Recently, Bill Torpey and Bill Rankin of the Atlanta Journal Constitution wrote an article revealing that 1 in 4 defendants in Fulton County are out on bond. The article focused primarily on the amount of people accused of Murder who are out on bond.
They interviewed several metro area District Attorneys. “Gwinnett DA Danny Porter said it is rare for murder defendants in his county to get bond and was surprised so many in Fulton got it. Cobb DA Pat Head, in office a decade, could not recall more than 10 murder defendants in Cobb getting bond. The DeKalb DA’s office said it does not keep statistics on bonds”.
Hopefully this statement has Bill Torpey and Bill Rankin following up on who is being released in DeKalb County. Obviously Gwen Fleming doesn't object to violent offenders being released back onto the streets of DeKalb County to prey on it's citizens.
Click here for a few examples of Murders on the loose in DeKalb County
Sunday, October 11, 2009
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30 comments:
One more reason for me to stay out of Fulton County. Why are any of those poeple on the link provided out on bail. That's crazy.
Dekalb Co doesn't keep track? I'm an outsider - someone please explain why they wouldn't want to demonstrate accountability by keeping track of this info?? Because I sure don't understand. Scary. Very scary.
No wonder the DeKalb County District Attorney's Office said they don't keep statistics on bonds. They don't want the truth exposed. A murder suspect released on bond and then gets arrested three more times and released on bond each time. Why was his bond on the murder case not revoked? How many more of these are there? This does not happen in Cobb County or Gwinnett County. How in the world can Gwen Keyes Fleming not know this is happening? No wonder crime is out of control in DeKalb.
Don't forget about Kelsey Ruth. He was wanted in connection with the murder of his girlfriend. The District Attorney's Office dropped that case and did not even present it to a grand jury.
http://www.kcbd.com/global/story.asp?s=5035351
Anyone who had ever worked CID can tell you that you're almost better off not doing a Court Supplemental or sending evidence and statements to the DA's office until they ask for them...3 years later. Whatever you send them will get lost, so you might as well hang onto stuff yourself!
The Judge in the article must resign right now. She admits that she does not pay attention to the presecutor in a specific case because of her general belief that the prosecutor's case is slanted towards keeping criminals in jail. In other words, the Judge is not doing her job, but the DA is doing his/her job. The Judge should resign now that she admits to not doing her job.
Who ran against Gwen in the last election and why didn't they win? They needed this blog for opposition prep. Good thing Director Miller has his sights set on running for office once he makes a name for himself in the public. I just hope he runs for DA and not county CEO. He would run the DA's office with a cop mentality and help us all out.
Well if you talk to detectives who have to deal with the District Attorney Office this is what they say.
Why bother, the D.A.'s office won't prosecute it. Don't waste your time.
They do whatever is the easy route to make a case go away.
Thats why we have so many repeat offenders in DeKalb.
We need a real District Attorney who wants to rid the county of crime.
The criminals know that probation or the case never going to trial is the DeKalb way.
The county want police to look at foreclose propetys to buy and live. Why would someone want to be a victim of a crime.
Thanks for this blog,it the only real truth coming out.
Here is a quote from Judge Marvin Arrington:
“I don’t know no family, black or white, who got no $500,000 cash money,” he said. “And if you do that, somebody is going out and rob somebody.”
This is the caliber of people on the bench?? We allow people this ignorant to be Judges?? He can't even speak proper English when he is being interviewed by the media!! I quoted two sentences of his and I count at least 4 grammatical errors! I'd give a rookie a low evaluation on their FTO Report for the day if they handed me a report with language like that in it!
Yeah, let's keep blaming the DA instead of taking accountability for the fact that there are some in our ranks who SUCK. I've had a great experience with this new group as opposed to the Good Ole Boys who ran the show last administration. How many of us noble boys in blue are under indictment for various things from getting blow jobs from prostitutes to feeling up civilians we arrest? Yeah, that's the DA's fault too!
Apples and Oranges...I agree that there are those among the ranks that are garbage and have been caught doing illegal things.
What is being said is that DeKalb is notoriously light on SERIOUS, PREVIOUSLY CONVICTED CRIMINALS. This is a combination of a number of things, but the DA and the judges bear much of the blame. Convicted robbers and burglars do not merit 5 year convictions reduced to 1 year reduced to time served...they deserve to do hard time.
If the person is being held without bond, the state must indict within 90 days or they must be granted a reasonable bond. Many of you, including police officers, don't realize that there is sometimes a failure to indict by the DA's office. This happens more frequently then it should. The case is prepared by a DA investigators and presented by an ADA to the Grand Jury. When the ball is dropped and a violent offender gets out on bond, who pays for the mistake? Answer, the next victim. Unlike the police department, when you fail to do your job in the DA's office there are no suspension days. It is all about accountability. Some organizations are run with a firm but fair adherence to policy and some are not.
