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Hennepin County voters just received an opportunity to engage in a more thoughtful process when choosing their next top prosecutor. Mary Moriarty’s announcement Wednesday that she will not be seeking re-election allows her to focus on her priorities as she outlined in her campaign — priorities many voters either willfully ignored or were ignorant about as they chose the name that carried the DFL endorsement.
It should also be noted that Moriarty, the previous chief Hennepin County public defender, won her election over former Hennepin County District Judge Martha Holton Dimick 58% to 42%. Holton Dimick had also served as a senior assistant Hennepin County Attorney and deputy Minneapolis city attorney. Contrast those credentials with allegations against Moriarty when she was the chief public defender, which resulted in a $300,000 settlement and the State Board of Public Defense declining to reappoint her.
In fairness, I don’t want to disregard those voters who truly believe in the progressive prosecution model. After all, it’s been trending nationwide, with cities like Orlando, Fla., and Austin, Texas, recently electing district attorneys who ran on a progressive platform.
However, the pendulum may have swung a bit too far. In California, several district attorneys who had implemented policies quite like those unveiled by Moriarty were recalled.
In the words of former Sacramento County District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert, “You can’t just burn the system down … [a]ny mainstream career prosecutor is going to tell you, yes — we support reforms. But at the end of it all, it cannot be extreme. It must be driven by the facts in the law. Every case is unique.”
For the record, I support criminal justice reform and know there are ways prosecutors can adjust how they approach their jobs. Unfortunately, it feels like the rank-and-file prosecutors in the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office were given no opportunity to provide input into any of the sweeping decisions Moriarty has implemented in the 2 1/2 years since she took control.