 Hi, good evening. My name is Sandy Baird, and I'm here at my office in the African Association, the Association of Africans Living in Vermont, and I'm here with Sarah George, who is our current state's attorney, and that is the main prosecutor of Chittenden County. And I wanted her to be a guest tonight to talk about the special role that prosecutors have in our legal system and the rather enormous power that a prosecutor has. And Sarah is happy, I hope, to explain that role and to explain it's a very unique role within the whole judiciary system, because I believe that the prosecutor, and Sarah will tell you this, represents the people of the state of Vermont. I remember I was a prosecutor for a couple of years in my early days as an attorney, and when you went to a jury trial, I was always careful to explain that, that the prosecutor does not represent any one individual, but in fact represents all the people of Chittenden County. And Sarah, I think, will be able to tell us more because she, of course, is the current prosecutor and is in charge of, or has a great deal of power within the system. So this is also sponsored by the Vermont Institute of Community and International Involvement, and also by an institution which I'm attempting to organize called the People's Law School or the People's Law Center. So Sarah, welcome. I'm happy to have you here. And I guess we will start, I think, with, I will start with asking you, what is the prosecutor's role within the legal system? Thank you. And thank you so much for having me, Sandi. I always look forward to these conversations. You're absolutely right. The prosecutor represents the people. So when we charge somebody with a crime, it will say the state of Vermont versus a particular person. And we, my office is responsible for all of the criminal prosecution that happens in... We lost you. I think everybody got muted there. My office is in charge of the prosecution for any criminal activity that occurs in Chittenden County. Every county has a prosecutor's office, a state's attorney's office and an elected state's attorney that controls that office. So there's 14 counties in Vermont. That means there are 14 elected state's attorneys, each of whom has an office and they hire deputy state's attorneys to work underneath them. Most other states call the same position, a district attorney, a DA. People will usually understand that a little bit better than state's attorneys. I have no idea why in Vermont we're called state's attorneys when we are county elected. And I don't know where that comes from. I'm sure there's a VPR episode on it somewhere. But in my office is obviously the largest in the state. We, you know, Chittenden County holds about a third of the state's population. When we are fully staffed, which is rare, my office has 13 deputy state's attorneys and myself, so 14 attorneys and then four victim advocates and then seven administrative staff that do some paralegal work and some administrative paperwork staff. And law enforcement sends us cases. We review the cases, determine whether- What do you mean by that? The law enforcement? You mean the police, correct? So police in Chittenden County, all the agencies investigate a particular crime. They decide from their perspective whether there's probable cause, which is a very, very low standard. It means that it's more likely than not that something happened. And the evidence is always weighed in favor of the state at that juncture. So those, the paperwork comes to us and- Which is an affidavit, correct? From the police, right? Correct. It's a certain affidavit of probable cause is what it's called. Plus other stuff too. They might also include some sworn statements from witnesses or their axon, their body camera footage, those types of things. We review that and decide whether we think that there is probable cause. And if there is, whether we think charging that case, whether we have the tools that we need to actually address the harm. And if we decide that we do, then we charge it and file it with the court and the person gets arraigned. And then the case proceeds in a bunch of different ways, which we can go into. Okay, so what is the paperwork? The affidavit comes from the police, correct? That's correct. And then the prosecutor decides what charge is brought also, right? And whether or not it would be a felony or a misdemeanor. And you decide then based on kind of how much at least some evidence is included in the affidavit, right? But the evidence does not have to be the kind of evidence that's introduced in the court. The affidavit can include, for instance, hearsay. Is that right? That's correct. Yep. Okay. All of that can go towards probable cause. It isn't then after that it isn't admissible in court. We have to actually bring in the person who said the thing in court to prove the case. So you get the information from the police, right? And then you decide the charge. Do you also at that point you decide what that the case is brought or diverted? So maybe you can say, yeah, what's diversion? All of it. So we would first, we often will get things from law enforcement, we'll get an information or affidavit from them that might say, we think there's probable cause for these five offenses. And we'll go through it and say, we actually think there's only probable cause for three of the offenses. And so we're going to charge those, or they might say they might send them as misdemeanors and we think there's evidence of a felony or vice versa. Or they might send it for one misdemeanor case and we see three others and might charge other cases as well. So what they send it as isn't necessarily binding or isn't binding, we look at it and determine what we think is appropriate. And part of the reasoning for that is that we have statutes, obviously, with different elements for each crime. And that's often what law enforcement is using to make to guide their decisions. But we also have what's called case law that's happening every day in our court where we will file a charge and defense will argue a particular reason why they think that charge should be dismissed. And judges will make decisions about what they think the state should be proving on these cases that will impact our charging