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MEMORANDUM
February 10, 2015
TO:
PORAC Board of Directors
FROM:
Marketplace Communications
RE:
PORAC News Flash
Following are today’s news clips
DATE
PUBLICATION
2.9.15
San Francisco Chronicle
2.9.15
2.9.15
2.9.15
2.9.15
Los Angeles Times
Sacramento Bee
San Francisco Chronicle
Los Angeles Times
2.9.15
Los Angeles Times
2.9.15
San Francisco Chronicle
2.10.15
Washington Post
TITLE
Yes, California, there is a death
penalty
AUTHOR
Debra J. Saunders
New L.A. alert system will
broadcast when fatal hit-andrun occurs
Laura J. Nelson and
Amy Hubbard
Analyst says revenue could be
billions higher than Jerry
Brown’s plan
Jim Miller
Mother of Antioch man killed
by deputy blasts response
Henry K. Lee
Top-two primary system hasn't
worked as proponents
promised
Mark Barabak
Hannah Graham suspect Jesse
Matthew Jr. charged with firstdegree murder
Brittny Mejia
Santa Clara police open fire at
vehicle in Sunnyvale
Kale Williams and
Henry K. Lee
Stoned drivers are a lot safer
than drunk ones, new federal
Christopher
Ingraham
4010 Truxel Road • Sacramento, CA 95834-3725 • (916) 928-3777 • FAX (916) 928-3760 • (800) 937-6722
data show
San Francisco Chronicle
Yes, California, there is a death penalty
By Debra J. Saunders Published 4:54 pm, Monday, February 9, 2015
http://www.sfgate.com/opinion/saunders/article/Yes-California-there-is-a-death-penalty-6071760.php
What happened to California’s death penalty? There has not been an execution since 2006, when a
federal judge ruled against the state’s three-drug lethal injection protocol. In 2008, the U.S. Supreme
Court upheld three-drug executions. It didn’t matter. Gov. Jerry Brown and Attorney General Kamala
Harris both personally oppose capital punishment, but as candidates promised to uphold the law. In real
life, they’ve let things slide. Fed up, two men related to murder victims have filed suit to push the state
to carry out the law.
Kermit Alexander wants to see the law work on Tiequon Cox, convicted of killing the former football
player’s mother, sister and two nephews in 1984 — Cox went to the wrong address for a $3,500
contract killing. Bradley Winchell is sick of waiting for the execution of Michael Morales, who raped,
hammered, strangled and stabbed to death his 17-year-old sister, Terri, in 1981. Sacramento Superior
Court Judge Shellyanne Chang ruled in their favor Friday after Harris challenged them on the dubious
grounds that crime victims and the general public “lack standing” to sue the state.
Brown had directed the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation in April 2012 to develop
rules that should pass court muster. What’s taking so long? Spokesman Jeffrey Callison answered that
his department has been working on “a single drug protocol” but “nationwide, there is a problem with
access to execution drugs and that is complicating efforts.”
California has used lethal injection since 1996 to spare condemned inmates unnecessary pain. Even still,
U.S. District Judge Jeremy Fogel stayed Morales’ execution as the judge perceived a 0.001 percent
chance the convicted killer might feel pain.
In other states not headed by Hamlets, leaders have found ways to anticipate court sensibilities and
keep faith with voters. Many adopted one-drug protocols. Death penalty foes responded by using their
considerable muscle to bar importation and choke the supply of lethal-injection drugs. Flat-footed
Sacramento stuck with the unused three-drug protocol for too long. While Brown’s Corrections
Department was working on a one-drug rule, Texas executed 38 killers with pentobarbital. The next time
you hear the cerebral governor argue that high-speed rail is doable, remember that he couldn’t pull off a
legal procedure that didn’t daunt former Texas Gov. Rick Perry.
If state corrections chief Jeffrey Beard ever does issue a one-drug protocol, it likely will sink like a stone.
Inmate apologists will go after doctors’ licenses, shackle supply and corral a friendly judge. Kent
Scheidegger of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, which represents Alexander and Winchell in the
suit, believes that if Brown is serious, his team will propose a one-drug protocol along with the option of
a gas, like carbon dioxide. Even the unscrupulous anti-death penalty lobby cannot isolate carbon
dioxide.
In 2012, California voters rejected a ballot measure to get rid of capital punishment. Alexander and
Winchell shouldn’t have to sue their government to enforce the law.
