On Election Night, Reform Prosecutors Win in Virginia, California, and Pennsylvania

Reform pros­e­cu­tors made fur­ther inroads into the admin­is­tra­tion of American law enforce­ment, sweep­ing coun­ty elec­tions in Northern Virginia and gain­ing con­trol of prosecutor’s offices in Pennsylvania and California. Progressive pros­e­cu­tors rode a blue wave of sub­ur­ban votes on November 5, 2019 that solid­i­fied Democratic con­trol of every state leg­isla­tive and pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al seat in the Northern Virginia coun­ties bor­der­ing the nation’s cap­i­tal and wrest­ed con­trol of coun­ty gov­ern­ment from one of Philadelphia’s most his­tor­i­cal­ly Republican sub­urbs. But the insur­gency was ide­o­log­i­cal, not par­ti­san, as for­mer pub­lic defend­er Chesa Boudin (pic­tured) unseat­ed the can­di­date backed by the Democratic Party in a close District Attorney’s race in San Francisco. 

The new pros­e­cu­tors ran on plat­forms of reduc­ing incar­cer­a­tion, end­ing cash bail and ​“the crim­i­nal­iza­tion of pover­ty,” pro­mot­ing police and pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al account­abil­i­ty, and reduc­ing reliance on harsh pun­ish­ments, includ­ing the death penal­ty. ​“It’s not a moment, it’s a move­ment,” tweet­ed Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner, whose office is con­sid­ered a pio­neer in pro­gres­sive-ori­ent­ed crim­i­nal legal reform. 

The reform-pros­e­cu­tor move­ment has had a direct impact on the declin­ing use of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment across the coun­try. Between 2015 and 2018, vot­ers replaced coun­ty pros­e­cu­tors in a third of the U.S. coun­ties with the largest coun­ty death rows. The clear­est shift in pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al pow­er came in Northern Virginia, where four of the most pop­u­lous coun­ties elect­ed pro­gres­sive or lib­er­al pros­e­cu­tors as their new com­mon­wealth attor­neys. The elec­tion marked a ​“sea change” in the state’s approach to law enforce­ment, said crim­i­nal defense attor­ney Marvin D. Miller. 

Two of the four win­ning Northern Virginia can­di­dates in last week’s elec­tions cam­paigned explic­it­ly against cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. Democrat Steve Descano, who faced inde­pen­dent Jonathan Fahey in Fairfax County, promised to end use of the death penal­ty. ​“Victims’ fam­i­lies need clo­sure. Communities need out­comes that accord with their val­ues. The death penal­ty pro­vides nei­ther,” Descano said on his cam­paign web­site. He also crit­i­cized the death penal­ty as ​“inef­fec­tive at stop­ping crime, in addi­tion to being pro­hib­i­tive­ly expen­sive. There is no link between the death penal­ty and com­mu­ni­ty safe­ty,” he said. During her suc­cess­ful cam­paign for com­mon­wealth attor­ney in Arlington, for­mer pub­lic defend­er Parisa Dehghani-Tafti pledged to nev­er seek the death penal­ty. Her web­site called cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment ​“inhu­mane, expen­sive, and racial­ly-biased.” Citing the case of Virginia death-row exoneree Earl Washington, who came with­in days of exe­cu­tion, she said “[t]oo many peo­ple sen­tenced to death have been found inno­cent and exonerated.” 

Prince William County held elec­tions to replace retir­ing Commonwealth Attorney Paul Ebert, whose office put more peo­ple on death row in his 51-year tenure than any oth­er coun­ty in the state and account­ed for more exe­cu­tions than 99.3% of all U.S. coun­ties. Incoming com­mon­wealth attor­ney Amy Ashworth cam­paigned for office say­ing she is ​“per­son­al­ly against” the death penal­ty and that its impo­si­tion ​“should be extra­or­di­nar­i­ly rare.” Candidate Buta Biberaj, who won Loudoun County​’s race, said that ​“we have to be very mind­ful as to how we use [the death penal­ty] … Death is final.” 

In Southeastern Pennsylvania, Jack Stollsteimer became the first Democrat ever to hold the posi­tion of Delaware County District Attorney, join­ing Krasner in neigh­bor­ing Philadelphia among the ranks of pro­gres­sive pros­e­cu­tors. Democrats also swept the coun­ty com­mis­sion­er elec­tions, gain­ing con­trol of the coun­ty gov­ern­ment for the first time since the Civil War. During the cam­paign, Stollsteimer had crit­i­cized the incum­bent for oppos­ing reopen­ing the near­ly 40-year-old mur­der case of Leroy Evans. Evans, who has con­sis­tent­ly main­tained his inno­cence, was impli­cat­ed by a teen offend­er who had been threat­ened with the death penalty. 

In San Francisco, for­mer pub­lic defend­er Chesa Boudin — whose par­ents were incar­cer­at­ed as mem­bers of the rad­i­cal Weather Underground and whose father is still serv­ing a life sen­tence — won the race for dis­trict attor­ney. Boudin ran as an anti-estab­lish­ment pro­gres­sive pros­e­cu­tor, and eschewed use of the death penal­ty. ​“The peo­ple of San Francisco have sent a pow­er­ful and clear mes­sage: It’s time for rad­i­cal change to how we envi­sion jus­tice,” Boudin said in a text mes­sage to The Appeal. ​“I’m hum­bled to be a part of this move­ment that is unwa­ver­ing in its demand for transformation.”