Everyday Injustice

Everyday Injustice Podcast Episode 121: Be the Jury - Pilot Would Pay Jurors $100 a Day To Serve

One of the biggest problems in the criminal legal system is that the notion of being tried by a jury of one’s peers has been disgarded. A large number of people of color await trial in the system only to face a jury pool that is overly white, affluent, and retired.

That is because working people and people of color are unable to serve on juries given the hardship caused by lost wages.

AB 1452, authored by Assemblymember Phil Ting, would authorize a first-of-its-kind pilot program in San Francisco Superior Court. The program will compensate low-income jurors $100 a day for their jury service with the goal of establishing juries that are more reflective of San Francisco’s diverse communities.

“The right to a jury of one’s peers is at the core of our justice system, but it’s common for my office, and our clients, to see juries that do not reflect the diversity of our city and our communities,” said San Francisco Public Defender Mano Raju. “I began raising this issue as a line deputy public defender, based on what we were seeing in court and based on what we were hearing from the community. After becoming the elected Public Defender of San Francisco, I approached the Treasurer and suggested this concrete step to address what is really a nationwide problem. After years of hard work, I am pleased that it has now evolved into a bill that will bring us one step closer towards providing fairer trials. It will also hopefully increase civic engagement opportunities for potential jurors who are otherwise deprived of the right to serve.”

“As a champion for promoting diversity in our jury pools, I am proud to co-sponsor AB 1452. Justice and fairness demand that the jurors tasked with making decisions on behalf of the community actually reflect the diversity of our city. The pilot project established by AB 1452 would be an important step towards advancing diverse jury pools in San Francisco and I urge the legislature to pass this bill,” said San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin.

Everyday Injustice discusses the legislation and the impact on the system in this week’s episodes.

GUESTS:

Deputy Public Defender Niki Solis, Chair of the Racial Justice Committee at the San Francisco Public Defender's Office.

Anne Stuhldreher, Director of the Financial Justice Project in the Office of the Treasurer for the City and County of San Francisco.

Cesar McDowell chronicles his journey from San Quentin to becoming, while still incarcerated, the co-founder and CEO of Unite The People Inc., a non profit organization that promotes social justice and offers affordable legal services throughout the state of California.

After spending 20 years in prison and falling victim to the social inequality in our criminal justice system, McDowell founded his organization from his prison cell with the hope of saving all those who have been wrongly prosecuted and sentenced.

It is an incredible story of perseverance and redemption and McDowell walks the audience through it.

McDowell on Everyday Injustice shares his story about how he spent 20 years incarcerated in one of the CDCR's toughest facilities, San Quentin State Prison; under an illegal sentence.

Alana Mathews is running for DA for the office currently held by Anne Marie Schubert, who is not seeking re-election (and running for California AG).

She graduated from Spelman College in Atlanta, becoming the first person in her family to earn a college degree. She went on to receive her law degree from McGeorge School of Law while raising her three children.

While serving as a Deputy District Attorney in Sacramento County, she worked her way up from misdemeanor jury trials to prosecuting perpetrators of domestic violence, juvenile delinquency, general felony, and prison crime cases.

Alana Mathews now works for the Prosecutors Alliance of California, a coalition of reform-minded prosecutors working to promote criminal justice reform statewide and teaches at McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento.

Listen as Alana Mathews talks about her candidacy and the challenges facing the criminal legal system.

85 percent of those incarcerated will be released at some point. 7 in 10 people who are released will re-offend. If we are going to transform the criminal legal system, we need a better way to allow those who have been released to turn their lives around.

Meet Leslie Robinson, Inventor of the Recharge Beyond the Bars Re-entry game, Leslie is a therapist in New York City, and she was a Consultant for the foster care system for twenty years. Leslie is the President of Beyond the Bars LLC, CEO and Founder of Trance4mation Games, and the President and Founder of the non-profit, Trance4mation Nation, Inc

The RECHARGE Beyond the Bars Re-Entry Game, was created in 2013, to help incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people process and heal from their experiences and to reintegrate into their families and communities, as well as to process their incarceration experience with their peers. This game is presently being utilized in re-entry programs in and outside of prisons, mentoring programs, work release programs, maximum security, sex offender units, substance abuse treatment programs, by cognitive-behavioral therapists, in mental health units, prison literacy programs, life skills programs, restrictive housing units, in general population, probation groups, by families, in prison visits, by church and faith-based organizations, in classrooms, by Social Workers, and many more.

The Recharge Beyond the Bars Re-entry game is the world’s first product specifically designed to aid the social, emotional and communication struggles of presently and formerly incarcerated men and women.