Los Angeles Times
New L.A. alert system will broadcast when fatal hit-and-run occurs
By LAURA J. NELSON AND AMY HUBBARD
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-los-angeles-hit-and-run-alert-system-20150210story.html
Los Angeles is set to introduce a mass alert system Tuesday that will broadcast to communities when a
fatal hit-and-run has occurred.
There is an epidemic of hit-and-run incidents in L.A. Nationwide, 11% of vehicle crashes are hit-and-run.
In L.A., it's almost 50%. Los Angeles police say nearly half of all crashes in Los Angeles end with the
culprit fleeing the scene.
From 2008 to 2012, the Los Angeles Police Department closed only one in five hit-and-run cases -meaning 80% went unresolved.
In 2014, 27 people died in hit-and-run crashes in L.A., and 144 others were severely injured, according to
the city.
The alert system will rely on Facebook, Twitter and Nixle — a website where government agencies share
information with their communities — to report on recent hit-and-run collisions.
Law enforcement officials say that sharing information about a crash, such as the make and model of
the car involved or a description of the driver, could help increase arrests and convictions among the
more than 20,000 hit-and-run crashes that happen each year.
Joe Buscaino and Mitchell Englander, members of the Los Angeles City Council, also are set to propose a
standing reward for information that leads to the arrest and conviction of a hit-and-run driver.
Fleeing the scene of an accident where someone was killed or severely injured is a felony punishable by
up to four years in prison and $10,000 in fines. Drivers convicted of misdemeanor hit-and-run —
typically, cases in which no one was seriously injured — can face $1,000 in fines and up to a year in jail.
As the L.A. Times recently reported, state Assemblyman Mike Gatto (D-Los Angeles) in December
introduced a bill that would allow the California Highway Patrol to display details on hit-and-run drivers
on electronic freeway signs near the scene of a crash.
That same bill had been vetoed in September by Gov. Jerry Brown, who did not want the notifications to
overwhelm the Amber Alert system.
Gatto told the L.A. Times: "The reason why so many people flee after accidents is because there's very
little chance that they will actually be brought to justice."
Sacramento Bee
Analyst says revenue could be billions higher than Jerry Brown’s plan
BY JIM MILLER
02/09/2015 3:54 PM
The Legislature’s nonpartisan fiscal analyst continues to believe that the state will collect an additional
$1 billion to $2 billion, and maybe more, through June compared to what the Brown administration
estimated in its January spending plan.
In a new review of incomes, sales and corporate tax collections, the Legislative Analyst’s Office reports
that January revenue was about $512 million above estimates in the budget plan released by Gov. Jerry
Brown last month. But the biggest piece of that – $500 million in additional sales-tax money generated
by holiday sales – is likely a quirk of timing because January ended on a weekend.
“This all suggests that February sales taxes will fall below projections by a large amount,” the LAO
reported.
Overall, though, the analyst’s office remains “of the opinion that 2014-15 General Fund revenues are
likely to exceed the administration's new projections by $1 billion to $2 billion and perhaps more,
barring a sustained stock market drop between now and June,” the office reported.
Additional income and corporate tax revenue comes with potential downsides, though. Virtually all of
the money will be absorbed by the state’s constitutional school-funding guarantee, levels that may be
hard to maintain if revenue falls.
Little of the new money, meanwhile, is available for other, non-school programs. And higher revenue
likely would increase how much money has to be set aside to pay off debt and for the state’s rainy-day
reserve, the LAO concludes.
Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitolalert/article9638315.html#storylink=cpy
San Francisco Chronicle
Mother of Antioch man killed by deputy blasts response
By Henry Lee Updated 9:13 pm, Monday, February 9, 2015
http://www.sfgate.com/crime/article/Mother-of-Antioch-man-killed-by-deputy-blasts-6071706.php
Dewayne Deshawn Ward Jr., 29, was shot by a Contra Costa County sheriff's deputy on Feb. 3 after
Ward charged at the deputy with a knife at his mother's home in Antioch.
Image 1 of 2Dewayne Deshawn Ward Jr., 29, was shot by a Contra Costa County sheriff's deputy on Feb.
3 after Ward charged at the deputy with a knife at his mother's home in Antioch.
The mother of an Antioch man killed by a Contra Costa County sheriff’s deputy angrily criticized the
agency Monday, saying her son was schizophrenic and needed medical help.