decisions. And sometimes that information is really hard to keep law enforcement updated on because it's happening all over the state every day all the time. So we look at it, decide whether we think there is. If we think the person did commit the crime, but there's other ways to address the harm. Like what? Like diversion or restorative justice processes or TAMRAC. Those are all programs within our community that allow us to send cases to them. And they will come up with what to do with the person. And it's usually engage in services. It might be to pay restitution. It might be to do community service. It might be to engage in mental health counseling or substance use counseling. And if they do those things, the case doesn't go through our court system. So we do it. You dismiss it at that point. If they do it, if the defendant does what he or she says, you know, you ask them to do, then the case gets dismissed, which is basically erased. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. And if they've either gone through that process a lot before or we tried that and it didn't work, or it's a crime of violence that is just too significant to send through a program like that, then we will charge it through the normal process and, you know, go through the litigation process in court. But we try to do as much as we can outside of it, because typically, even on our best days, the court process is really long. It's not super friendly to victims. It's very traumatizing and re-triggering for victims. So we try to keep as much as we can in these other processes. But with COVID, it's even worse. So despite the governor lifting the state of emergency over a year ago, despite Burlington mayor lifting the state of emergency over a year ago, the Vermont Supreme Court has extended the COVID state of emergency. Right. It's still in place. It actually just got extended again through the end of August. So our courts are still not open. We are still entirely virtual. Entirely? And people can go in court if they want. They can have a couple of people in a courtroom at a time. But nobody is expected. Nobody is expected to be there. Most people are still working remotely or appearing remotely. And the people charged are still not being required to come into court. So we have an incredible backlog. The nonviolent cases aren't even being set by the court. Wait a minute. Nonviolent cases are not being set like in settlement and all that. Those kinds of crimes. Yeah. What's happening to them? I don't really know. They're in a... Honest? Oh my God. They're just sort of sitting aside. And despite my best efforts, the court is just not scheduling them. So there is this misinformation, disinformation being kind of spread in the community that we're not charging certain cases like retail thefts, car thefts, those types of things. The reality is that we are. We're charging them and we're sending them to court. And then the court is just not doing anything with them. Sarah, how can that be? Because with the judicial emergency, there's an order from the Supreme Court to prioritize cases of violence and to limit the number of people and cases coming through the courthouse. And so the judges are taking that to mean that most of these nonviolent offenses are not a priority that we need to be charging and litigating violent offenses before we move on to these other cases. I would say DUIs are being scheduled. So those are not technically by law, violent offense, and those are being scheduled by the court. But most other things are not. And we are trying, like just because they're not being scheduled in court, we are trying to still resolve those cases and do whatever we might be able to do to file plea agreements. But without us being proactive about that, the court isn't isn't requiring it, which is a huge problem. No, I know I've been trying to deal with the other parts of the court for two years on this electronic system. And it's very, very difficult. I think Jim Lockridge might have a question. Is that right, Jim? Yeah. Can you help me with this? Yeah. You kidding? Thanks, Andy. And thanks, Sarah. There's a question in the chat that is pretty straightforward. Yeah. So I didn't say it, though. I'll read it. I'll read it. So this is about there have been an uptick in car thefts since COVID. They're actually a case or a charge that we really don't see a lot in historically in Chittenden County. And I don't know if the rest of the state. But during COVID, we saw an uptick in them. What was happening is a lot of folks without homes were stealing cars and living in those cars. And then when they'd get caught, the car would get returned, and then they would steal another car and live in that car until they were caught. And because we had this uptick in them, and we really hadn't had a lot of them before, we were seeing that law enforcement wasn't providing the information that we needed in the affidavits to prove the cases. And law enforcement was asking us, Burlington Police Department specifically, was asking us what they could be doing to make these cases stronger. So we did an internal memo at a law clerk dig deep into all of the case law into what we needed to successfully prosecute these cases. And we sent out a memo to law enforcement indicating what it was we needed to successfully prosecute the cases. That memo quickly got turned on us to somehow mean or look like we were trying to limit the number of cases coming in when in fact in the very memo it says that we're trying to prosecute these cases and we were trying to do so successfully. And so these are the things we need. I don't know. So the question is that it seems to set an improbably high criteria for probable cause, seemingly substituting the memo's guidance for the responsibility of the accused lawyer. Can you explain how vehicle thefts are or aren't treated the same as other cases when decisions to prosecute are being made? So we treat them the same as any others. We have nine, I checked yesterday, two days ago, we have 96 pending car theft cases in our office. We had 48 possession of stolen property felonies that are presumably mostly cars. We're charging those cases and it's actually a very limited number that we've had to decline, but even