Intervention and Prevention Initiatives that Work

To help reduce juvenile crime, the two deputy district attorneys on the Youth Accountability Team (YAT) serve the seven Coachella Valley high schools, the feeder schools, and the continuation school. YAT is comprised of members from Riverside County's Sheriff and Probation departments, Office of Education, school districts, and District Attorney's Office. This combination of experts provides for kids and their families, the services they need to prevent serious juvenile criminal behavior.

Studies and our experience show that such a comprehensive, community-based approach through early intervention is the most effective way of ensuring that at-risk youth are steered away from criminality and put on the path of becoming productive citizens.

YAT raises awareness about the consequences of juvenile crime through school presentations, home visits, community outreach, and aggressive prosecution. The team has made a difference in the way our county's children and their parents view delinquent behavior. Intensive supervision of juvenile probationers and this multi-agency approach to intervention with at-risk youngsters have made campuses safer, reduced truancy, and effected a lower juvenile crime rate in targeted areas.

Another help for youngsters in the Eastern region of our county is the mentoring program established by Deputy District Attorney David Greenberg who, with fellow prosecutors - and in cooperation with Shelter From the Storm - mentors the sons and daughters of battered women who seek safety in that women's shelter.

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Family Violence Prosecution

Crimes of family violence include adult and child sexual assault, statutory rape, sexually violent predators, felony child abuse, and homicide cases. The deputy district attorneys who prosecute these crimes are highly skilled and specially trained to handle these cases from investigation through sentencing.

Recent notable cases of violence in families:

• A father who sexually assaulted his 12-year-old daughter was convicted by the jury and sentenced to 18 years in state prison.
• A man pled guilty before trial to molesting the young teenage daughter of family friends and was sentenced to 6 years in state prison.
• In a case of "Shaken Baby Syndrome," the cause of death was disputed by differing broad medical opinions, but the jury found this man guilty anyway. He is now serving 25 years to life in state prison.
• In a tragic case, a young father-to-be shot and paralyzed his 16-year-old, pregnant girlfriend at an abortion clinic. He is serving a life sentence in state prison.
• A woman viciously bit the 5-year-old daughter of her boyfriend. Convicted of torture, willful harm to a child, and 33 counts of physical abuse, she is serving 16 years to life in state prison.
• For threatening to kill his wife in the presence of their 4-year-old son, this husband was sentenced to 3 years in state prison.

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Crimes Against Police Officers (CAPO)

When a peace officer becomes a victim of a major crime while on duty, the case is handled by our prosecutor assigned to the CAPO Unit. That prosecutor also responds at any time of the day or night to all Officer-Involved-Use-of-Force incidents that occur in the Eastern region of the county.

In one such case, the defendant shot Riverside County Sheriff Deputy J.C. Garcia after the deputy had detained him. Deputy Garcia, who was shot three times, two times in the head, is back on duty, but the defendant was convicted and is serving 40 years to life in state prison.

Homicide

The more complicated homicides are handled by a special team of experienced deputy district attorneys. Their most recent significant cases include these:

• This defendant met the victim (a recovering meth addict with psychiatric problems) at a bar in Blythe. They spent the night in her motel room (where she was living at the time), discussing their various attempts at drug rehab. The next day, after having sex, the victim began yelling, "Rape. Rape." Being a two-striker, the defendant couldn't allow her to continue yelling "rape" because he'd "go back to prison for sure." So he strangled her. The jury found him guilty and he is serving 75 years to life in state prison.
• This mother, under the influence of drugs, took her two little girls to the desert to kill them. She shot and killed 4-year-old Cecilia, put her body in a trash bag, dumped it in the trunk, and drove home. Gracey, age 5, was also shot but survived. The mother drove her home, too, where she slit her throat and left her to bleed in the bathtub. Little Gracey testified via closed circuit television (a first in a Riverside County case) about what her mother had done. Convicted by the jury, the mother is serving 76 years to life in state prison.

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