Dewayne Deshawn Ward Jr., 29, was shot by K-9 Deputy Scott Pliler on Feb. 3 after Ward charged at the
deputy with a knife at his mother’s home on Claudia Court, authorities said.
Pliler, a 13-year veteran, was trying to serve Ward with a domestic violence restraining order that had
been filed a week earlier by Ward’s mother, Yolanda Dozier.
In an interview Monday, Dozier, 55, confirmed she had filed the court papers — which included a
provision that her son move out — because Ward had punched her several times on New Year’s Day,
leaving her with bruises and a black eye.
But Dozier said the Sheriff’s Office confronted her son when he instead needed medical help because he
was schizophrenic and heard voices.
“My son wasn’t himself at the time he did that, you know what I’m saying? My son was somebody else,”
she said of the Jan. 1 incident. “My son needed some help. He needed his medicine, so it’s not like he
tried to kill me or hurt me or anything.”
She said she didn’t press charges because she didn’t want him jailed. Police told her to get a court order.
On the day of the shooting, deputies contacted Ward, who “did not obey verbal commands” and began
resisting, said sheriff’s spokesman Jimmy Lee. Deputies then used pepper spray, a police dog and a stun
gun on Ward, but “they did not appear to have any effect on him,” and Pliler opened fire, Lee said.
Ward, who had also been sought on a no-bail probation warrant, died at the scene from numerous
gunshot wounds to the chest and abdomen, Lee said.
The shooting is under investigation by the Sheriff’s Office and county district attorney’s office
investigators. Ward’s death will also be the subject of a county coroner’s inquest.
Dozier said her son, the father of a 6-year-old daughter,“was a good son.” She said she didn’t believe he
was armed with a knife and that even if he was, the deputy didn’t have to shoot him numerous times.
Referring to the restraining order, she began crying as she added, “I did what they told me to do, but
they went in there and killed my son.”
Los Angeles Times
Top-two primary system hasn't worked as proponents promised
By MARK Z. BARABAK
http://www.latimes.com/local/politics/la-me-pol-california-politics-20150208-story.html
Reinvention is part of California's credo, the inalienable right of every man, woman and child to make of
themselves and their lives what they will — and do it over again, if they're not happy the first time.
Second chances, surgical alterations, artificial enhancement — the only limits are wealth and the
imagination.
That extends not just to the body beautiful but the body politic.
After years of partisan squabbling, massive budget deficits and general haplessness in Sacramento,
voters grew fed up and decided it was time for a government makeover. One result was Proposition 14,
passed in June 2010 and intended to help bring a new breed of more accommodating, less ideological
lawmaker to the state capital. (The proposition also covered congressional and U.S. Senate contests, for
good measure.)
It was supposed to work like this: Candidates would run in a free-for-all primary with the two top votegetters advancing to a November runoff, regardless of party affiliation. Absent the need to appease the
most puritanical elements of the major parties, the thinking went, candidates would broaden their
appeal to the many voters in the middle.
Voila! A more harmonious, pragmatic and productive Legislature. (Fixing Washington's scabrous culture
would, presumably, take longer.)
Has it worked? In short, no, not yet.
New academic research, published Sunday by the California Journal of Politics & Policy, found that
voters were just as apt to support candidates representing the same partisan poles as they were before
the election rules changed — that is, if they even bothered voting.
Moreover, the studies found, while there is indication of a somewhat more "business-friendly" —
another way of saying moderate — approach to lawmaking by Sacramento's majority Democrats, there
is no conclusive evidence the change resulted from California's new way of choosing its lawmakers.
"To summarize, our articles find very limited support for the moderating effects associated with the toptwo primary," Washington University's Betsy Sinclair wrote, summarizing half a dozen research papers.
(A link to the journal, published by the Institute of Governmental Studies at UC Berkeley, is here.)
It is much too soon, after fewer than a handful of elections, to draw definitive conclusions about the
top-two primary, much less declare it a success or failure. Like any change, it will take a period of
adjustment, not least for Californians accustomed to approaching their ballot in a more conventional
fashion. As Sinclair wrote, "It is possible that voters simply need to adapt."
But the research, based on thousands of voter interviews and data from the last two elections, does
suggest impediments that must be overcome if the system is to have its desired moderating effect.