in the ones we've declined, we've told law enforcement, this is just the little bit you need to add to your affidavit. And then you can send it back to us. That hasn't happened. They haven't been sent back to us, but we encourage them to do so. I do struggle with the concept that it's doing the defense attorney's job because it's our burden. It is the state's burden. So the state is responsible for proving criminal charges beyond a reasonable doubt. It is not defense's job. It is not a person who's accused jobs. Our constitution requires that the state prove it beyond a reasonable doubt. So if we are charging a case that we don't have probable cause on or we barely have probable cause on, we're actually only setting the victim up for failure when we can't prove that case. And I can tell you, especially now with cases pending as long as they are, those cases are not getting stronger. If we don't get those statements from the person or the evidence that we need when the thing is happening immediately, we're never going to get it. So the idea that by putting out a memo telling law enforcement what we need to make these cases strong is somehow doing the defense attorney's job is a little frustrating to me to hear. And I've heard it a lot over the last week. We have had cases where we charged it with very minimal probable cause and a motion to dismiss is immediately filed by the defense if the judge even finds probable cause. We had some where the judges just threw it out. And there's always a risk when that happens that we won't be able to refile it. So from my perspective, I would much rather make sure we have the evidence we need from the beginning so we can actually ensure that the victim gets the restitution or a conviction or whatever it might be to heal that harm. Instead of risking it and knowing that we probably won't and then having it, you know, having it get dismissed or worse dismissed with prejudice, which would mean we can't refile it even if we did get the evidence we needed. So I hope that helps. I know it's, you know, I really, I really, I feel strongly that the memo was purposeful. It was actually at the request of law enforcement to make sure they could provide what we needed. And it's so that we can charge these cases and charge them successfully. And we try to do that whenever we can, especially with, again, how much case law is changing. It's really important that we keep law enforcement up to date on some of that because a lot of it they may not be aware of. Okay, I think there's another question from Bill Schubert. To what extent does your office become the catch-all for the criminalization of poverty or our lack of mental health and addiction recovery resources? Almost entirely. That's the short answer, Bill. There obviously are some offenses that we deal with. So I've been a prosecutor for 12 years in this office. And I did the domestic violence docket for four and a half years. So I only did domestic and sexual violence cases. And I've done homicides, attempted homicides. There are some cases where there's just a criminal intent. And there isn't a lot more to it. It's like a handful in my 12 years. Most individuals who are committing crime are doing so because of an either underlying mental health issue or an underlying substance issue, or the sort of combination of those things that lead to unemployment, homelessness, and those types of things. All of those are even worse since COVID. So before COVID, Burlington had 32 chronically homeless people, which is probably was probably undercounted, but let's say it wasn't. And it's 32. It's now 160. So we have, I'm not good at math. That's why I'm a lawyer. That's an incident a lot more than we had before. And that problem is not getting fixed. So talking about how I started with the car theft story, yes, we have an uptick in car theft. And that's incredibly concerning. But the cases that we're seeing, those people aren't stealing the cars and then selling them or stealing them and breaking them up for a bunch of parts and selling all of the parts. People are living in them. And so when I see those cases, I feel incredibly for the victims who had their car stolen. And I can't believe an individual in our community has to steal a car to live in it. So most of it is this criminalization, not just of poverty, but of mental health issues and criminalization of substance use disorder. A lot of those folks too that we deal with are vets. And they are not getting the services they need. And that's to me like an incredible failure of not just our community, but really of our state and country, that we are relying on the legal system to sort of pick up. And we're not very good at it. And we're especially not good at it when we don't have the full capacity of our system behind us. Okay. Are there other questions before we go on? All right. So I think what we've covered, if I'm correct, Sarah, is the charging process of how the state's attorney just, and I think that's the first incredible power that the state's attorney has is to decide which crime is going to be charged against which defendant also, right? Yeah. I mean, and what you're saying is there's got to be at least probable cause, if not real evidence in order to even meet that burden, that you have to decide that the state has enough evidence not only to proceed, but most likely to be able to win in a jury trial, correct? And that really is to win beyond a reasonable doubt, right? That's right. So again, probable cause is actually a pretty low standard. And from my perspective, we are not doing victims any good by filing charges with very, very little evidence, knowing that we aren't going to get more. And the case is not going to get stronger because those cases are ultimately going to get challenged by defense and likely dismissed. And arguably some of these cases might further encourage the person who did it because they've now kind of been with it, or it's going to retraumatize or trigger that victim who had to go through our system just to have a case dismissed. So we really try to make sure we have admissible evidence to prove a case. I don't require that at the time of filing, we have beyond reasonable doubt that is the highest standard in the land. And some of