Sheriff Margaret Mims and her key aides are now making enemies in the Fresno Police Department. That's not smart, even if she's in a budget battle with the Fresno County Board of Supervisors. Mims has refused to tell the Police Department the names of the felons that she's releasing because of overcrowding at the jail. The PD should have this information because many of the felons being released will be preying on Fresno residents.
The lack of cooperation between the sheriff and Fresno PD has gotten so bad that the city has filed a formal Freedom of Information Act request to get the information. City officials say the PD wants the information so its officers can patrol areas where these criminals frequent.
But the sheriff's office response was simple: We don't have to give it to you and we won't. We won't. We won't.
Here's the text of a letter the city has just been sent to the Sheriff's Department:
Pursuant to the California Public Records Act (C.P.R.A.) the City of Fresno ("City") requests all information on inmates, who over the last five years due to the Federal Consent Decree (jail overcrowding) or budgetary constraints, were subject to early release from the Fresno County Jail. This request includes, but is not limited to the name of the inmate, the inmate's booking date at the Fresno County Jail, the inmate's charges and the date of release from the Fresno County Jail system.This information is a matter of public record and the City requests the material be delivered electronically within the guidelines of a C.P.R.A. If the material can be delivered in a more efficient manner through another method, the City of Fresno accepts delivery by that method. The City agrees to pay all reasonable costs associated with this request.
It is Time for the taxpayers to save the taxpayers some money. Clean your pistols and buy some new ammo.
Release the marijuana dealers so the free market patients can administer the medicine that the dysfunctional health care system does NOT want you to have.
Harvard economist Jeffrey A. Miron : Marijuana use rates are little different now than in 1975, despite a substantial escalation in federal marijuana spending over this time period." And: "The fact that trends in marijuana use bear no overall relation to federal marijuana spending casts doubt on whether these policies reduce marijuana use."
Marijuana use rates are little different now than in 1975, despite a substantial escalation in federal marijuana spending over this time period." And: "The fact that trends in marijuana use bear no overall relation to federal marijuana spending casts doubt on whether these policies reduce marijuana use."
Mirken noted that, at the very least, taxpayers might want to shift resources and spend federal dollars fighting "drugs that actually kill people." Bruce Mirken of the Marijuana Policy Project noted that, at the very least, taxpayers might want to shift resources and spend federal dollars fighting "drugs that actually kill people."
I think FPD should be privey to who is being released for sure. It saddens be that all the hard work of our officers is wasteful because of the release and with them being let out it puts the officers at risk. They should have been able to project the need for a larger jail when they built the new one since there has not been a huge drop in crime. Why cant they move some inmates to the old jail and use correctional officers in training as on the job training. Asd far as I know the old jail is still there so use it. They could probably even get officers to donate time so they don't have to redo the work they have done only to see them on the street again in hours
It doesn't take a mathematician to have seen this one coming!
I would take this a step futher, once this material is released and if the "special federal funding" was used to apprehend any of these criminals early released.
I would think Sheriff Mims out of "her budget" should have to re-pay those federal funds for the effected cases they would effectively have put aside through her poor judgement. An effective Administrator would have sought federal/state grant funding to provide for the over-crowding. After all it is a federal judge who will file charges against her for over-crowding. Let them fund it.
Everyone wants the gang problem resolved accept Sheriff Mim's, if it means an overcrowded condition at the jail. She should have seen this problem coming along time ago when these programs first started and she should have applied for federal funds to provide the jail capacity for the new program.
Sheriff Mim's is using the safety of Fresno and surrounding communities to combat budget cuts made on her budget. Is that what we call an effective crime fighter and leader in the community of law enforcement? I think not!
Hanford just received a grant for 30 million dollars to expand it's jails and all they had to do was to agree to placing re-entry facilities in the county. Why couldn't Fresno have done the same thing. Now the entire overload from all the surrounding jails is going to be placed on these Kings County re-entry centers.
Chief of Police Jerry Dyer and the entire Fresno Police Department have made major progress on jailing the Bulldog Gang Members. But it does little good to jail them if they hit a revolving door at the Fresno County Jail. It's like discovering a leak in your canoe and bailing the water out only to discover the water is actually just falling back into the bow of the boat. Very little success and an awful lot of work, for nothing. Eventually unchecked, the boat sinks to the bottom.
The county needs fiscal accountability with current funding not an attempted blackmail by releasing known felons back onto the streets. Can you even begin to understand what that does to the morale of the men/women who have worked so hard to make a safe Fresno?