Voters in Durham, North Carolina Expand Reach of National Reform Movement, Elect Anti-Death Penalty Prosecutor

Voters in North Carolina added their voic­es to an expand­ing move­ment for local crim­i­nal jus­tice reform, oust­ing sher­iffs who close­ly coop­er­at­ed with fed­er­al author­i­ties seek­ing to detain and deport immi­grants and nom­i­nat­ing reform can­di­dates in local dis­trict attorney races. 

In Durham County, con­sid­ered the state’s most pro­gres­sive coun­ty, vot­ers in the Democratic pri­ma­ry opt­ed for a can­di­date who advo­cat­ed more rapid reform and said she would nev­er pur­sue the death penal­ty, replac­ing incum­bent Roger Echols with for­mer defense attor­ney, Satana Deberry (pic­tured). With no Republican chal­lenger in the Fall, the nom­i­na­tion vir­tu­al­ly assures that Deberry will be elect­ed dis­trict attor­ney. Durham County vot­ers also unseat­ed incum­bent Sheriff Mike Andrews, who had hon­ored con­sti­tu­tion­al­ly prob­lem­at­ic immi­gra­tion detain­ers, in favor of for­mer Duke University police chief Clarence Birkhead, who vowed ​“to not coop­er­ate with ICE.” 

In an his­toric pri­ma­ry elec­tion in Mecklenburg County, Democratic vot­ers ensured for the first time ever that African Americans would be elect­ed to the offices of sher­iff and dis­trict attor­ney in the coun­ty. Thirty-year Charlotte Mecklenburg Police Department vet­er­an Garry McFadden said he would end incum­bent sher­iff Irwin Carmichael’s con­tro­ver­sial immi­grant deten­tion poli­cies and inter­im District Attorney Spencer Merriweather called his elec­tion ​“a begin­ning in the process of build­ing trust in our crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem.” Neither of the can­di­dates face oppo­si­tion in the general election. 

During the Durham dis­trict attor­ney’s cam­paign, Echols and Deberry both said they would work to reform poli­cies that have con­tributed to over-incar­cer­a­tion, but Deberry chal­lenged the pace at which Echols pur­sued reform and called for a ​“cul­ture change” in the DA’s office. The can­di­dates’ views on cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment typ­i­fied their dif­fer­ent approach­es to reform. In respons­es to a can­di­date ques­tion­naire from the Durham’s People’s Alliance Political Action Committee, Echols said he was ​“not a pro­po­nent of the death penal­ty” and favored its abo­li­tion, but ​“recognized[d] that it is allow­able under the law” and should be con­sid­ered ​“at most … [on] rare occa­sions.” By con­trast, Deberry’s ques­tion­naire response was unequiv­o­cal: ​“I am moral­ly, eth­i­cal­ly, the­o­log­i­cal­ly, and in all oth­er ways opposed to the death penal­ty [and] … as District Attorney, I would not seek the death penal­ty in any case in Durham County.” Deberry wrote that cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment ​“is irrev­o­ca­bly flawed and does not pro­vide jus­tice to vic­tims nor soci­ety. I believe it suf­fers from racial and socioe­co­nom­ic bias and there is no way to ensure that it is being eth­i­cal­ly applied.” She called the death penal­ty ​“a human rights vio­la­tion” and said it ​“should be abolished.” 

Deberry is one of a grow­ing num­ber of pros­e­cu­tors, such as Denver’s Beth McCann and Philadelphia’s Larry Krasner, who have announced they will not use the death penalty. 

In anoth­er close­ly watched local elec­tion that is con­sid­ered a bell-weath­er for the strength of reform efforts, San Diego dis­trict attor­ney chal­lenger Geneviéve Jones-Wright recent­ly com­mit­ted to exer­cise her pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al dis­cre­tion to decline to seek the death penal­ty. ​“Although the death penal­ty is still legal in California, it is not manda­to­ry that a District Attorney impos­es it,” she respond­ed to an ACLU-spon­sored California District Attorney can­di­date ques­tion­naire. ​“The death penal­ty is dis­crim­i­na­to­ry, cost­ly, and inef­fec­tive as a deter­rent. I am moral­ly opposed to it,” Jones-Wright said. 

Jones-Wright, whose cam­paign is sup­port­ed by the pro­gres­sive REAL Justice PAC and by phil­an­thropist George Soros’ California Justice & Public Safety PAC, is attempt­ing to unseat incum­bent inter­im DA Summer Stephan, whose cam­paign is backed by a PAC spon­sored by the California deputy dis­trict attorney’s asso­ci­a­tion. Stephan did not respond to the questionnaire.