that comes with the age of the case. But I do require a little bit more than probable cause because we will have cases where a victim will make a statement, but then refuse to do a sworn statement and say that they don't want to do a sworn statement. Without a sworn statement, we can't go forward with the case. So what's the purpose? What purpose are we serving by filing a case that we know we're not going to be able to go forward on? The other interesting kind of aside from it is that we are all licensed attorneys. So we have ethical obligations as licensed attorneys, Andy knows, that we can't do, I mean it seems crazy, but like we can't do certain things or we will lose our license, we will lose our bar license. So there is obviously another element to that where as prosecutors were held to an incredibly high ethical standard. People seem to understand that though Sarah. I know and prosecutors have a different ethical standards than really then defense attorneys, right? Absolutely much higher than defense attorneys. Defense attorneys represent one person and their sole purpose, I mean obviously a lot of them are great and do more than this, but their sole purpose is to for the best interests of one person without really unless they're they can't lie in court, but you know they don't have nearly the ethical standards that prosecutors do. And so there is a lot of stuff that we will do as prosecutors that is really because of our ethical standards and yet because this is a political position will sometimes be made into a political thing when it really isn't, sometimes it really is just about the law and wanting to make sure that we aren't violating our ethical obligations. But what is it? What is the ethical obligation of a prosecutor? There's a lot of them. There's like I mean we have a whole slew of them in the rules of professional conduct, but you know some of them obviously we are we cannot file cases that we cannot charge cases that we don't believe we can prove. So even if it is again kind of going back to James's question, like even if the police standard is a little bit lower than ours or quite a bit lower than ours, we still have an ethical obligation to know that we're filing a case that we can prove. So it might be probable cause, but if we know we can't prove it, then we cannot ethically charge it. We can't, we have to disclose every single piece of evidence to defense. Even even exculpatory evidence. You have to disclose evidence that would tend to prove the defendant innocent also, right? Especially, yeah, right. We would absolutely not just likely lose our license if we didn't do that, but the person that is harmed, the person charged that who's who that evidence is not turned over for. If they were convicted of a crime without it, would absolutely that conviction would be overturned. We see a lot of wrongful convictions around the country and most of them stem from prosecutorial misconduct, which is the that's the ethical rules prosecutorial misconduct where they did not give defense evidence. They did evidence basically, right? Yeah, which again just seems like obvious. Like of course you wouldn't, but the unfortunate reality of the legal system is that it's become very much about winning or losing, but not really about the truth. And so a lot of prosecutors over the years have hid stuff that might be true or tend to show someone's innocent because they want to win. And a lot of folks spend a lot of time in jail for charges they didn't commit. So our office obviously does not do that. Vermont is also very, very friendly in our discovery rules. So we actually have a completely open discovery system in Chittenden County where we when we get a case from law enforcement, they upload all of the evidence, everything that they have onto a shared system. And then they add us when it's ready. So we immediately have access to that same case and all of the discovery. And then once it's arraigned and an attorney, a defense attorney is assigned, we add them. So they have access to everything we have. And that's incredibly rare. Most other, it's even rare around Vermont, like Chittenden County lucked out that former Burlington police chief turned department of public safety. Are you talking about Mike Shirling? Yeah, Mike Shirling, he actually started this particular system called Balfour. And so because he was the chief in Burlington at the time, we were the lucky starting point for it. So not even everybody in Vermont has that process. But it's incredibly helpful because we never have to worry about whether defense counsel has everything because it gets uploaded immediately. And when police upload something new, we both me and the fence get an email saying that something's been uploaded, which is really fantastic. So we don't really have to worry about that where it does come in a lot. And it came in a lot when I was doing the domestic violence docket when victims recant, which unfortunately happens a lot. Meaning that they say, I was lying, it didn't happen, which usually we know isn't true. But again, if they're saying it under oath, we don't have a lot of choice, but to either dismiss the case or try to resolve it. But we are still ethically bound to tell defense that they have made those statements. And so in those circumstances, it was actually up to the prosecutor was actually up to me to tell defense directly. But if there's any evidence that the police are getting, we're all getting it at the same time, which is really we're lucky in that sense. Okay, so then from there, I guess you also decide whether it's going to be a felony or a misdemeanor. And many people are not certain understand the difference, but a felony as I recall is anything that can be sentenced for over two years, correct? And the misdemeanor is for one. That's correct. Under two, right? Under two, yeah. Yeah. Which is actually most of them are up to one year. And then domestic, domestic violence is 18 months. And then DUI twos are two years. Those are the only two that are between one and two years, which is interesting. But yeah, anything over two years is a felony. Anything that could land you in jail for over two years is a felony. And anything under that is a misdemeanor. Most of the places where