Violent crimes continue amid a strong push to keep New Orleans elected officials honest about what they’re doing about it. Meanwhile, people are being shot and killed, and residents are frustrated. Rafael Goyneche of the Metropolitan Crime Commission believes that District Attorney Jason Williams has changed his tune on prosecuting offenders, but there are other obstacles preventing crime from decreasing in the city.
Making the headlines is another case of a murder suspect, Montreal Bayham, who Williams decided not to prosecute for prior charges. Are we seeing any changes in prosecution from the DA’s office?
According to the MCC, the DA's office is doing things differently with respect to violent felony cases. In January of this year, we released a report showing that Williams just wasn’t prosecuting 701 cases. When we started releasing our weekly prosecution reports, the DA's office’s acceptance rate had increased by 14% this year. Their dismissal rate reduced by 50% and their felony conviction rate increased by 75%. In the case you described, the individual was given a second chance with diversion, but they violated those conditions. Part of diversion is to provide counseling and access to programs that he didn't take advantage of, and didn't complete. So he goes right back into the same environment and he progresses as a criminal.
Our elected officials are not making the connection or understanding the nexus between vehicle burglaries and those trying to steal weapons and other things.
An automobile burglary is classified as a property offense and a nonviolent offense.
When Jason Williams was running for DA, he was focused on the lions, tigers and bears of crime, and not the rabbits and squirrels. The only thing separating a nonviolent automobile burglary from a crime of violence in many instances, is if the car owner confronts the offender. We know from the security camera on most homes that the burglars are already armed when they’re committing the crime… Judges and the DA’s office cannot just look at the offense. They have to look at the offender in the context of their criminal history, when you make decisions on these cases. Not all automobile burglaries are nonviolent.
It's been my experience that if you get one guy that's responsible for 20 or 30 of these vehicle burglaries, or end up putting a dozen of these guys in jail, you’ll put a significant dent in criminal activity.
All of the crimes that we have are not committed by individual distinct offenders. It's a relatively small number of repeat offenders that are out committing crime.. If we could identify, arrest, prosecute and convict the hundred worst offenders, we would see our crime rate plummet. If we could even get one of the 100 worst offenders off the streets that one out of 100 would be responsible for a number of unsolved crimes. More importantly, it is going to prevent future crimes from being committed.