Failure to indict is usually attributed to gaps in the case whether it be pending Crime Lab results or evidentiary gaps in the case which need to be closed up for a successful prosecution. The case is not "prepared" by a DA investigator. It is "prepared" by Major Felony - the DA's office is not the investigative arm of law enforcement - except in rare cases. If gaps exist it falls on us as Detectives. Our problem is we don;t have enough manpower to wrok the endless tsunami of cases coming at us. So, let's stop pointing the finger of blame and seek a better working relationship as opposed to the vitriolic whining that usually passes this board.
On many occasions the bond is set based on the weaknesses of the case that is pending.
One last point, the defendant is entitled to a reasonable bond, but what is reasonable for a murderer?
Say what you want but the DA's Office has allowed murder suspects to remain out on bond when they continue to get arrested committing other crimes. Obviously there is a serious problem is in the DA's office and Gwen Keyes Fleming should be held accountable for what happens in the District Attorney's Office.
It's certainly not reasonable to grant bond to a murder suspect with a rap sheet as long as your arm! Is there a revolving door at the jail or what?
On a somewhat related note, I noticed this statistic in an article in today's AJC about budget cuts in Gwinnett:
"Porter [the Gwinnett DA] said his office opened 6,300 new felony cases in 2008 using 103 people. By comparison, Cobb County opened 4,364 cases with 115 people, he said, and DeKalb County opened 8,209 with 161 people."
So DeKalb opened almost 90% more felony cases than Cobb, but did so with only 40% more staff. And DeKalb opened 30% more felonies than Gwinnett, but did so with 60% more staff.
News Flash!! News Flash!!
IT'S VERY EASY TO GET AN INDICTMENT!!!
Stop making excuses for the DA's Office. Many cases don't even require "lab results." The only exception to that might be Special Victims. But here are the facts: If you can get an arrest warrant, you can get an indictment! If you can make it past a probable cause hearing, you can get an indictment! The Mag Court Judges are all Defense Attorneys. If the perp's Defense Attorney can't convince another Defense Attorney to dismiss the case, you can get an indictment!
I've seen cases dismissed by Mag Court Judges for "lack of probable cause" then seen an indictment and a plea bargain or conviction! Of course, that was many years ago, before Gwen showed up.
Officers and Detectives arrest people all of the time and get cases bound over all of the time at Mag Court without lab results. You don't need to be ready for trial the day after the indictment.
Whoever is playing the statistics game is trying to trick us. Must be someone in the DA's office.
Forget percentages lets look at the real numbers
Cobb County DA
6300 cases divided by 103 people = 61 cases per
DeKalb County DA
8209 cases divided by 161 people = 51 cases per
Gwinnett County DA
4364 cases divided by 115 people = 38 cases per
I find this very informative and not "vitriolic" as someone wrote in. If this is happening then people must me held accountable as the critic stated.
Truly the person who quoted the statistics is gullible. Porter added the Child Support Unit to the DeKalb stats which inflated the DeKalb office numbers. It's a unit that he doesn't have. WHen you compare unit for unit, Dekalb DA does more with less in a much more hostile environment - including the unhappy few on this blog and a couple of insane Judges. Let's cut them a break.
I have noted the light sentences for years in DeKalb, it seems like a murderer can walk out after five years in DeKalb, but a bank robber goes to the Fed Pen for 10 on the first offense. As for raising productivity by the DA, you aren't going to get anywhere with management until the next election. I advise that both the DA investigators and the CID boys and gals make a concerted unofficial effort to get to know each other better, and communicate to each other what each side needs to successfully prosecute the perp. Your fight is not with troops in the trenches but their leaders. Keep it low key and management won't know whats going on....
So Cobb DA's have a greater work load and they still manage to send more people to prison every month than DeKalb?? There goes the "we're overworked" excuse!!
I'm the person who posted the statistics, and I don't work for the DA or DeKalb government in general. I thought the stats were interesting mainly because stats like these aren't often discussed in public.
To "The Real Numbers":
I'm not trying to trick anyone. All I did was copy exactly what Danny Porter was quoted as having said. I wanted to share the stats so people could see the case averages, which is what you did when you took the numbers I provided and did the math. I'm not your enemy. I'm just trying to get as many facts as I can.
Also, you transposed the numbers for Cobb and Gwinnett. Gwinnett is 61 per; DeKalb 51 per; and Cobb 38 per.
To the person who thinks I am gullible, all I did was copy the quote. There was no explanation in the article of what crimes were used, only that Porter was counting felonies. If there really is an issue that makes his comparison invalid then I seriously hope you inform the AJC so they can print a correction.
Also, if you do work for the DA or have personal contacts there, please encourage them to make their statistics accessible on their web site. I saw Gwen Keyes Fleming on WSB today, and while the fact that she actually went on camera for a one-on-one interview was shocking, I was not surprised that it was basically a PR stunt with Ryan Young asking no tough questions. Maybe she was feeling the heat from this blog and that AJC article? I don't know. But I do know that the DA's office, PD, and SO should all make frequently updated stats easy for the public to obtain.