the distinction is made in terms of the statute is either if it's a money situation or the value of something, then if that value is over $900, it's deemed a felony. And if it's under $900, then it's deemed a misdemeanor. Although that has over the years is interesting kind of not just with inflation, but if you think about things like an iPhone or even some jeans and crazy stores, you could get to a felony with one item very quickly. So that's just sort of an aside. And then in terms of harm or other cases of violence, the difference is the injury. So whether someone has serious bodily injury, it's a felony. And if it's just bodily injury, it's a misdemeanor. Serious bodily injury being defined as like a maiming of your body or the inability to use a particular body part or an imminent risk of death. So that's usually where it's used obviously in stabbings or shootings or the like. I think there are some questions that Nancy has her hands up. Yes. You mentioned that a person can refuse to give a sworn statement. Yeah. Does he understand exactly what that meant? Yeah, that's a great question. So when the police, a sort of surprising amount of times police will be called to an incident, it actually again happens a lot more in domestic. So I'll just use that as an example where a woman or a person who's been harmed by a domestic partner will call the police and say, you need to come, this person just hit me or this person just strangled me. And then the police will show up and they'll kind of separate the parties and they might see some injuries on the victim or maybe they don't. And they say, you know, can I take your statement? And they might say yes. And they have to by law tell them beforehand that they're under, they're being sworn to their under oath. And a lot of times when they'll say that, when they'll say you're going to be under oath while you give this statement, is that okay? A lot of victims of domestic violence will say no. Kind of a fig, you either need to try to prove this case without me by what you see or I'm not like I'm not otherwise cooperating for obvious reasons, you know, I think that that's probably where it comes up the most. So then we'll get a case and have to decide whether or not we could essentially prove that charge without the victim because without a sworn statement we can't use anything that they've said. It might happen otherwise in like, you know, I think the police have been pretty clear on some of these gunfire incidents that we've had recently. They'll show up and they'll try to talk to some witnesses who probably saw something and those witnesses will refuse to give a sworn statement. Police can't force them to in those circumstances. So when that happens, there's not a lot for law enforcement. They have to just sort of liken the domestic, they have to just see what they can prove without that person's statement, which makes their job harder and it certainly makes ours harder when we get those cases, if we get them. Does that help, Nancy? Yes, thank you. Okay. Are there other questions you see any, Sarah? No. Okay, so why don't we, okay, so we're talking about then these cases go before the court, sometimes with a jury and sometimes just before the judge. And once again, a jury has 12 members and maybe you could explain a little bit about what happens in a jury. I've never been on a jury. Me neither. But I totally respect the juries. Absolutely. It's the best part of our legal system. I think so too. And you know what I've learned is that so again, I've been a prosecutor for 12 years. I sort of stopped counting at some point, but I would guess I've probably tried about 50 cases in those 12 years. With a jury? With a jury. And everything from like a DUI first offense till, you know, three years ago, I've tried Stephen Burgoyne, the individual who killed the five teenagers on the university. All right. Yeah. So a whole, you know, from the not all that serious to arguably Vermont's most infamous homicide case. And nobody wants to be on a jury, right? Like, when you're trying to pick a jury, everybody just is trying, you can tell they're trying to come up with excuses not to be on the jury. But without fail, every single time this, I've had a jury trial and I've had an opportunity to talk to people after they've said it was the best thing they've ever done. People really do enjoy it. It gives you a really good, it gives really good insight into our system and the sort of realities of our system. There are so many jury trials that, you know, the jury doesn't get to hear half of the situation because of the ways our laws are structured or because of evidence getting suppressed, you know, all kinds of things that happen before we ever get to a jury trial. And they still just really, really enjoy it. And then when I talked to them after about what led you to the not guilty verdict or what led you to the guilty verdict, I always go into trials thinking like, okay, A, B and C, I'm really strong on and D and E and maybe F, like, I don't know, you know, I think that's going to be a problem. I don't know how the jury is going to see that. And then I talked to juries about like, what were you guys focused on? And it's like X, like the thing I never even thought about, never crossed my mind as an issue. And they're like, yeah, we just couldn't get over the way that this, like he said this or did this, like, I didn't even notice that. And that's sometimes it's a little scary because it's not actually the law and it's not really shouldn't really matter. It's not part of the elements of the crime. But it's human nature. And that's that's what our juries are. They're an ability for our peers to look into the case and have a say about it for better or worse. And, you know, I think that, as I said, most folks who do it really enjoy it. I would also say though the downfall, the in the last couple of months, I've run into two different people at different events who sat on the jury of Steven Burgoyne. And there is some very that trial was over a month long. There's a lot of trauma from that, like juries, jurors who sit through really, you know, violent cases hear about really horrific things day in, day out, all day for a month, carry a lot of that trauma with