OAKLAND — Just six months after Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price was sworn into office, becoming the first Black woman and justice reformist to hold that role, an effort has been launched to oust her.
On Tuesday, a recall committee called “Save Alameda for Everyone (Safe): Recall Pamela Price” filed paperwork with the county’s elections office, signaling its intent to fundraise and collect signatures to recall Price. A principal officer for the committee declined to comment for this story but said the group plans to issue a statement in coming days.
Neither Price nor a spokesperson for the Alameda County DA’s Office immediately responded to requests for comment. But Price had to have known the recall effort would come, eventually, given the 2022 successful recall of former San Francisco DA Chesa Boudin, 18 months after he won election on a justice reform platform similar to Price.
Price won her election handily in November 2022, beating longtime prosecutor Terry Wiley in an effort to replace outgoing Alameda County DA Nancy O’Malley. It was a straightforward, policy-based election where the two candidates presented their divergent views in a series of debates before live audiences.
The recall group’s treasurer and assistant treasurer are listed as two political law attorneys with a Los Angeles-based firm. Its principal officer, Brenda Grisham, is an East Bay resident who became prominent in local politics after her son was gunned down in Oakland in 2010 and recently led an unsuccessful effort to reinstate Oakland police Chief LeRonne Armstrong after his termination.
Alameda County’s elections office has not yet determined how many signatures a Price recall would require. California’s rules on recall elections require voters to obtain signatures for 10 percent of a county’s registered voter base, which for Alameda County would be roughly 93,000.
A meaningless Change.com petition to recall Price, which started last February and misspells her name as “Pamala,” has garnered a fraction of that, at around 22,000 online signees, many of whom reside outside the county.
Price’s platform includes a moratorium on filings that would send murderers to life in prison without the possibility of parole or the death penalty, halting virtually all cases where juveniles are charged in adult court, urging prosecutors to seek probation over jail or prison time, and generally emphasizing alternatives to incarceration. Price has also advocated against the use of gang charges, arguing they are disproportionally used against non-white people.
Her justice reform efforts have been met with resistance and controversies. Dozens of prosecutors from her office have quit or being placed on leave, some writing and leaking resignations letters that offered pointed criticisms of Price, who brushed off concerns over office turnover in an interview.
“I want to hire prosecutors who want to save lives and not destroy them,” she said. “That’s the theme of what we’re looking for.”
Two protests have been held outside the Rene C. Davidson courthouse, prompting Price’s supporters to hold a demonstration in support of her.
Her efforts to offer a 15-year prison term to an Oakland man accused of three murders were balked at by political opponents and an Alameda County judge, who refused to let the plea deal go through until a prosecutor returned months later and said two of the murder charges had been impugned by an uncooperative witness.
In April, the National Asian Pacific Islander Prosecutors Association demanded an apology from Price after she penned a letter “To the Chinese Communities” intending to assuage concerns over how the prosecution of alleged gang members who shot and killed a 1-year-old boy in a freeway shooting would be handled.
In neighboring San Francisco, the effort to oust Boudin started in April 2020, less than 18 months after he took office. Critics of the effort blasted it as premature, but it ended up being successful. Last year, Boudin was recalled and DA Brooke Jenkins was appointed to replace him.
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Source: www.mercurynews.com