3 days into new job, Philadelphia DA Krasner fires 31 staff members

Larry Krasner

3 days into new job, Philadelphia DA Krasner fires 31 staff members
ABA Journal Daily News
By Jason Tashea
January 5, 2018

New Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner fired 31 members of the office three days into the job.

The move makes "clear his intention to take the office in a different direction," spokesman Ben Waxman told philly.com.

Before winning the election last year, Krasner was a civil rights attorney who often sued the government, including law enforcement. He also defended activists, like those arrested at the 2000 Republican National Convention, and protesters from the Black Lives Matter movement.

The Philadelphia District Attorney’s office employs about 600 people, half of whom are prosecutors. While names of those fired were not released, reports state that the people pushed out Friday could account for up to 10 percent of the prosecutorial staff.

Homicide prosecutor Andrew Notaristefano, who was actively preparing a case, told philly.com he received "no explanation" for being let go. Notaristefano also says his request to speak with Krasner about the firing was denied.

After Krasner took the oath of office on Tuesday, he said, "A movement was sworn in today… A movement for criminal justice reform that has swept Philadelphia … and is sweeping the United States."

Krasner was financially supported in part by George Soros, a billionaire who has started to invest in local district attorney races to promote progressive criminal justice reform and minority candidates. Since 2015, Soros has spent at least $3 million dollars on electing prosecutors, according to Politico.

Krasner takes over an office that’s not been without controversy. Seth Williams, the previously elected district attorney, resigned from office and plead guilty to federal bribery charges last June.

The District Attorney’s office had not yet released a statement on the firings as of Friday evening. Read more

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George Soros

George Soros' quiet overhaul of the U.S. justice system
politico.com
By SCOTT BLAND
August 30, 2016

Progressives have zeroed in on electing prosecutors as an avenue for criminal justice reform, and the billionaire financier is providing the cash to make it happen.

While America’s political kingmakers inject their millions into high-profile presidential and congressional contests, Democratic mega-donor George Soros has directed his wealth into an under-the-radar 2016 campaign to advance one of the progressive movement’s core goals — reshaping the American justice system.

The billionaire financier has channeled more than $3 million into seven local district-attorney campaigns in six states over the past year — a sum that exceeds the total spent on the 2016 presidential campaign by all but a handful of rival super-donors.

His money has supported African-American and Hispanic candidates for these powerful local roles, all of whom ran on platforms sharing major goals of Soros’, like reducing racial disparities in sentencing and directing some drug offenders to diversion programs instead of to trial. It is by far the most tangible action in a progressive push to find, prepare and finance criminal justice reform-oriented candidates for jobs that have been held by longtime incumbents and serve as pipelines to the federal courts — and it has inspired fury among opponents angry about the outside influence in local elections.

"The prosecutor exercises the greatest discretion and power in the system. It is so important," said Andrea Dew Steele, president of Emerge America, a candidate-training organization for Democratic women. "There’s been a confluence of events in the past couple years and all of the sudden, the progressive community is waking up to this."

Soros has spent on district attorney campaigns in Florida, Illinois, Louisiana, Mississippi, New Mexico and Texas through a network of state-level super PACs and a national "527" unlimited-money group, each named a variation on "Safety and Justice." (Soros has also funded a federal super PAC with the same name.) Each organization received most of its money directly from Soros, according to public state and federal financial records, though some groups also got donations from nonprofits like the Civic Participation Action Fund, which gave to the Safety and Justice group in Illinois. Read more