them. So it ends, there's no real resources for that afterwards. So it is, depending on the case, it can feel really awesome to be a part of it. It's also a really big burden. And there's times where I'm waiting for a jury verdict. And I'm glad I'm not the one making the decision. Prosecutors make hundreds of decisions a day. And sometimes we just don't know. We just have to let a jury decide. And it's a, it's a big job. It's a really big job. An excellent movie about that is 12 Angry Men and Forever Seas. Great movie. Yeah. Any other questions? James Hazlina, I think. What? Who? James. James. Okay, James. So do all your cases come from the police? Or can someone, I can't bring it, bring something to you directly? No, but it's an interesting question because it's come up in the lat, it's never, I've never thought about it before. Honestly, the entire time I've been a prosecutor about whether somebody else can, because in other jurisdictions, not in Vermont, but my counterparts in Philadelphia, for example, Sandy could go down to the courthouse and fill out an affidavit that somebody assaulted her and handed into a judge and a warrant will get issued for that person's arrest without a prosecutor ever seeing it. That's wild to me that there's just no, you don't need a law enforcement agency or officer to do it. There's no oversight. We don't have that. But I've never really thought about the alternatives until recently I have had a couple of examples. One is that law enforcement sent a case for me to review against a police officer, an assault on a minor that was in his custody. And I reviewed all the evidence and I wrote them back and I said, I think there's probable cause. Please cite this officer for simple assault. And they responded, we don't think there is. We're not going to sign an affidavit to that effect. And I've never had that happen. And so I started to kind of look into what are our options. If we think that this happened, the victim's harmed, the victim is invested in seeing this happen. How do we do that? And then there's been a couple other cases. I just learned of one today, a pretty violent offense that happened in Burlington that law enforcement refused to respond to. And they asked me whether we could charge it without an affidavit from them. What did you learn? Did you think that you could? I don't know. The law says that it requires a sworn affidavit of probable cause. From whom? No. It doesn't specify. In other words, it doesn't have to be the police officer, correct? Or you don't know. I don't know. We've never tried it. But I think Jim, Jimmy Lee, what do you think of that? Well, I think that might open a possibility if the police aren't interested or they are biased towards a fellow police officer or another state employee like the governor. In the case that I'm particularly interested in, it's the governor who's the commander-in-chief and orders the F-35 training flights that violate, certainly, disorderly conduct because they are recklessly creating a risk of public inconvenience or annoyance. I'm in the flight path and I twice during a change of plea today had to mute my computer and my eardrums were ringing while they went over my head. People are experiencing pain. It's finally injury too. Maybe it would be all too. Hey Jim, maybe that's an idea. I think someone else has a question. Anyway, Barry, where is he? Jim, I'm going to look into it and I'll let Sandy know what I find. Yes, that would be a really interesting project, Jim. I hope there's Barry. Okay. My understanding is that police affidavits usually are hearsay. The victim or a witness told them. And it seems to me that the affidavit should really be signed by a person with direct knowledge. That's one point. And the other is, what about grand jury? Yeah. And so that was the route that I was thinking with this particular officer, at least, was going the grand jury route. Our caseloads are, each attorney in my office has 300 cases each. I have 200 with, you know, name the smallest caseload in my office. So I certainly don't want to, we'd never use grand jury unless like really extreme circumstances. I know that I don't have the time or resources to make that a new normal. But it is, I think in some of these, in some of these situations might be the way we do it. We never have, but. So you're open to it, Sharon? Yeah, I'm absolutely open to it, especially with cases where there's a particular conflict with law enforcement. I think that's in some ways exactly what that should be for to find an alternative way to do it. But in this other case, my hope with this other case I heard today is that it's not too late and law enforcement can just go and get, they have surveillance video, they have sworn statements, they've done the whole investigation themselves. So we really just need somebody else to write them. Maybe we don't, but it would certainly be easier. Yeah, there are other questions. Oh yeah, there are others. Okay. Who else? No, that was just Barry and James's hands are still up. Okay, so what's this idea of some of the prosecutors and other jurisdictions, like someone that you know, Jason Boudin was recalled recently, right? Yeah. And it seems to me that he was recalled for at least the idea that he was soft on crime, right? And that San Francisco was a real mess. What's going on in Burlington? Yeah, so I've heard that too. Yeah, so I think there's, you know, there's multiple levels to that. I'm on a Zoom meeting. Call me back in 20 minutes. Oh, there we go. Okay. There are multiple levels. Their overall crime is down in Burlington. Is that right? Because right here every day I pick up my newspaper downtown right across the city market. Every day I hear about all this crime in the streets. So what do you think is that crime is down? The actual numbers show that crime overall is down. There are some crimes that are up, like car thefts we were talking before. Those are up. There obviously are gunfire incidents. Those are up. And those are, those are two not insignificant things. So I certainly don't mean to imply that they are. But overall, over the last 10 years, crime is down over 30% in Burlington. What kind of crime? What about, for instance, everything else? What about domestic violence? Everything