For starters, voters will have to pay far closer attention to their choices. Some candidates may have
hugged the middle in a bid to entice more pragmatic-minded voters, but the research suggests relatively
few voters noticed. There was little discernment between, say, a flaming liberal and a more
accommodating Democrat; in most voters' minds they fell under the same party umbrella.
In addition, voters will have to be less partisan themselves, showing a far greater willingness to support
a moderate of the other party over a more extreme member of their own. Research into 2012's state
Assembly races found an exceedingly small percentage of so-called cross-over voters: just 5.5% of
Democrats and 7.6% of Republicans sided with a candidate from the other party.
"Orphaned voters," or those who didn't have a candidate from their party advance to the general
election, typically lost interest in the contest; so, for instance, rather than support the more moderate of
two Republicans in a November runoff, Democrats simply didn't vote.
The top-two system also fell short on another of its promises: boosting turnout.
Voters with no party preference — the fastest-growing segment of the state electorate — were
forbidden from casting ballots under the old system of partisan primaries. One selling point of
Proposition 14 was that independents would be allowed to participate in the nominating process,
broadening the pool of potential voters.
But as researchers noted, the June 2014 primary drew barely 1 in 4 registered voters, the lowest turnout
in California history.
Proponents of the ballot measure didn't necessarily mislead people. But they seem to have invested
more hope than merited in the virtues of their transformative surgery.
To have its promised effect, Proposition 14 will have to overcome both widespread ignorance and deep
apathy among California voters.
Otherwise, the reform is just skin deep.
Los Angeles Times
Hannah Graham suspect Jesse Matthew Jr. charged with first-degree murder
By BRITTNY MEJIA
http://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-suspect-in-hannah-graham-charged-murder20150210-story.html
Suspect in disappearance of University of Virginia student charged with first-degree murder
Jesse Matthew Jr., the man linked to the deaths of two Virginia college students, has been indicted on a
murder charge in the death of Hannah Graham.
Matthew has been charged with first-degree murder in connection with last year's disappearance and
death of University of Virginia student Graham, the Albemarle County, Va., prosecutor said at a press
conference Tuesday morning. Matthew had previously been charged with abduction with an intent to
defile.
"The prosecution for the abduction and murder of Hannah will bring Mr. Matthew to justice for these
crimes," prosecutor Denise Lunsford said. "These indictments signal the beginning of the next phase in
what has been an incredibly difficult process."
Lunsford pointed out that Matthew had not been charged with capital murder. While she wouldn't go
into specifics about the decision, she said a "great deal of serious thought went into this determination,
including the impact on the community, the Grahams and the need to provide Mr. Matthew with a fair
trial."
Graham vanished the morning of Sept. 13 and her remains were discovered a few weeks later. The
college student had been at a bar in Charlottesville the night of her disappearance, and police released
surveillance videos that show her running and stumbling.
Police said last year that forensic evidence also links Matthew to the 2009 disappearance and death of
Morgan Harrington, a 20-year-old Virginia Tech student. Harrington disappeared during a Oct. 17, 2009,
concert on the University of Virginia campus in Charlottesville and her remains were found the following
January in a field.
At the press conference, Lunsford said both Graham and Harrington's families were made aware of the
charges. There are no pending charges against Matthew in the Harrington case, Lunsford said.
"The case involving Hannah Graham was ready to be charged first," Lunsford said.
Matthew is scheduled to appear on the murder charge on Feb. 18 at 11 a.m. The appearance is expected
to be over video.
Matthew is also scheduled for a Friday hearing in connection to a separate 2005 case. An indictment,
filed in Fairfax County, Va., Circuit Court in October, alleges that Matthew abducted, sexually assaulted
and tried to kill a woman in 2005.
San Francisco Chronicle
Santa Clara police open fire at vehicle in Sunnyvale
By Kale Williams and Henry Lee Updated 8:32 am, Tuesday, February 10, 2015
A Santa Clara police officer fired shots at a vehicle Monday night in Sunnyvale after the driver tried to hit
the officer, authorities said.
The shooting happened near El Camino Real and South Wolfe Road about 6:35 p.m.
A Santa Clara officer in an unmarked sport utility vehicle had pulled over a white Mercedes-Benz in
connection with an auto-burglary investigation, Capt. Shawn Ahearn of the Sunnyvale Department of
Public Safety told reporters.
“During the attempt to stop the vehicle, the vehicle drove toward the officer at a high rate of speed,”
Ahearn said.
