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San Jose Mercury News: Santa Clara County DA program aims to boost reliability of eyewitness identifications

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According to the Innocence Project, eyewitness misidentification is the single greatest cause of wrongful convictions nationwide, playing a role in more than 75% of convictions overturned through DNA testing. Implementing this program is a step in the right direction to make sure that justice can be properly carried out.  Submission post by Charisse Domingo

SANTA CLARA COUNTY DA PROGRAM AIMS TO BOOST RELIABILITY OF EYEWITNESS IDENTIFICATIONS

By Tracey Kaplan
02/04/2012 06:40:08 AM PST

To boost the reliability of eyewitness identifications, every police department in Santa Clara County has recently begun videotaping or recording most witnesses as they pick out a suspect from a set of photos or a live lineup.

The practice, spearheaded by District Attorney Jeff Rosen, is the latest technique law enforcement agencies across the nation are using to try to reduce wrongful convictions. In the Bay Area, police in San Francisco, Oakland and Pleasant Hill are among those who also have adopted it.

But Santa Clara County is believed to be the only county in the state where every police agency from the Highway Patrol to campus officers at San Jose State has signed a protocol agreeing to it.

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Sixth Annual “Beyond the Bench Conference” Empowering Families, Engaging Parents

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James Bell, Founder of the Haywood Burns Institute

ACJP organizer Gail Noble was invited to the Santa Clara County “Beyond the Bench Conference” a convening of juvenile justice court practitioners and advocates. She reports back on the event that both described the uphill battle to bring a new mind frame to youth incarceration, as well as some hopeful signs of changes to come.

By Gail Noble: The Sixth Annual Beyond the Bench Conference Empowering Families, Engaging Parents was held at Saint Claire Hotel Downtown San Jose, February 3, 2012. The conference room was filled with Public Defenders, District Attorneys, Probation Officers, City Council Officials,  Community Organizations, and Parents.
The Host of the event Beyond the Bench was Judge Patrick Tondreau, who has been the Presiding Judge of the Juvenile Justice System. In the year 2009 Judge Tondreau began to put in motion the concept of the “Model Court.” Continue reading →

15 Year old American teen is Wrongfully Deported to Colombia

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By the CNN Wire Staff
updated 4:33 PM EST, Thu
Published January 5, 2012
 
Jakadrien, ( was14 years old, when she went missing) mother Johnisa Turner and grandmother Lorene Turner in desperation contacted  all the right agencies to help find Jakadrien, but in the end they failed the family and Jakadrien. Their cry for help, fell on deaf ears.  Submission Post by Gail Noble
 
Jorge Asfrubal Farcia Romero and Luis Carlos Velez contributed to this reportfor CNN.

(CNN) — A Dallas teenager who ran away from home more than a year ago somehow wound up deported to Colombia after U.S. authorities mistook the girl, who lacked identification, for a Colombian national. Now her family is demanding to know why immigration authorities deported the now-15-year-old teen — a U.S. citizen with no knowledge of Spanish — and why they simply took her at her word when she gave them a fake name.

The family of Jakadrien Turner had been searching for her since she ran away in the fall of 2010. Her grandmother scoured Facebook looking for the girl, viewing Jakadrien’s friends’ pages for any information. Continue reading →

Billions Behind Bars: Inside America’s Prison Industry

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GLADIATOR SCHOOL 

The biggest prison in the state of Idaho is also known as the toughest. The privately run Idaho Correctional Center – The ICC – was so violent, the employees and inmates began calling the place the “gladiator school.”

Published: Monday, 19 Sep 2011 by: Jennifer Dauble

People of color once again have become the new found commodity that fuel’s the growth for building new jails and prisons in the U.S. and lined the pockets of big businesses.   Post submission by Gail Noble

Billions Behind Bars: Inside America’s Prison Industry

With more than 2.3 million people locked up, the U.S. has the highest incarceration rate in the world. One out of 100 American adults is behind bars – while a stunning one out of 32 is on probation, parole or in prison. This reliance on mass incarceration has created a thriving prison economy. The states and the federal government together spend roughly $74 billion a year on corrections, and nearly 800,000 people work in the industry. Continue reading →

Mercury News: Public Defender Mary Greenwood in line for Santa Clara County judgeship

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A County’s head of the Public Defender’s office may be the most important, yet least discussed decision-maker in a local criminal justice system. With Mary Greenwood potentially leaving to receive a judgeship, an important transition is going to be made by County Board of Supervisors for a position that will impact thousands of people for years to come. Seems like community input should be gathered for this important selection. — Post submission by Raj Jayadev

By Howard Mintz // hmintz@mercurynews.com (Published on 12.12.11)

Santa Clara County may be losing its top public defender but gaining a well-qualified new judge.

Mary Greenwood, the county’s chief public defender for the past six years, appears to be on the brink of an appointment to the Superior Court bench.

Gov. Jerry Brown’s staff has forwarded her name to a statewide judicial screening commission, which last week began circulating questionnaires on Greenwood in the local legal community, ordinarily a prelude to a judicial appointment. Continue reading →

MSNBC: Must-Watch Maddow Segment on New GOP Voting Restrictions Barring Elderly Women From the Polls

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From progressive to regressive voting laws. What has his world (aka the right to democratic inclusion) come to. — Submission by Cesar Flores.

The poll tax that isn’t a poll tax is arriving around the country in the form of new GOP-instated voter restrictions–and the ACLU is filing suit.

The anticipated victims of these stringent ID requirements include the poor, the young who don’t drive, students, and minorities, and as Rachel Maddow noted in a devastating segment last night, the elderly. Maddow focused on two lovely elderly women who cannot vote now, including an 84-year-old who is a member of her town council–who has cast her vote in elections regularly for 63 years. Now, thanks to efforts by the one and only Scott Walker, she cannot exercise her rights in this upcoming race.

It’s a must-watch.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32545640

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

SF Bayview: Real Talk on Three Strikes

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YES YOU!!!

Post Submission by Blanca Bosquez —

By Richard Wembe Johnson — For many years, the “three strikes” law has rained havoc and waste over the state of California, plunging its state debt increasingly deeper each and every year, which the taxpayers are paying for without any real justification. In getting the three strikes law passed in the first place, the general public was duped into believing that the law was directed to all those violent repeat offenders – child molesters, murderers, rapists and so on.

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Arizonification vs. Santaclarification of enforcement policies

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Members of the Probation Department of Santa Clara County question an inmate during... (Gary Reyes)

The following piece entitled On Crime Policy, Takes a cutting edge — some say risk — approach in the Mercury News highlights Santa Clara counties strategies around realignment and immigration detainers — both of which were influenced by community input.

By Tracey Kaplan, Mercury News: Long overshadowed by freethinking San Francisco, Berkeley and now protest-roiled Oakland, Santa Clara County has been eclipsing its lefty neighbors lately — with criminal justice policies that critics blast as risky but supporters call cutting-edge.

From its controversial stand against a federal policy on detaining jailed illegal immigrants to its open-arms, welcome-home stance toward newly freed state prisoners, Santa Clara County has struck the kind of permissive chord that puts Fox News pundits in a lather. Continue reading →

Santa Clara County Counsel Sends ICE New Detainer Policy for the County

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On October 21, 2011, just days after the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors passed a detainer policy praised by many community members, legal service providers, and immigrant rights advocates as one that balances public safety, honors civil rights, and protects immigrants, County Counsel Miguel Marquez sends off a letter to ICE notifying them of our County’s official stance.  Click below to read the letter….

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