else. Yeah, there's like, there's four, I think four or five that were listed in this recent article by Seven Days that have slight upticks, but that everything else overall is down. That doesn't mean though, like in the beginning of the pandemic, when everybody was kind of in their homes and locked up, and then people started coming back out, our domestic violence numbers definitely went up for like a month when I think survivors were finally able to go to the police and finally able to go and stay with other people. So there's, you know, there's always little jumps for particular reasons or things go down for particular reasons. So it's definitely not. I also think that with COVID, some of it is that people are home more. So people are seeing more stuff that maybe while they were at work or where otherwise not home might not have seen. And there are definitely more people using and selling drugs in our streets, like because our services are down, there are people who are struggling, there are more people who are homeless, there are more people who don't have jobs, there are more people without childcare. All of these other things we were talking about before people's mental health is worse. I mean, my mental health is worse and I have a perfectly great well paying job in a warm home. So imagine like the people that are really struggling and their mental health is really declining and their drug use is going up. So there are things that I think people are seeing more and some of that I think is drug use, which makes people very uncomfortable to see. There might be more needles on our grounds, for example, because of it, that type of thing makes people feel less safe. And I don't minimize that. I think that's understandable that people when they see that type of activity, activity might feel less safe. And then there are like some instances where police are just not responded often enough that people might not call the police quite as much. So some of the numbers might not be up, but people might still have like their bikes being stolen, for example. The problem with it, I think, is that it really to say that one, that my office or us being stopped on crime has anything to do with it. When the reality is one, the inability of our court is not a policy of mine. The court's putting us on an extended judicial emergency is not a policy of mine. I don't have any control over that. I have a lot of people who will say, are you going to prosecute this person or are you going to let them back out? And those are not mutually exclusive. And I think that is a huge misunderstanding in the community that legally, not policy-wise, not anything my office is doing, but legally, the only way you can hold somebody in jail, pre-trial, like while their cases are pending, is for violent offenses. That's it. You cannot do it for any other charges. I want to interrupt you for one minute. Because at that point before conviction, people are innocent until proven guilty, correct? People do not understand that, that people cannot go to jail while they're innocent. Yes, and we do go that extra step and take that right from people for certain offenses, but it's very small. And so what's happening now is folks are picking up nonviolent misdemeanors like theft cases, retail theft cases, for example. They're getting charged, like I said, and they're getting arraigned, and then they are released because the Constitution requires that they be released. Because those cases aren't being set, it means those cases aren't resolving. And so those folks, because their basic need or whatever led them to commit the crime in the first place isn't being addressed, they are committing another offense. And then that same process is happening again. And so in a way, because of our courts being closed, we aren't addressing these issues as quickly as we usually do. And people, again, are mixing that frustration with thinking that I'm being soft on crime, when really that's just the law. That isn't a policy sign that was always happening. It's happening around the state. And the idea behind that is that people are innocent until proven guilty and our Constitution requires us to release them unless they have committed a violent felony that our evidence of guilt is great. So in those cases, it's not even a probable cause level. We actually have to have an evidentiary hearing before the court within a week to prove our case. So it's even harder. It's really, really hard to hold somebody pretrial as it should be. You're taking away every single basic right of those folks. But again, this idea that that's a soft on crime thing. That's just our law. It's happening in every county around the state. And it's happening throughout the country. Because I think that the perception about Chesa Boudin was that he was soft on crime. He was therefore responsible for all the spikes in crime in San Francisco. He was recalled because of that. He was. In other words, his election was undone. His crime went down 30% while Chesa wasn't. Well, what happened? Why? Anyways, so there was, yeah, that recall effort was paid for. It wasn't against a human being. It wasn't against another person. People paid $7 million to essentially spread lies about him for a very long time. And it's hard to overcome. I deal with some of that in a very small county in Vermont where disinformation is like wildfire. And I spend so much time just undoing rumors and misinformation and disinformation in the community here at a really small level. So imagining having to do that or attempt to do that in a city like San Francisco where the county across the ocean from them or across the bay from them has one of the most conservative district attorneys in the country. And crime is skyrocketing way more than it ever did in San Francisco. So the there is this element of this when you hear the term progressive prosecutor, you assume that means they're soft on crime. And you assume the worst if you want to. Obviously, some people don't because some people do. And it's really hard to overcome that narrative. All right. And I also would just as an aside say that in the recall, Chesa did lose the recall, but he received more votes in his favor than he did in the underlying election that