Month: July 2016

by Mary Rupert

Candidates turned up the heat Tuesday night in the district attorney’s primary contest.

Incumbent Jerry Gorman highlighted his many years of experience in the district attorney’s office, while challenger Mark Dupree said he had a passion for the people.

Both are on the Democratic primary election ballot Aug. 2. The forum was sponsored by Business West, neighborhood business organizations and the college.

At the forum, the two candidates challenged each other on a number of points.

Gorman talked about his 11.5 years of experience as Wyandotte County district attorney, and another 23 years spent as assistant district attorney in the Wyandotte County office. He also said he has always been a Wyandotte County attorney, is the grandson of hard-working immigrants, and he grew up around 8th Street and Pacific. He attended Bishop Ward High School.

Dupree, who is currently a criminal defense lawyer, talked about his Wyandotte County roots as a native who grew up near 11th and Richmond and attended Wyandotte High School, and whose parents worked as the pastor of a church here. He also has been a minister at the church for 20 years, in addition to his legal career.

Gorman said the most important qualities for a district attorney were experience, leadership and integrity. He said he had tried more jury trials than any other prosecutor in Kansas, more than 400 jury trials. He has tried 45 homicide cases, more than any other active prosecutor in Kansas, he said. He’s written more than 175 briefs to the appellate courts to defend his convictions, and has argued and defended them before the Kansas Court of Appeals and Kansas Supreme Court.

He said his office has worked with programs to protect children, created a safe graduation program, and an expanded truancy program in the public schools. His office created a diversion program returning $177,000 to victims here, he said.

His years here included a period of time when furloughs were in place, yet attorneys including himself worked anyway on call without pay.

Five of the seven candidates for judge plus his opponent this year have worked under his direction in the district attorney’s office previously, he said.

“I believe that we’ve done a good job in the district attorney’s office, I believe there are still more good things to come,” Gorman said.

Gorman said his opponent was a Johnson County attorney because his office and registration with the Kansas Supreme Court was in Johnson County.

“I’m a Wyandotte County lawyer,” Dupree said. He said he and his wife did not want to put their home address on forms. His address on the official voter candidate list is at a downtown Kansas City, Kan., address which has other lawyers listed in it.

“I’ve lived here all my life, but what I’m sick and tired of is the crime that occurs in Wyandotte County. It’s almost as if there’s two different worlds – there’s a Crime-Dotte, and there’s this other great big, wonderful county that only a certain few get to live in,” Dupree said. “I believe that when you live in Wyandotte, you ought to feel safe from 1st Street to 143rd Street, and I believe that the people in office ought to serve everyone, to make the entire county safe.”

Dupree was an intern in the Wyandotte County District Attorney’s office, under Gorman. After graduation from law school, he worked a while as an assistant prosecuting attorney in Missouri. Dupree also worked as a public defender in Johnson County, Kan., for three years, then he and his wife opened their own law practice, where he practices criminal law. He practiced in Jackson, Johnson and Wyandotte counties, and defended indigent clients. In private practice he has worked in 10 jurisdictions and lived here all his life, he said.

Dupree said when he worked in the district attorney’s office he started a job shadowing program for Kansas City, Kan., public school students.

He said he grew up at 11th and Richmond, and didn’t meet a lawyer until he was 14 years old. For six years, Dupree brought students every year to the district attorney’s office, because he believes that if he exposed students to a different side of reality, there could be a difference.

“It’s not just about prosecuting and litigating in court,” Dupree said, “it’s about being involved.”

He is in favor of a veterans’ court in Wyandotte County. “I believe that our veterans deserve better,” Dupree said. “They go and they fight in war and then they come back here, and then, when they commit low-level nonviolent offenses, I’m saying we need to connect with the VA, who will partner with us, if we go and talk with them.”

A mentor could be assigned to veterans, and once they complete the program, they could be diverted, not in jail and receive the services they need, he said.

While Dupree said he favored starting a mental health diversion program, Gorman said one has already been started and has been operating six to nine months in the Wyandotte County district attorney’s office.

Dupree said someone was needed who was willing to try something new, such as initiatives to deal with young people.

Dupree said in the last 18 months, 1,100 cases were not filed in Wyandotte County, for whatever reason, such as lack of evidence. “For every case that’s not filed, that’s a victim that goes without justice,” he said.

In one case, a person was arrested on being a felon in possession of a gun, and kept in jail for 48 hours, then released, Dupree said. Within six months, that person murdered someone and was found guilty of second-degree murder, he said.

“This is a servant’s job and you have to serve the entire community, not just parts of it,” Dupree said.

Gorman said he would like to see more funding for the state, as it has decreased in recent years. When mental health funding is cut, sometimes people commit more crimes, he said. If the funding would be there to assist individuals before they commit a crime, it would be of great assistance, he said.

