Our Central Valley area, Yolo County, has a chance to replace a really bad DA with Dean Johansson, an honest, competent man with the skills and commitment to work for equal justice for all. Dean has many years of experience as a civil rights lawyer, a prosecutor, and currently a highly regarded public defender.
We have been afflicted for 16 years with Jeff Reisig, a DA who practices “Charge ‘em the highest, imprison ‘em the longest.” Especially if Reisig can go after a kid, or a poor person, or a person of color. Our county has the third-highest percentage in the state of kids 10-17 years old in the criminal justice system. Since 2013, 93% of the youth charged as adults have been Latino. Black adults are 10x more likely to be imprisoned than white adults (compared to 9x statewide and 6x nationally.) And this county is a mix of rural, small towns, and a university town, not exactly a fetid swamp of crime, except maybe bike theft.
This DA is not only destroying lives, but he’s also wasting our money and time. We have more felony jury trials than Alameda County (where Oakland is), a county 7x larger. We have the highest rate per capita in CA of jury trials, and 41% of the felony ones wind up in acquittals or dismissed by the judge.
Dean is the first serious challenger ever — Reisig has scared off previous people with threats and swift-boating style personal attacks. He’s tried this on Dean already, but Quakers don't scare easily. Reisig has support of the local police, and a lot of money from them. But Dean has support from a wide swath of the community, including the Yolo County Democratic Party (despite a misleading flier labeled “voter guideline for Democrats” and promoting Reisig.) He has over 500 volunteers canvassing for him, making calls, tabling at the farmers’ market, writing postcards — I’ve heard 10,000 or more cards mailed locally and from allies nationally! You can see a few of mine at the top.
If you know anyone in Yolo County, please give them a heads-up. We have a chance to change lives here. We can send our kids to schools, not prisons. We can have integrity in office. We can have someone who is truly the DISTRICT’S Attorney.
As the postcard says, Thanks for being a VOTER!