Diverse field shaping up in Sacramento district attorney’s race to replace Schubert
The campaign to replace Sacramento County District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert is shaping up as one of the most diverse races in county history for the post, and with the election more than a year away the the field still expected to grow.
Schubert, who has announced plans to run for California attorney general, already has endorsed Deputy District Attorney Paris Coleman, a 56-year-old Democrat who would be Sacramento’s first Black D.A. if he won.
But Alana Mathews — another African American candidate and former Sacramento prosecutor — is in the race, and says she plans to focus on criminal justice reform.
“I’m not running to be the first Black D.A.,” Mathews said in an interview Monday. “I want to be the first D.A. who’s focused on not just locking everybody up.
“We need new data-driven policies to tackle crime.”
Mathews, a 46-year-old Democrat, works with the Prosecutors Alliance of California, which pushes for criminal justice reform, and formerly was an appointee of Gov. Jerry Brown to serve as public adviser for the state Energy Commission.
She began as an intern under then-D.A. Jan Scully and served as a prosecutor from 2004 to 2012, she said.
But both candidates may soon find themselves facing off against one of the higher profile prosecutors in the office — Thien Ho, who was chosen along with prosecutor Amy Holliday to oversee the successful prosecution of Golden State Killer Joseph James DeAngelo.
Ho, who was born in Vietnam and came to this country as a refugee after escaping his homeland in a fishing boat with his family, said he is taking a hard look at the race.
“I am seriously considering running for Sacramento D.A.,” he said in an interview last week. “The Sacramento region deserves an experienced prosecutor with a proven track record and the veteran leadership necessary to serve the community.”
Ho has supervised the gang and hate crime unit and in 2017 was named prosecutor of the year by the D.A.’s office and the National Asian Pacific Islander Prosecutor’s Association.
He prosecuted the Lilly Manning case, a horrific child abuse case involving a young girl who was kept in a small closet and routinely beaten until she escaped. Her great aunt and her husband were convicted in that case, which Ho handled from the start and insisted on keeping even after being transferred to another D.A.’s unit.
Following the prosecution of DeAngelo, who was sentenced last August to 11 consecutive life terms without the possibility of parole, plus one life term with the possibility of parole and eight years for other enhancements, Ho was promoted to assistant chief deputy district attorney overseeing the office’s justice and community relations bureau.
Ho, 47, is a Democrat, meaning that so far there are no Republicans in the nonpartisan race. Schubert had been a Republican, but switched to no party preference in 2018, one week after winning re-election.