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Blue city DA says repeat drug offenders ‘will not respect the law’ under current system
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Democratic San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins went against many in her own party and said releasing repeat drug offenders before their trial is a big reason why the city sees “repeat offenders in and out of our stores, on our streets, rotating through our courtrooms.”
Jenkins made the comments during a late September community gathering in San Francisco where residents shared their concerns over crime, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. She said that the outcome of releasing repeat drug offenders – who then go on to commit more crime – is something that deeply frustrates those in the local law enforcement community, which includes prosecutors.
“The community, especially in the Tenderloin, find it abhorrent, right? To have to keep dealing with the same problem each and every day,” Jenkins said. “We simply cannot live in a society where we let people tell us over and over again that they will not respect the law.”
She said that while most of the time repeat drug offenders get multiple “chances,” those same drugs continue to take lives.
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San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins criticized the practice of releasing repeat drug offenders. (Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
“That is part of the problem of why we continue to see repeat offenders in and out of our stores, on our streets, rotating through our courtrooms: Because until we take the responsible position, when somebody’s clearly putting people in danger, clearly demonstrating to us that they will not follow the law so that we can figure out a plan for them, that will help them follow the law, we’re in this cycle,” Jenkins said.
On Oct. 1, Jenkins’ office tried to detain eight of 11 people who were charged with felonies relating to drug trafficking, but wasn’t successful.
The public defender’s office in San Francisco said Jenkins’ comments were “fearmongering.”
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A homeless couple sleeps on a sidewalk in San Francisco on Sept. 2, 2023. (Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
“Our legal system is based on the presumption of innocence,” the office said. “This fearmongering is another attempt by the district attorney to attack the independence of the judiciary, further pack our already crowded jails, and put her thumb on the scale of these pending cases.”
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Homeless people consume illegal drugs in an encampment along Willow Street in the Tenderloin district of downtown on Thursday, Feb. 24, 2022, in San Francisco. (Gary Coronado / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
Tom Wolf, a former homeless addict from San Francisco, told Fox News Digital that Jenkins is fighting an “uphill battle” when it comes to detaining accused drug traffickers before their trial.
“We have a problem, especially in San Francisco, but really throughout the state of California…because of a law that was passed in 2018 in California called the Mental Health Diversion Act, so many of these repeat offenders basically go into court and say, ‘hey, I’m struggling with my mental health,’” Wolf said.
“Addiction is considered a mental illness. And so they’re continually referred to diversion, which means that they’re let out of custody. And it’s created an untenable situation in cities like San Francisco, where we have 8,000 people on the street. Most of them are addicted to drugs, and most of them have been arrested multiple times, and yet they continue to remain.”
Fox News Digital reached out to Jenkins for comment.
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LAS VEGAS (FOX5) — Conservation groups are pushing back against a new state mapping tool that identifies federal lands potentially available for development in Nevada.
The governor’s office, in partnership with the Bureau of Land Management Nevada, unveiled the interactive map this week to make it easier to find federal land that may be available for development throughout the state and in the Las Vegas Valley.
“It is shocking to look at the map and see how many lands could potentially be sold off,” said Olivia Tanager, executive director of the Sierra Club Toiyabe Chapter.
Tanager said she was surprised at how many federal lands were identified for disposal when she first looked at the map.
“Places like Red Rock and Sloan Canyon in Southern Nevada are what draw people to live in Southern Nevada. We cannot continue to develop right up onto the boundaries or perhaps even in these precious places,” Tanager said.
The conservation group says the mapping tool is the latest effort to treat Nevada’s public lands as a real estate inventory rather than a shared public resource.
“We know that a lot of these areas are environmentally sensitive. We know that there are endangered species on these lands,” Tanager said.
MORE ON FOX5: Nevada unveils interactive tool mapping federal lands available for possible development, other uses
Housing concerns
Lawmakers have proposed using federal lands to create more affordable housing. Several areas at the edges of the Vegas Valley have been identified for potential development on the mapping tool. Tanager said she does not see that as a viable solution.
“The areas on the outskirts or far outside of existing urban areas are wholly inappropriate for affordable housing. Housing that is located that far away from services will never be truly affordable,” Tanager said. “As folks have to live further and further away from resources like schools and grocery stores, transportation costs go up substantially.”
The conservation group says the valley should fill in open lots and build upward within the existing urban core instead of building outward.
“We know that sprawl and developing on the outskirts of the valley worsens air quality as well from increased transportation,” Tanager said. “We know that sprawl is incredibly water-intensive. The further out you build, the harder it is to recapture that water.”
The Sierra Club Toiyabe Chapter says treating federal lands as disposable assets could set a dangerous precedent that accelerates privatization efforts and undermines the principle that public lands should remain in public hands for future generations.
Approximately 85% of Nevada’s total land area is owned by the federal government.
The state says the tool is designed to bolster information sharing about federal lands. The mapping tool is available here.
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