For those whose lives have been filled with punishment and rejection, Recharge Offers a new experience of acceptance, appreciation, understanding and validation and builds bridges back home.

Listen as Leslie Robinson joins Everyday Injustice to discuss her story and the success of her approach.

On July 13, 2021, one of kind, radical attorney Tony Serra joined the Vanguard for a live webinar and podcast. At the age of 86, he is not only still practicing as an attorney but continues to have the drive and passion that has driven his long and storied career as an attorney.

Listen as he discusses his career, some of the notable cases he has defended and the Chief Stankowitz case.

Santa Clara Public Defender Sajid Khan recently announced he was running for District Attorney.

His announcement follows events of a year ago last summer when in response a pointed column by Khan, Santa Clara DA Jeff Rosen threatened to initiate a whistleblower retaliation proceedings against the Santa Clara County Deputy Public Defender.

“Santa Clara County needs a true progressive as its District Attorney. I will be that person,” he said. “As District Attorney for all people, I will be committed to truth-telling about systemic racism, shrinking mass criminalization, addressing root causes of crime, and bringing the criminal legal system in line with basic notions of justice and humanity.”

For the last 13 years, Khan has been a public defender serving Santa Clara County. He has fought for people’s constitutional rights, and against systemic racism, and against mass incarceration. He has sat in the county jails and juvenile hall, representing countless individuals.

Khan was born in San Jose to Muslim immigrants from Madras, India. His mother worked as a laboratory scientist at O’Connor Hospital, and his late father was a physicist in the semiconductor industry who established a mosque and later a school, both in Santa Clara.

Sajid Khan speaks to Everyday Injustice about his candidacy and his vision for transformative change in Santa Clara County.

Donald Watson was convicted of felony murder but thanks to SB 1437, the law by Nancy Skinner, that allows people convicted of murder who were not the actual killer or major participants to petition for resentencing, Watson was able to get released from prison.

During his time in prison, he had become a jailhouse lawyer and helped his fellow incarcerated individuals file motions and petitions. He has parlayed that into a business where he acts as a paralegal, filing motions and helped incarcerated individuals and others file motions with the court for release or resentencing.

Silverio Strong spent 32 years incarcerated off and on from the time he was 12. Finally, he got involved in a robbery and attempted murder and received a 20 year sentence. On Everyday Injustice he talks about going from the troubled young man to someone who helps mentor others and has put together a successful life following his release from prison.

He is now a spokesperson and board member for Hustle 2.0, a group that is led by formerly incarcerated to help the currently incarcerated, “Hustle 2.0 reduces crime, violence, and recidivism through evidence-based correspondence programs that equip incarcerated people with the tools to transform their lives by changing their thoughts and behaviors.”

Earlier this season on Everyday Injustice, we spoke with Flint Taylor who highlighted his years of fighting to expose the Chicago Torture Scandal. We also spoke with former Illinois Governor George Ryan who ended the death penalty in Illinois in part due to the torture scandal. And this week we talk more about the torture scandal and the death row 10 with four guests, two of whom were past survivors of the torture machine by former Police Captain Jon Burge.

Three of these men were tortured into making false confessions landing on death row. One remains incarcerated but the death penalty was ended in Illinois by Governor Ryan in part due to the efforts of the Death Row 10. This is a story of their work from the inside to expose this scandal and force the hand of the governor.

Mark Clements: Organizer Chicago Torture Justice Center

Ronnie Kitchen: Death row wrongfully convicted, Jon Burge torture survivor

Stanley Howard: D eath row wrongfully convicted, Jon Burge torture survivor

Joan Parkin: One of the activists who helped to pressure the governor to commute the sentences of the death row incarcerated people.

Prosecutorial misconduct continues to be widespread in the courts across the country. As a report from a decade ago discovered – with over 800 instances of documented prosecutorial misconduct, much of it serious with grave effects, courts, district attorneys, and bar associations “rarely hold prosecutors accountable for their misconduct. In fact, the whole system incentivizes misconduct by using “court wins” to measure prosecutorial success.”

Accountability NY is a non-profit coalition of law professors and public interest groups seeking consequences for prosecutorial misconduct.

Overview of the project:

• The power prosecutors have in the criminal justice system and how their misconduct frequently goes unnoticed

• How harmful their misconduct is to individuals, families, communities, and to the legal system itself

• Why grievances were the way Accountability NY approached this issue (Currently the only avenue for accountability in New York)

• What this means nationally. This is a nationwide issue plus it is happening at a time when there is a national movement for police accountability -- police accountability and prosecutorial accountability go hand in hand.

Everyday injustice speaks with Steve Zeidman, Professor, Director of the Criminal Defense Clinic, has spent the last 25 years working in the area of criminal defense.