Fearing for his safety, the officer, who wasn’t named, fired several shots, possibly hitting the right side
of the Mercedes, police said.
“All we know right now is that he feared enough for his life, that he was going to be pinned between the
two vehicles, that he decided to take the force that he did and shoot at the vehicle,” Ahearn said. “We’ll
know more as we investigate this.”
Santa Clara police chased after the Mercedes but lost it, authorities said.
It wasn’t immediately known whether anyone in the car was hit, but police had alerted area hospitals to
be on the lookout for any gunshot victims.
No one was hit by gunfire at the scene of the shooting.
It’s not the first time that a shooting involving an outside agency took place in Sunnyvale.
In 2013, five Santa Clara police officers and a county sheriff’s deputy shot and killed unarmed drugdealing suspect Juan Ruelas, 34, outside the Hobee’s restaurant at 800 W. Ahwanee Ave. in Sunnyvale.
The officers were cleared of any criminal wrongdoing by prosecutors, who said that although Ruelas
didn’t have a gun, he made a movement that led the officers to believe he was armed.
Washington Post
Stoned drivers are a lot safer than drunk ones, new federal data show
By Christopher Ingraham
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/02/09/stoned-drivers-are-a-lot-safer-thandrunk-ones-new-federal-data-show/
A new study from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration finds that drivers who use
marijuana are at a significantly lower risk for a crash than drivers who use alcohol. And after adjusting
for age, gender, race and alcohol use, drivers who tested positive for marijuana were no more likely to
crash than who had not used any drugs or alcohol prior to driving.
The chart above tells the story. For marijuana, and for a number of other legal and illegal drugs including
antidepressants, painkillers, stimulants and the like, there is no statistically significant change in the risk
of a crash associated with using that drug prior to driving. But overall alcohol use, measured at a blood
alcohol concentration (BAC) threshold of 0.05 or above, increases your odds of a wreck nearly sevenfold.
The study's findings underscore an important point: that the measurable presence of THC (marijuana's
primary active ingredient) in a person's system doesn't correlate with impairment in the same way that
blood alcohol concentration does. The NHTSA doesn't mince words: "At the current time, specific drug
concentration levels cannot be reliably equated with a specific degree of driver impairment."
There are a whole host of factors why detectable drug presence doesn't indicate impairment the way it
does with alcohol. "Most psychoactive drugs are chemically complex molecules, whose absorption,
action, and elimination from the body are difficult to predict," the report authors write, "and
considerable differences exist between individuals with regard to the rates with which these processes
occur. Alcohol, in comparison, is more predictable." In heavy marijuana users, measurable amounts of
THC can be detectable in the body days or even weeks after the last use, and long after any psychoactive
effects remain.
Several states have passed laws attempting to define "marijuana-impaired driving" similarly to drunk
driving. Colorado, for instance, sets a blood THC threshold of 0.5 nanograms per milliliter. But that
number tells us next to nothing about whether a person is impaired or fit to drive. The implication is that
these states are locking up people who are perfectly sober.
A companion study released by the NHTSA identified a sharp jump in the number of weekend night-time
drivers testing positive for THC between 2007 and 2013/2014, from 8.6 percent to 12.6 percent.
Numbers like these are alarming at first glance. They generate plenty of thoughtless media coverage.
They're used by marijuana legalization opponents to conjure up the bogeyman of legions of stoned
drivers menacing the nation's roads.
But all these numbers really tell us is that more people are using marijuana at some point in the days or
weeks before they drive. With legalization fully underway in several states, there's nothing surprising
about this. "The change in use may reflect the emergence of a new trend in the country that warrants
monitoring," the NHTSA study concludes.
So, should we all assume that we're safe to blaze one and go for a joyride whenever the whimsy strikes
us? Absolutely not. There's plenty of evidence showing that marijuana use impairs key driving skills. If
you get really stoned and then get behind the wheel, you're asking for trouble.
What we do need, however, are better roadside mechanisms for detecting marijuana-related
impairment. Several companies are developing pot breathalyzers for this purpose.
We also need a lot more research into the effects of marijuana use on driving ability, particularly to get a
better sense of how pot's effect on driving diminishes in the hours after using. But this kind of research
remains incredibly difficult to do, primarily because the federal government still classifies weed as a
Schedule 1 substance, as dangerous as heroin.