Another issue involved bed space in prisons, Gorman said. If the Legislature is looking at passing a law about a new crime, legislators may look at it and say they will not pass it because it would create a need for more bed space in the prisons, he said. The police chief was advocating for a new law involving armed criminal action, and Gorman said he is afraid legislators will look at it and say it will create a need for more bed space in prisons.

“There are presently just under 400 people incarcerated in the Wyandotte County Jail,” Gorman said. “Between 30 and 40 percent of those suffer from severe mental illness.” That percentage has been prescribed medication for their illness.

There are about 12,000 bookings a year to the jail, and about three-fourths or seven-eighths of them are from Municipal Court, not District Court, he said, and many of those inmates who committed misdemeanors had a mental illness.

Dupree agreed that more funding was needed, and also said he would like to create a community prosecutor’s unit to interact with members of the community.

Dupree said in 2015, about 60 percent of the felony trial cases in Wyandotte County District Court resulted in convictions, which is a lower rate than the other large counties in Kansas.

“One of the reasons that occurs is because of a lack of trust when it comes to the community,” Dupree said. Sometimes the police can’t get a witness to testify.

When there is no connection with the community, the witness sees that a person has been picked up for a crime, then released within 48 hours and is back in the community, and no charges were filed because it wasn’t a murder or violent crime, Dupree said. When the police interview the witness, the witness says he won’t talk because the suspect is still in the community, he said.

“We cannot pretend as though there’s not a problem,” Dupree said. Someone is needed to bring about a solution to the problems, he said. He said a better relationship needs to be built with the community to improve the situation.

Gorman emphasized his many years and training to be a prosecutor.

“I’ve trained my entire professional career to be a prosecuting attorney,” Gorman said at the forum.

He responded to the remark about 1,100 cases that were not filed:

“There’s standards, and we can’t ignore as lawyers those standards,” Gorman said. The standards say a case can’t be filed unless there is evidence to show beyond a reasonable doubt, he said.

Police can arrest upon one standard called probable cause, he said, and they do a good job. “If they can’t put the case together to reach beyond a reasonable doubt, I can’t file that case,” Gorman said.

If the case is filed anyway, and the standards are broken, the state disciplinary administrator could come and take their license away, he said.

“We have to follow rules, and if we don’t follow rules, then we have something like Ferguson, or something like that,” Gorman said. “We have to be fair in our prosecutions.”

He said the Fraternal Order of Police, two chapters representing the Kansas City, Kan., Police Department, and the Wyandotte County Sheriff’s Department, has endorsed Gorman. Also, the last four police chiefs in Kansas City, Kan., who are not in office currently, have endorsed Gorman.

“As the chief law enforcement officer of Wyandotte County, I will say that I have never been arrested for any crime, that I have never been charged with any crime, I have never pled guilty to, nor have I been found guilty by any judge or jury of any crime,” Gorman said. “And most importantly, I have never expunged anything off of my record at any time.”

Dupree said it was important that the prosecutor is not simply reactive, but is proactive, that the prosecutor is involved in the community to help the police make the community safer, to protect and to serve.

“The police is supposed to work in partnership with the community and the district attorney’s office, and if that partnership lacks, then crime occurs. And right now, it is lacking. The community and the district attorney’s office, and where there is no connection, where there is no innovative work to make the community better, then it doesn’t work,” Dupree said.

Dupree said that when he was 18 years old, and in college, he came home and went to a movie in Johnson County, and was accused of stealing a ticket.

“I was beat by six officers. You talk about wanting to make things better, after I was beat by six officers, I didn’t allow that to grow root inside of me and to hate the criminal justice system,” Dupree said at the candidate forum.

The case went to a trial, he said. He was found guilty on a minor charge, but not on the more serious charges. He said a battery charge against law enforcement officers was thrown out by the judge.

“There’s two sides to the law, and to really get justice, you have to know them both,” he said.

“I didn’t sue the police,” Dupree said. He said a colleague sued the police and won.

“You talk about Ferguson, he just throws it right out there,” Dupree said. “The issue is not about what you can say, but about what you can do. I understand what it is to serve people, and the reason why I will make a great prosecuting attorney is the same reason I made a good defense lawyer, because I sat in the seat, and I understand that justice is not about a conviction, but justice is about equality and fairness. And when you file a charge against a person, it is your job as the chief law enforcement officer to make sure you know what you are doing, or else we waste taxpayers’ money, or else we continue to allow this … racism that occurs in the justice system to seep in because we just say stuff.”

Dupree said that growing up near 11th and Richmond, he saw a drive-by shooting at the age of 8 and his father told him, “Just pray.” Then he became a lawyer and his father told him, “Now you do something about it.”

Dupree said he is not against Gorman. “I’m running in this race because I believe God told me to do it,” Dupree said.

The candidate forum will be shown on KCKCC’s cable television channel at a later date.