he won. So to, you know, and at the same time, seven or eight progressive prosecutors were up against tough on crime opponents around California, and they all won their elections. So there is, you know, Chesa's thing got really highlighted. And a lot of these other elections got really like buried because people, you know, some people in the media and elsewhere want that narrative that this progressive prosecutor movement is not working. But anyway, that was a long winded answer. But I think, you know, the reality is that people there are people in our community that are not feeling safe. And there are people in our community that are struggling, they're really, really struggling. And we need to we need to address both of the other questions. I have a question, more of a philosophical question, because the idea of the prosecutor is that in the people's mind, so long with that long teeth that have to bite on, you know, everybody around to, you know, is there a space, is there a place for crime prevention? Are you also part of the task force to talk about why certain crimes are going up? I don't know, it's like, yeah, I think I want to make sure I understood you, Eric. You're saying that is there a way to do like a task force or community meetings to figure out why certain crimes are going up? Yeah. Do you get to just like in your office and look for the next criminal to be jailed? Okay, he's muted, Sandy. So I can only hear him through you. So can you, are you able to just He's right here. He's here. I was like, he's muted. I can hear him. So I assume he's with you. He was like, we were having a discussion with Sandy earlier. In the public, you know, people want a prosecutor that has long teeth, like very like a wick, ready to put everybody in jail. Is there a space in your job in the crime prevention? I mean, yeah, no. Great question. Yes. Okay, I understand now. It's such a great question. And so I think talking about the sort of, you said it perfectly, the sort of historical context of a prosecutor, and I say it all the time, it makes people very uncomfortable. Like ours, the foundation of our legal system is an extension of slavery. We eliminated slavery and we started mass incarceration as just a replacement to cage black and brown people and to criminalize poverty and mental health issues. And so that has always been the role of a prosecutor raised by putting people in jail, putting people, putting certain people in jail, and demonizing them as the problem to avoid having to actually deal with the prevention of the underlying brute causes, right? So I think what this sort of quote unquote prosecutor movement is, is exactly what you're saying is starting to shift that narrative to talk about the fact that prosecutors don't prevent crime. We respond to it. And so many other systems have already failed. Most of the individuals that are coming into our system by the time we are a part of it. And so there is, I do think there's a place for prosecutors to be involved in the prevention. There are district attorneys around the country who have started their own violence interruption programs in the community. And they have fantastic results. Gun violence is dropping in those or in those areas. Or they have started like community organizations and forums where they'll address the root, the trauma involved in most young people who are involved in gun violence, right? Like that the same concept. The problem is getting everybody else to understand that that is public safety, right? That is what we should want prosecutors focusing on because again, by the time we're getting most cases, it's too late. And it's a, you know, perfect example is talking about the gun incidents that we have. Like, yes, we can work really hard to solve those and prosecute those. But it's not addressing the underlying causes that are leading to the gun violence in our community. And it never will if we're doing it on this end. So I think there is absolutely a place for it. And I actually think that it's, it's, it should be our, our focus right now is figuring out, yes, we need to solve these cases. They're creating harm in our community. But what we really need to do is like get this community together and figure out what the heck is going on and try to eliminate that conflict so that this the violence stops, the gun violence stops and those issues are addressed. It's not happening enough because it requires the changing of a 200 year old system that has relied on punishment, right? It hasn't relied on prevention. It has relied on punishment. And it's, and you can't, I, you know, I learn you can't have those conversations without the response being your soft on crime. But it's, it's a really hard play. It's a, and I still do it. I do it all the time, but it definitely, some people are just never going to want to hear that they're never going to want to hear that that's the better route. The evidence and data and research show that is what we should be focusing on, not the punishment. The punishment makes makes things worse. We put people in jail and they're 36% more likely to commit violent crimes when they get out. That's not public safety, right? Like that's not what we should be doing. We should be putting that money and time and resource into making sure it doesn't happen. Okay. I think we're just about out of time, Sarah. Any final thoughts? I, we didn't even get to what I wanted to in the end, which was how do you sentence in the first place? What are the considerations for sentencing? But that might be a topic for a whole different conversation. So if anyone has any final one question or so, anybody, you know, at least I have a feeling that I'm not too soft on crime. But it would be good if you could think about prevention. By the way, Sarah, Eric is going to help me try to create what we're going to call something like the people's law school. And yeah, well, I do too. And I'm really working on it. So I think Bill Schubart maybe said, yeah, what Bill, are you there? He said really terrific. Well, you are. I think you are, Sarah. So any other final thoughts? Thank you very much. Thanks for joining us. I haven't seen you in ages. I know. Anyway, yeah. Okay. Have a great night, everyone. Thank you. Thank you.