Defending the District Attorney

The last thing District Attorney Pat Lykos needs in an election year is being defended by a defense attorney. But, I want to set the record straight about her.
Lykos's election in 2008 was the first hostile takeover of the Harris County District Attorney's Office since Frank Briscoe beat incumbent Dan Walton in the 1964 Democratic Primary. For 44 years, the outgoing DA had a big say in picking his successor. Things just rocked along in the DA's office both with personnel and policies.
As Lykos prepared to take office in late 2008, she gave quite walking papers to quite a few longtime assistant district attorneys. I agree with some of the personnel decisions and disagree with others. Some of those given the boot were supporters -- often vocal supporters -- of Kelly Siegler, the longtime, well respected assistant district attorney defeated by Lykos in the Republican runoff. One had "anonymous"blog which was and still is critical of Lykos and her top assistants. He even calls them "the gang who couldn't shoot straight." After publishing a blog comparing Lykos to the GEICO gheko, he probably wasn't too surprised when he got the boot.
Are there problems in the District Attorney's Office. You bet. A good number aren't Lykos's fault. Shortly after she took office, the county slapped a hiring and pay freeze on all county departments. So, as people quit, retire or get fired from the DA's office, they aren't replaced. People get promoted but they don't get raises to go with their new responsibilities. There are fewer people to do the same amount of work.
Is morale low. Probably. I'd be unhappy if I got a "promotion" with more work and responsibility but no more money.
Lykos has done quite a few things which are good. She's the DIVERT program which tries to keep drunk drivers from doing it again. She has caught a lot of heat for doing it but it appears to be working. People charged with first offense DWI can be screened and it they qualify, they go through a program which hopefully keeps them from re-offending. While some people call it an "illegal" form of deferred adjudication, it isn't illegal or a form of probation. It is pretrial diversion which prosecutors both state and federal have been using for years.
The police also don't like Lykos's policy of not accepting felony charges for possession of trace amounts of cocaine, so-called "dirty crack pipe" cases. There are good public policy reasons for this decision.
First, the code of criminal procedure requires that persons convicted of possession of small amounts of cocaine get probation.
Second, it costs a small fortune to arrest a person, process him into jail, house him and get him a court appointed lawyer if he's indigent (and most crack users are). And, both if he's jailed pretrial and sentenced to prison, that person takes up a bed which could be used by a violent or more dangerous person. Many people have forgotten the late 1980s and early 1990s, when prison overcrowding forced state officials to parole just about everyone who was eligible so they would have beds for new inmates.
I for one would rather have that prison cell reserved for a rapist or armed robber than a crack addict.
Third, many of the dirty crack pipe cases are the result of constitutionally questionable police detentions or searches. Takikng those cases encourages police to ignore the constitution.
Lykos has done other things which have improved the operation of the district attorney's office. Before the hiring freeze, she would bring on newly hired prosecutors who were waiting for their bar results and assign them to work under supervision in felony courts. When they finally passed the bar and became lawyers, they had some experience and knew that there are no capital DWI cases in Texas.
For my money, Lykos is a mixture of good and bad things, just like every other public official from the president to the county surveyor. And, yes, Patricia Lykos will never win the award for being sweet and cuddly. That's just not her.
Like all elected officials, she has to answer to the voters for her conduct in office. But, it should be done with facts, not inuendo and half truths.