Selective Prosecution

Trying to second guess prosecutorial decisions in the criminal procedure (as one of my grad school profs explained, he named his course “criminal procedure” as opposed to “criminal justice” because the use of the term “justice” to describe our system is a value judgment that political scientists should avoid) system is to enter into a maze. It is also an example of how federal and state authorities have tunnel vision and fail to recognize the laws that can be enforced by their counterparts and colleagues in other branches of government.

There are some public servants that have served the Compton-Carson-Long Beach area with great integrity. Others have left much to be desired. Either way, it seems that with some notable exceptions it seems that if y0u’re a Black or Brown politician your odds of being prosecuted go way up in the Los Angeles area. If you do the same thing as a white public official it is frequently hands off, no matter how solid the case is. Let’s get down to cases.

Compton Mayor and later Rep. Walter R. Tucker III won Merv Dymally’s congressional seat [http://janbtucker.com/blog/2012/10/08/mervyn-dymally-the-good-the-bad-the-ugly/] when Merv retired in 1992. He was accused to taking bribes by the federal government when he’d been Mayor of Compton, prosecuted, convicted, and sent to jail. Walter was a stand up guy, loyal to friends, and when we’d appear at public forums we’d kid each other and the audiences that we were cousins (as I always say, I’m the proverbial “honky in the wood pile”). At the same time as that prosecution was going down, I had reported to the District Attorney, the State Attorney General, the Los Angeles County Counsel, the Sheriffs Department and the FBI the fact that (a) I was an eyewitness to the Bradbury City Clerk’s (at the time a virtually all-white, gated community) office falsifying a government document in my presence (a felony under the government code) and (b) the public recording of a bribe made to a Bradbury City Planning Commissioner (which I also complained about to the Fair Political Practices Commission).

Nobody would do squat about the falsification of the public record. I literally had to force the Sheriff’s Department to even accept a criminal complaint right after I witnessed the crime. First they claimed it wasn’t a crime. Then they claimed they didn’t have a copy of the Government Code when I cited the sections violated. When I demanded their written procedures under Section 832.5 of the Penal Code for filing a personnel complaint, they conveniently “found” a copy of the Government Code and made a report.

As to the latter problem, you’ve got to be wondering how and why on Earth anybody would publicly record a bribe???? Well, you would if you were white and rich and knew that nobody would do anything about it and that you got to keep the bribe even if anybody did. On May 21 of the year this happened, a developer and his wife signed (and had notarized) for a $950,000.00 mortgage on a piece of property and made out a grant deed for the property for a one-half undivided interest to the planning commissioner and his wife. The deal apparently was that the mortgage would be paid off by the developer so based upon the actual value of the property, the bribe amounted to more than half-a-million dollars. The night of the meeting (I got the tape recording of the planning commission meeting) the commissioner moved for, argued for, and voted for approval of a development involving a real estate tract. That tract was precisely the one in which I had witnessed and reported the falsification of documents on. The planning commission met on May 25. The next morning, May 26 promptly at 8:00 a.m. when the County Recorder opened for business, the deed of trust and the grant deed were promptly filed and recorded.

Nobody would do anything about this bribe except the Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC). They fined the planning commissioner for failing to disclose the bribe as income on his Form 700 Statement of Economic Interests. The fine: $1,500.00. He got to keep the bribe itself.

Okay, so let me get this straight: Walter Tucker goes to jail for what amounted to chump change and a rich white planning commissioner gets fined $1,500.00 for failing to report over $500,000.00 that he gets to keep? H. Rap Brown said at the height of the civil rights movement that “Justice in America means ‘Just Us White Folk.'” Can the contrast be any sharper?

Fast forward to Walter’s successor in Congress, Juanita Millender McDonald. She promotes her son, Roderick Keith McDonald to run for State Assembly in the 55th District. He registers to vote at her home address in Carson which is in the district. I get assigned by one of his opponents to do opposition research on him and lo and behold, he lives a mile outside the district in Long Beach and under penalty of perjury he signs for a homeowner exemption for property tax purposes at his Long Beach house meaning that the house is supposed to be owner-occupied!

Although a Sacramento judge at least ruled that if elected, Roderick won’t be able to take office, he isn’t disqualified from the ballot (he does lose the primary). The House Ethics Committee ignores and does not even respond to my complaint about his mom letting him register to vote at her house (which is also under penalty of perjury). As usual with my complaints, everybody else ignores it. Compare that to the current prosecution of my old college buddy Richard Alarcon for supposedly not living in his City Council District, a far, far weaker case than one where you’ve got two different documents signed under penalty of perjury (one with a tax consequence) with two different addresses sworn to be true and correct. Go figure. Richard’s busted but on that Roderick never was.

