Commonwealth’s attorney to reform Fairfax County criminal justice system
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| Descano speaks to the community at a campaign event in Mason District. |
Fairfax County Commonwealth’s Attorney Steve Descano announced on June 4 several steps he is taking to reform the country’s criminal justice system.
In response to the nationwide protests following the murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer, Descano said: “Our country—our society—is still writhing in response to recent events. It’s important that we take conspicuous action right now to ensure that real change starts to take hold now.”
Descano is creating a Justice Advisory Council to improve communications with the community. This organization will “hear from local voices, discuss the potential for better processes, exchange data, group-think policy ideas, and help lead the fight for tangible justice reform.”
Members of the council will include heads of nonprofits, advocates, activists, faith leaders, business owners, and everyday community members.
The council will meet with Descano and his office regularly. “If I’m going to fight for our community’s values inside this courthouse, I want to be sure we’re always aware of what’s going on in the community as well,” he says.
Although he has already begun to ask some prominent leaders in the community to participate, anyone can apply. He plans to post an application process for the public on the commonwealth’s attorney’s website.
Descano is also changing the structure of his office “to better serve our constituents in a conscientious and forward-thinking way.” The leadership team is being restructured with three new designations:
- A deputy for community justice will serve as Descano’s “conduit to the community at all times.” This position will help identify shortcomings within the criminal justice system, as well as create new programs and bolster existing ones that remedy deep-seated problems.
- A deputy for policy reform will review current policies and analyze internal data and the prosecutorial decision-making process and develop new policies and procedures to better align the criminal justice system with the values of the community.
- A new deputy for court strategies will be responsible for implementing the changes the community is asking for in the courthouse. They will be responsible for training prosecutors and making sure the office has the resources to reform the local system.
Descano also intends to hire a director of data. “When I took office in January, I was shocked and dismayed at the complete lack of data that was kept by this office,” he says. “We found no centralized information on arrests, charges, plea deals, convictions, sentencing, or the demographic information of victims, defendants, and everyone in between.”
The director of data will be in charge of capturing, cataloging, and processing all of this untapped data. According to Descano, “We will scrutinize the data to better understand our prosecutorial tendencies and ensure that this county’s criminal justice system serves everyone fairly and equally.”
2 responses to “Commonwealth’s attorney to reform Fairfax County criminal justice system”
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More layers and bureaucracy always makes it better.
Just what we need more bureaucracy….Yes, government bigger, and government slower, and government spending more money, government spinning…..will not make a difference.