OAKLAND — In a shocking rebuke for Alameda County’s new district lawyer, a Superior Court docket decide rejected a plea deal that may have given a 15-year sentence to a reputed Oakland gang member accused of gunning down three individuals when he was 18 years outdated.
The transfer was the sharpest but towards District Lawyer Pamela Worth, a longtime civil rights lawyer who campaigned and received workplace in November on a platform of criminal-justice reform. Her maneuvers to keep away from looking for sentences of a long time or longer have already drawn objections — together with within the triple homicide instances of Delonzo Logwood and a San Leandro case the place a suspect fired on cops.
Choose Mark McCannon, saying he had determined towards accepting a plea deal proposed by prosecutors, dominated Thursday that Logwood, now 31, ought to go to trial within the 2008 slayings. Logwood had beforehand been eligible for a sentence of dying or life with out parole earlier than being supplied the bizarre plea deal by Worth.
Earlier than he rejected the deal, McCannon stated he has had “many sleepless nights” about this case. He then picked aside feedback by Logwood’s lawyer, who had tried to rebut the proof towards his shopper Thursday, just for Logwood to take the stand and apologize with out admitting to any particular conduct.
“You possibly can’t suppose an apology will make this all higher,” McCannon, himself a former deputy district lawyer in Alameda County, stated in courtroom Thursday. “What are you sorry for in the event you didn’t do something?”
He later stated he usually presses prosecutors for much less jail time. “I don’t simply hand out prolonged sentences,” he stated, including that he wouldn’t need to spend a minute in jail. “I’ve obtained household in jail. I’ve obtained mates in jail. So this isn’t misplaced on me.”
Worth herself attended the listening to, sitting within the first row of the gallery. After the continuing, she left the courtroom surrounded by a half dozen staff, declining to touch upon the ruling.
The plea deal was one of many highest-profile selections but by Worth, who received election in November whereas proposing a sweeping new strategy to justice and punishment, together with reopening investigations of deadly police shootings whereas putting quite a few longtime prosecutors on depart. Amongst her first strikes was to assessment instances involving defendants who had been youthful than 25 on the time of their crime.
The transfer additionally comes simply a month and a half after McCannon expressed deep concern over Worth’s deal, notably given the dearth of regret proven by Logwood over the 15 years because the killings. Chief amongst McCannon’s “public security” issues was an alleged assertion Logwood made to a different Santa Rita Jail inmate about how he plans on “simply going dangerous on all people” after his launch.
The deal represented an about-face from the workplace’s strategy simply final summer season when a deputy district lawyer who has since resigned argued in courtroom data that it was correct to cost the case in a approach that made Logwood eligible for all times with out parole.
It's uncommon for a decide to reject a plea deal that has been agreed upon by each protection attorneys and the DA. Throughout Thursday’s listening to, Logwood apologized, however the mom of one among his three alleged victims submitted a letter to the courtroom that stated 3 times of Logwood: “He'll kill once more.”
A trial date has not but been set.
Showing in courtroom in a yellow jail jumpsuit with a white lengthy sleeve undershirt and a blue face masks, Logwood stated he needed to apologize for “all of the destruction I brought on.” He spoke for about two minutes however by no means referred on to the killings of which he's accused.
“I need to apologize for my conduct. I’m going to show a unfavorable into the constructive,” Logwood stated in courtroom Thursday whereas referencing his need to assist finish violence and construct up the neighborhood. “It’s going to take us to avoid wasting us.”
He ended his apology by saying: “Please forgive me. I’m sorry.”
The mom of Zaire Washington — one among three individuals Logwood was charged with killing — submitted a letter to the courtroom that was learn aloud Thursday by a sufferer’s advocate, saying her son was “so senselessly and cruelly taken from me.”
“There's vacancy inside me that haunts me on daily basis for the remainder of my life … (Washington) won't ever be capable to stay out his full potential,” the letter reads. She requested McCannon for a strict jail sentence, including that when she heard of the proposed deal, “It felt like I used to be shot within the coronary heart once more.”
“I do know that this man will kill once more,” she wrote, later including, “I worry for my life and all people else’s.”
Lawyer David Briggs, representing Logwood, gave a point-by-point rebuttal of the proof within the two murder counts that Logwood hadn’t pleaded no contest to, saying he didn’t need to tackle the third murder intimately in case McCannon rejected the deal. He stated he was assured Logwood can be exonerated at trial.
“We don’t do justice to the household or defendants or the neighborhood if we convict an harmless man,” Briggs stated, including that a lot of the prosecution proof in one of many killings was based mostly on “a convicted liar.” He argued Logwood was the product of an especially tough upbringing, that he’s labored to scale back violence in the neighborhood, he’s stayed discipline-free within the jail, that he obtained baptized, and that he plans to enhance his life when he will get out of jail.
Lawyer Linda Fullerton, additionally a part of Logwood’s protection crew, stated she was “utterly disillusioned” with the ruling and stated “this was a simply plea.”
Logwood was charged with homicide within the deaths of Eric Ford, 22, Zaire Washington, 24, and Richard Carter, 30, in separate Oakland shootings in 2008.