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From the moment Gascon was elected, he introduced a buffet of wide-ranging criminal justice reforms.
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Cops found the two victims in the historic Mount Washington neighbourhood in Los Angeles.
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Someone had parked a slew of bullets into their bodies sometime a little after midnight on Thursday. Witnesses said the gunmen approached the pair and then opened fire.
Both were dead at the scene.
But things are about to change in crime-ravaged Southern California.
The man called the “Godfather of Progressive Prosecutors,” Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascon, has been kicked to the curb by fed-up voters.
In the wake of George Floyd and the resultant rioting in 2020, Gascon became billionaire George Soros’s golden boy. There were other soft-on-crime DAs across the U.S. but none quite as committed as the perma-tanned Gascon.
Few of the others had gangbanging killers boasting they were going to get tattoos of the DA plastered on their arms because of their infuriatingly light sentences, as Luis Angel Hernandez did.
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From the moment Gascon was elected, he introduced a buffet of wide-ranging criminal justice reforms. Some of these reforms would have undoubtedly delighted criminal justice tinkerers in Ottawa.
Gascon eliminated cash bail, refused to seek the death penalty for even the most heinous homicides, and refused to try juveniles as adults, even if they were killers.
The result was violence and chaos.
The Los Angeles Times reported that violent crime jumped 8% in L.A. County from 2019 to 2023.
“The voters of Los Angeles County have spoken and have said enough is enough of D.A. Gascon’s pro-criminal extreme policies, they look forward to a safer future,” winner Nathan Hochman, a former federal prosecutor, said in a statement Wednesday.
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The voters agreed. Gascon — who Hochman described as a “public safety failure” — got less than 40% of the ballots cast.
“As D.A., I look forward to representing all of the people, whether they voted for me or not, since their safety will be my responsibility,” Hochman said.
So far, Gascon has not commented on his defeat.
But the woke DA gave his rival plenty of ammunition on the campaign trail. Even Gascon’s assistant district attorneys resigned in droves and called for him to quit.
More than 20 of them are now suing the lame-duck lawyer claiming they were demoted and retaliated against if they questioned the DA’s soft-on-crime policies.
Their union called Hochman’s victory a “pivotal moment in the fight to return balance and accountability to the justice system.”
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What’s next for Los Angeles? Hochman vowed on the hustings to “make crimes illegal again.”
Prosecutors will have the discretion to seek the death penalty for the vilest murders and wider sentencing enhancements (i.e. longer prison sentences for gangbangers).
Already voters approved a measure on Tuesday to make shoplifting a felony again for repeat offenders. Some sentences for drug offences will also be sweetened.
This is all dire news for the likes of Shanice Dyer, 22. Dyer — a member of the Crips whose street name is Infant Chyna — was charged with premeditated murder in 2019 by the DA’s predecessor.
She cut down two innocent men, an expectant father and a NASA scientist. They were in the wrong hood.
Gascon tried the then 17-year-old as a juvenile and she was sentenced to four years and served less.
In early October, just months out of prison, she was charged with being an accomplice in the murder of Joshua Streeter, 21, who was shot in the back.
Social experiments are best left in the faculty lounge, not the cold hard streets. George Gascon knows that now.
bhunter@postmedia.com
@HunterTOSun
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