against any Soros-backed DA.  It looks like San Francisco is recalling their DA.

See, also:

In San Francisco, Democrats Are at War With Themselves Over Crime

Fueled by concerns about burglaries and hate crimes, San Francisco’s liberal district attorney, Chesa Boudin, faces a recall in a famously progressive city.