Consider what the statistics really say~ Gwinnett Police are better than we are and put together rock solid cases.
This is further verified by the fact that Gwinnett's Mag Ct dismisses 1 of every 500 cases and our Mag Ct dismisses 1 out of 10. Gwinnett Judges rarely grant motions to suppress but our bench does all the time and routinely impugn the integrity of DKPD.
While the above is probably true,lets compare important numbers
Gwinnett murders in 2008? <40
DeKalb murders? >140
Now think....
Gwinnett Armed Robberies 2008?
DeKalb Armed Robberies 2008?
Gwinnett Rapes 2008?
DeKalb Rapes 2008?
The statistics remain the same.
Sure Gwinnett outs together better cases no doubt. But they are have a tremendously less stressful workload too.
All in all the "murder's on the loose" link is more a testimony how overworked we are as cops and our inability to spend as much time per case then the brothers in Gwinnett.
You really can't compare Gwinnett to Dekalb. Dekalb dwarfs Gwinnett in # of Murders and armed robberies. Yes is Dekalb's Major Felony squad overworked, sure, but management could easily change how they worked (work smarter). Major Felony detectives not only work all murders and armed robberies, but are tasked with all crimes against persons, including simple batteries and Terroristic Threats. You can walk in off the street and meet with a detective in Major Felony during and ongoing murder investigation. A detective will be taken off assignment and made to handle an unimportant walk-in. Dekalb is big enough to have strictly a homicide squad. If this were the case detectives would have more hours to focus in on a murder and do the necessary follow ups to prevent any gaps that supposedly prevent indictment. And the fact is a felony case is worked on and prepared by DA investigators that is their job. The label investigator would or should mean something. Sure the detectives put the case together and should have all the ends tied up, but that is not the reality of the beast. I personally have seen the ball dropped by both detectives and investigators. Major Felony detectives are accountable, if they f.. up there is usually sometime type of punishment.
The problem with the DeKalb DA's Office is they don't prepare for hearings or trials. They will call you at the last minute and tell you they need you, but they don't spend enough time going over the case with you. And that's being generous to them, because most spend ZERO time going over the case with you.
If they would get off their lazy asses and spend at least 30 minutes with each Officer or Detective before the hearing or trial, things would go a lot better.
The DA's office has no business complaining about anything PD does when they don't take the time to speak with Officers and Detectives about cases. If they can't prep us or tell use what would make a case easier to prosecute, that's on THEM!
If anyone from the DA's office would like to dispute that, please let us know!
"The problem with the DA's office..."
Thank you for keeping our eyes open. This information has helped me realize that we (citizens) need to take a much more proactive role in following through with the criminal activity that threatens us all. Much to my dismay, it's not enough that they are arrested and only too temporarily taken off the street.
If you only knew....you have helped me make the decision to NOT trust the system, rather keep in contact with the DA's office and follow the entire process to increase the odds that the conclusion of an arrest gets an appropriate penalty.
We love you out here, and hope that we can in turn help you guys be safer by stopping these slugs in their tracks.
God bless you....
One experienced Major Felony Detective to another, "Don't blame the DA's office for failure to go over the case. Yes it would be nice to know the line of questioning first, but don't count on them preparing you. I follow these rules:
*know exactly what I did in case
*Know what every other detective did.
*know what statements were taken and what was said.
*times, dates and weather
*What CSU collected, what was processed, what was sent to crime labe, and what were the results.
*what the def looks like, full, name, and what he had for breakfast.
* I could go on, but you get my drift, some detectives just read a court supp and that is it. No way dude, we are pro's at what we do.. or should be. Good luck.
Seems like a lot, but it usually takes me 2 hours to bone up for a murder case,but when the defense attorney is left looking helpless and bad guy has to buy stock in KY, it's all worth it.
Yes, you should prep yourself for a trial, but any DA with half a brain and who cared even a little bit about winning should question and prepare you for a trial or hearing. They should make sure you remember everything. They should be asking you questions. They should be letting you know what their concerns are. They should be giving you a heads up on what the defense is going to ask of you. They should let you know the defense attorney's strategy. They should be finding out if there is something about the case they don't know about. Maybe a case note got lost. Maybe they (the DA) don't know as much as they think they do about the law. Maybe they don't know what we do, what we can and can't do, and why we do what we do.
It isn't enought that the DA reads a report, you read your notes, then you show up to testify. The first time you talk about the case with the DA should not be after you were just sworn in.
They dont get bond in Gwinnett becuase they have good judges there that actually care about keeping the place they live safe.
ALSO if you fail to do everty thing in your power to keep someone in jail as an ADA in Gwinnett your FIRED. Period.
Danny Porter will fire you if you screw up a murder case. So you can bet ADA's are prosecuting the hell out of these cases and keeping on top of deadlines....like the 90 day indictment deadline.
No one seems to care in Dekalb or Fulton.
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