Roderick did get his just rewards later, because even though everybody ignored my complaints, he eventually was sentenced to prison by the feds for mail fraud, conspiracy to commit extortion under color of authority, and money laundering.

Fast forward again. Laura Richardson succeeded Juanita as representative for the district. When Laura was young and just starting out on her political career, I met and was impressed with her when she appeared before the “Wednesday Group,” a coalition of women’s political organizations that met on Wednesdays for joint interviews of candidates. I represented San Fernando Valley/Northeast Los Angeles NOW. At the time I was the only male allowed to participate (prior to me they’d begun a female only rule to get rid of a real sexist pig and jerk who’d been showing up but relaxed it when SFV/NELA NOW wanted me as their representative).

For some background on the issues that have recently plagued Richardson, see my last blog on the subject: http://janbtucker.com/blog/2012/11/09/will-laura-richardsons-luck-follow-arturo-danaire-frazier/. The case of what Laura Richardson did to her staff brings up some interesting questions for whether she could be prosecuted under California law, a matter which has drawn no attention by the mainstream press. Just to review a few facts for background, in not one but two elections, 2010 and 2012, Richardson’s staff was unlawfully forced to work on her congressional campaigns. For example, it was widely reported that her District Director, Samuel J. “Joey” Hill Jr. “…was often out of the office working on campaign issues, and when he was present, he did campaign work at the office” according to the House Ethics Investigative Subcommittee Report, p. 47 [House Committee on Ethics, 112th Congress, In the Matter of Allegations Relating to Representative Laura Richardson, Appendix A, Report of the Investigative Subcommittee in the Matter of Allegations Relating to Representative Laura Richardson, August 1, 2012 (Investigative Subcommittee Report)]. Hill, was a former staffer for former legislator Teresa Hughes (and husband of Hughes’ daughter, current Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Deirdre H. Hill) who was defeated by Herb Wesson for State Assembly in 1998 and has since continued work as a legislative and congressional aide.

According to the Ethics Committee report, Richardson also retaliated against staff for cooperating with the committee investigation, one of her aides falsified a staff member’s employment record (time report), threatened staffers, and suggested false testimony for them to give in the committee’s investigation. This goes back to my initial point: why hasn’t the State of California taken any action to protect the California Labor Code rights of the employees at her Long Beach office? These are some of the laws that apply and violation of them are misdemeanors under Section 1103 of the California Labor Code:

1101.  No employer shall make, adopt, or enforce any rule,
regulation, or policy:
   (a) Forbidding or preventing employees from engaging or
participating in politics or from becoming candidates for public
office.
   (b) Controlling or directing, or tending to control or direct the
political activities or affiliations of employees.
1102.  No employer shall coerce or influence or attempt to coerce or
influence his employees through or by means of threat of discharge
or loss of employment to adopt or follow or refrain from adopting or
following any particular course or line of political action or
political activity.
1102.5.  (a) An employer may not make, adopt, or enforce any rule,
regulation, or policy preventing an employee from disclosing
information to a government or law enforcement agency, where the
employee has reasonable cause to believe that the information
discloses a violation of state or federal statute, or a violation or
noncompliance with a state or federal rule or regulation.
   (b) An employer may not retaliate against an employee for
disclosing information to a government or law enforcement agency,
where the employee has reasonable cause to believe that the
information discloses a violation of state or federal statute, or a
violation or noncompliance with a state or federal rule or
regulation.
   (c) An employer may not retaliate against an employee for refusing
to participate in an activity that would result in a violation of
state or federal statute, or a violation or noncompliance with a
state or federal rule or regulation.
   (d) An employer may not retaliate against an employee for having
exercised his or her rights under subdivision (a), (b), or (c) in any
former employment.
   (e) A report made by an employee of a government agency to his or
her employer is a disclosure of information to a government or law
enforcement agency pursuant to subdivisions (a) and (b).
   (f) In addition to other penalties, an employer that is a
corporation or limited liability company is liable for a civil
penalty not exceeding ten thousand dollars ($10,000) for each
violation of this section.
   (g) This section does not apply to rules, regulations, or policies
which implement, or to actions by employers against employees who
violate, the confidentiality of the lawyer-client privilege of
Article 3 (commencing with Section 950), the physician-patient
privilege of Article 6 (commencing with Section 990) of Chapter 4 of
Division 8 of the Evidence Code, or trade secret information.

This is a very timely issue. With the well-reported threats by employers to shut down their workplaces or lay off employees if President Obama won re-election, where there are laws in place that protect workers from political coercion, they should be applied and enforced vigorously. If that means taking on a now defeated member of the House of Representatives, so be it.

But frankly, I’m not holding my breath.

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Jan Tucker