It’s time to change the Sacramento County District Attorney’s Office. This candidate can

Sacramento County’s district attorney election is as much a test of values for roughly 900,000 voters as it is about selecting a successor to two-term District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert. At a tense moment when violent crime is rising, Sacramento needs a district attorney who can help the public feel safe whether walking in their neighborhoods or going out for the night.

The race between elite prosecutor Thien Ho and attorney and law professor Alana Mathews is perhaps the most consequential election in the county this year. The winner would make history as the first person of color to hold the job while serving and protecting constituents who are clamoring for results. Which candidate can do that better is not an easy question, and this race is not an easy call.

After eight years under Schubert, however, it’s clear that traditional prosecutorial tactics haven’t thwarted a recent proliferation of gun violence, domestic abuse and other crimes. Sacramento needs a district attorney with a fresh perspective who doesn’t resort to erecting a fence around her office. It needs a top prosecutor who is willing to prioritize prevention as much as punishment.

Mathews, a measured but reform-minded former prosecutor, is more likely to do so.

A nonprofit founder and former public adviser for the California Energy Commission under Gov. Jerry Brown, Mathews grew up in Gary, Ind., once dubbed the “murder capital” of the country. Confronting the scourge of unlawful firearms is a core plank of her platform on which Ho lacks an equally clear position. Mathews pledges to launch a team dedicated to gun-violence-related restraining orders and wants to step up enforcement of red flag laws, which research has shown to be a powerful tool for prevention.

Mathews also has strong relationships within the state Legislature, where she served as a chief consultant on climate change, fighting for environmental justice statewide. That could help in developing innovative policies to stem recidivism and gun trafficking.

Ho, the office’s assistant chief deputy district attorney, is a ranking official of a department that has failed to hold police officers accountable for misuse of deadly force, and his extensive list of endorsements and campaign contributions from law enforcement raises questions about whether he would represent a needed departure. Ho has nearly doubled Mathews’ fund-raising thanks to the support of business and law enforcement. Mathews, who has eschewed law enforcement donations “to establish prosecutorial independence,” has enjoyed support from a broader group of small donors with whom the promise of change resonates.

In one case that highlighted the contrast between the candidates, Schubert’s office chose not to prosecute Sacramento police involved in the 2016 shooting of Joseph Mann, a Black man experiencing an episode of mental illness whom officers shot 17 times and even tried to hit with a police cruiser. Although Mann was armed with a knife, the Police Department ultimately fired one of the officers involved in the shooting, citing “incompetence, inefficiency (and) inexcusable neglect of duty.”

Schubert’s office, however, ruled that Mann was “lawfully shot.” Ho said he was not involved with the case but didn’t dispute the decision. Mathews did.

“When the Police Department took action the way that they did, it was an opportunity for the DA’s office to do the right thing, and they didn’t,” Mathews said. “So I called for the attorney general to review that case.”

While it’s easier for outsiders to say they would do things differently, Ho’s relationships do invite skepticism about his ability to impose accountability on his fellow law enforcers.

That doesn’t diminish Ho’s standing as one of the most accomplished prosecutors in the state, with superb experience earning guilty verdicts in the courtroom. He prosecuted the case against Golden State Killer/East Area Rapist Joseph DeAngelo, securing consecutive life sentences.

Ho’s journey to becoming Sacramento’s premier prosecutor is extraordinary. In 1976, when he was 4 years old, his family escaped Vietnam on a small fishing boat after his relatives were tortured and killed. Ho said they were stranded in the South China Sea for two weeks before a French merchant ship rescued them. After six months at a refugee camp in Malaysia, they immigrated to Stockton before his family planted deeper roots in San Jose.

“I want to give back to the community,” Ho said. “I want to be able to bridge the gap between our system of justice and, really, all communities — not just the affluent community or the gated communities, but the communities that are affected most by crime and injustice.”

Ho is clear-eyed about the need to address spillover crime linked to the downtown Sacramento jail, proposing a 24-hour reception service to link released inmates to temporary housing. But Mathews has a more comprehensive vision of addressing homelessness through rehabilitation and access to housing.

Both Ho and Mathews are capable and compelling candidates who don’t conform to the caricatures their critics might draw of them. Ho is not a lock-’em-up, law-and-order zealot with no understanding of the need for reform. Nor is Mathews an ivory tower leftist who wants to empty the jails. Both believe pretrial release should be a matter not of wealth but of public safety, and both want to strengthen risk assessments to ensure repeat offenders are not carelessly returned to the streets.

There’s no doubt, however, that this is a contest between the law enforcement establishment and an outsider who is challenging that establishment.

Increases in violent crime over the past two years have justifiably disturbed and frightened people across Sacramento County, the state and the country. That makes this race important and difficult. Our board spent hours with each candidate and was divided over whom to endorse. Our board is a reflection of our community.

Those who are largely confident in a traditional law enforcement response to crime and its capacity to make us safer will probably vote for Ho. His long and impressive experience offers the better chance of perpetuating an orderly continuation of his office’s approach to prosecuting crime and ensuring that suspects are punished. Those with less or no faith in the current system are more likely to vote for Mathews, risking a degree of turmoil in the office for better prospects of a more just and perhaps more effective approach to law enforcement.

This story was originally published May 13, 2022 at 5:00 AM.