Candidate for
Superior Court Judge; County of Los Angeles; Office 29

I grew up in a racially diverse middle class neighborhood in Dayton Ohio. After graduating high school in January of 1975, I attended a local university (Wright State University), for one semester. I then took six months off, and hitchhiked throughout the United States. This exposed me to many different aspects of our society, and allowed me to gain a greater perspective beyond those available where I grew up. I resumed my college education at Indiana University in Bloomington, where I graduated with a B.A. in psychology in January of 1979.

After college I spent three and a half years in Ann Arbor, Michigan. During that time I was deciding on a career options. One of my jobs was as manager of a "blue collar" bar. The owner of a bar I managed, who was an attorney, suggested that I should consider law school because practicing law would provide a concrete way to have a positive effect on society. I followed his advice and found his suggestion to be true.

I graduated from the University of California, Hastings College of Law in May 1985. While at Hastings, I was a member the Hastings Constitutional Law Quarterly, and in my third year I was a Note and Comment Editor.

I started at the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office as a senior law clerk in August 1985, and became a deputy district attorney in December of that same year, after having passed the July bar exam. I am presently a Grade IV Deputy District Attorney. I have tried fifty felony jury trials, thirty-two of which have been homicides.

I am presently assigned to the Training Division (from October 2000 to present). My responsibilities include training deputy district attorneys with various experience levels, in several areas in which I specialize. As such, I am responsible for keeping current in the law. I teach at our New Hires Class, New Prosecutor College, Midlevel College, Law Clerk Training, Filing Deputy College, and at various Target Crime Seminars. The areas I am primarily responsible for include Felony Sentencing, Courtroom Presentations, Search & Seizure, Discovery and Theories of Criminal Liability. I also provide instruction to other prosecutorial agencies on search and seizure issues. My assignment also requires that I research a variety of other topics, to address issues that other deputies are confronted with during their cases.

In addition to the D.A. training, my other primary responsibility is to provide and coordinate the legal training my unit conducts for numerous law enforcement agencies. I provide instruction on Criminal Procedure, Case Preparation & Filing, Theories of Criminal Liability, Law of Homicide, Courtroom Testimony, Current Case Law, and the Fourth Amendment. I also regularly teach for the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department and the Los Angeles Police Department.

From 1988 through 1996, my trial skills were recognized and I was assigned to the Hardcore Gang Division. During that assignment, I prosecuted well over one hundred and fifty homicides. While in that assignment, I obtained the first felony conviction under the Street Terrorism Enforcement Program, which increased the punishment for certain gang related crimes. Many of the cases I prosecuted were high profile cases.

After my assignment to the Hardcore Gang Division, I was asked to join Environmental Crimes/OSHA Division to enhance the trial strength of that unit. I was assigned there for four years (1996 +2000). My primary focus was Cal/OSHA workplace fatality investigations. I was co-counsel on People v. Morton International, et.al the first criminal workplace fatality prosecution in Los Angeles in several years. I was also responsible for conducting the criminal investigation into numerous workplace fatalities, including several that occurred during the construction of the Metro Red Line. During that assignment I helped develop a new protocol for Cal/OSHA to use in workplace fatality investigations, not only for Los Angeles, but all of California. I coordinated the first statewide training in ten years between Cal/OSHA and prosecutorial agencies and worked on the passage of AB1127, which significantly strengthened the criminal penalties for workplace safety violations. This legislation put California in the forefront of enacting legislation to protect employees in the workplace. A recent article in the New York Times (California Leads Prosecution of Employers in Job Deaths, 12/23/03) discusses the impact of this legislation, and called it a model for other states to follow.