“When a Prosecutor Won’t Prosecute”
This piece is the best article on the effort to recall George Gascon that I have ever read. I can’t verify the statistical accuracy of what is said by my friend Phil Stirling here, but it’s certainly close — and I love this quote so much I want to have its baby:
Phil Stirling, the lead prosecutor on the Andrade case, pointed out what pretty much everyone in the city’s rougher neighborhoods already knew: “Ninety-nine percent of the victims of gang murders and gang rapes and gang robberies and gang beat downs are minorites—black and brown people,” he said. “That’s what’s crazy about this whole racist prison bullshit.”
That’s my experience, for sure. Until you’ve fought back tears at a murder sentencing as a mother pours out her heart for her son whom she will never see again — and then repeated that process dozens of times — you can’t really understand what Phil means there.
I plan to have much more to say about this, and about the recent Atlantic piece about the Chesa Boudin recall and about San Francisco’s meltdown as a failed city in recent years. But I wanted to get the link out to you as soon as possible. Don’t miss this. It’s truly a must-read.
Thanks very much to Simon Jester for sending the link.