Making Schmidt Executive Director of the Oregon Criminal Justice Commission was like giving every fox in Oregon a master key to every hen house in the state. Even if Nathan Vazquez wins, Schmidt will cash in on his ceaseless schmoozing to land on his feet right away in another position that will allow him to continue his war against law and order.
It's a shame that there aren't more principled and accomplished men like the former Multnomah County D.A. Mike Schrunk standing in Schmidt's way. A ladies' man like Schmidt would quickly discover that his oily charisma and soap-opera good looks don't exactly charm powerful males they way they do fan girls like Kate Brown and the other women who dominate progressive politics in this state.
Why hasn’t Schmit et al publicly touted the success of their “restorative Justice” programs that supposedly prevented incarceration and made victims whole? Where’s the transparency on how victims were “RESTORED”, were they involved at all, was it a simple apology, or not even that????
It’s all about the criminal supposedly being given a restorative opportunity, leaving victims to wonder were the hell the justice for them comes into play!!!
Stupid ideas with no actual record of success leads to stupid outcomes!
Like all anti-racism initiatives, so-called restorative justice is a form of institutionalized cheating that is intended to give members of certain marginalized groups favorable outcomes they haven't earned and don't deserve.
I’d be curious to know how many crime victims have declined Schmidt’s invitation to join in face-to-face restorative justice meetings with their offenders and end up with no prosecution. That’s one statistic Schmidt’s not talking about.
The case I’m most familiar with involved the 17-year-old daughter of a friend of mine. She was physically assaulted in broad daylight on a Portland street by a stranger. It was serious enough to be classified as a felony. The police arrested him but he was released. Schmidt’s office invited the victim to come down and meet with her assailant in a restorative justice session. She refused, and there was no prosecution. It’s anybody’s guess how many other victims have had to suffer this injustice.
There is so much wrong with this state of affairs that I do not know where to begin. But I do not need to tell you that; as a former prosecutor - in Multnomah County no less - you have a much greater appreciation than I for the enormity of what Michael Schmidt has done to the institution of criminal justice in the County and the state in general.
First Schmidt effectively repeals the criminal laws that rioters violate most frequently, stating that he does not think individuals should have convictions for such crimes on their records. He thereby substituted his woke ideology for the will of the people's elected representatives in Salem. For Schmidt to claim he was exercising prosecutorial discretion is a sham defense because his policy resulted in the release of an unconscionably high percentage of the rioters who were arrested.
I submit what Schmidt did during the riots of 2020-21 was nothing short of a violation of the principle of the separation of powers. Charged with enforcing the state's criminal laws, Schmidt assumed a legislator's power to change the law.
The most problematic aspect of using so-called restorative justice when individuals are charged with violating criminal law is that nobody is representing the people of the state of Oregon in whose name and interest criminal prosecutions are meant to be carried out. Moreover, as I understand it, restorative justice is extrajudicial in that it does not even take place within a criminal prosecution under the supervision of a judge. There is no sword bearing the inscription "In the Name of the People of Oregon" hanging over the defendant's head.
In fact, unless I am mistaken, the entire point of restorative justice is to solve a problem that is apparent only to woke progressives of Schmit's ilk, namely that members of certain favored marginalized identity groups are being prosecuted at rates higher than their percentage of the population. Whether there's probable cause to believe that any given beneficiary of a restorative justice session has broken the law seems irrelevant.
Do you know whether the sort of restorative justice program Schmidt is running is governed by any sections of the Oregon Revised Code and related regulations? It's hard to believe that he and/or other progressives have ginned up the entire operation on their own without involving the legislature. There should be rules in place to ensure that similar cases are handled similarly. The only legislative action I'm aware of was counterproductive in that it cast a veil of secrecy over certain phases of the process.
There are times when pointing out the obvious is not redundant. The situation you described is one of them. It should be obvious to anyone with the slightest sense of decency that it would be traumatic in the extreme to expect a 17-year-old girl to meet her criminal assailant face-to-face, much less listen to anything he might have to say about the assault. I guess that's why Schmidt's office went full speed ahead to put that girl in an untenable position.
They - alone - present the people of the state of Oregon, and if they refuse to speak for the victim labeled them, there’s absolutely no recourse for the victims whatsoever. In theory a victim who knew the law might be able to show up in court and state their objection to a plea deal or sentence, but that assumes both that the case is filed and that the DA’s staff notifies the victims.
In my 40 years as a Deputy DA and DA, I was always struck by the fact the vast majority of victims did not know they could even be in the courtroom, much less be heard at “crititical stages of a proceeding.”
Schmidt’s restorative justice project has no basis in any written Oregon law. It is based purely on his understanding of prosecutorial discretion. He sees himself as the gatekeeper of the criminal justice system, and as such the sole determiner of how cases are selected for prosecution. It, of course, flies in the face of victims’ rights, which have been clarified and expanded over the past 50 years. I’m sure he would say those rights don’t accrue until he decides to charge someone. It’s a further mockery of justice.
Thank you for establishing this deeply disturbing point. I'd like to think that a creative litigator could come up with a legal theory that would shut this down. My first step would be to inquire whether Schmidt is violating nondiscrimination laws in the way he selects who's entitled to restorative justice. Are members of historically marginalized racial and ethnic identity groups being disproportionately favored?
Sure, Schmidt subjected a white cop to restorative justice as a defendant, but I got the distinct impression that he was trying to humiliate that officer and make an example of him by forcing him to engage personally with a surly leftist who has a contemptuous attitude toward police officers and law enforcement in general.
That is an excellent question, and I will have to put it to both the Multnomah County District Attorneys' Office and his campaign. Last year when I wrote about restorative justice, I was at a hearing in open court and was told I had to leave because they were moving into something confidential re: restorative justice.
This past week I have been attending a murder trial in Courtroom 10-D. I've been the only reporter in attendance. The jury went into deliberations yesterday afternoon. I gave my card to the judge's clerk and asked if she could notify me when the jury returned with a verdict.
However, I was skeptical that she would do so. Today I went to courthouse in late morning to check. A bailiff was exiting the courtroom and told me the jury was still out. There was a man sitting on the bench outside Courtroom 10-D so I sat down on the bench in front of Courtroom 10-C and did some reading.
About 20 minutes later, the judge's clerk -- accompanied by two other women -- approached me and said they had a report that I had tried to speak to a juror, that this was strictly forbidden, and the judge was going to take it up in court.
I told them I didn't know what they were talking about. I have been well aware of the prohibition on juror-media contact since last century when I covered courts in California. It felt like a setup, like they were trying to get rid of me. I spent the entire afternoon there. Got a lot of reading done.
I have so little confidence in city and county government, that while you raise an excellent question, a truthful answer may be hard to obtain.
Do you know whether Schmidt's restorative justice operation is governed by written rules of any kind? If so, where can the public find them? Surely it can't all be entirely discretionary. In a well-regulated system, the use of restorative justice by county prosecutors would be governed by a comprehensive statute and regulations if necessary.
When I was at the courthouse on Friday, I stopped by the 5th floor where the DA’s office is located. In the DA’s lobby, there is a 9-page handout with detailed instructions and forms on how to apply for an expungement to have a conviction or arrest record set aside. There was nothing available on Restorative Justice.
I went into the reception area, and asked a young woman behind the counter if there were any handouts or information on Restorative Justice. I told her the DA’s website made reference to it.
She called someone who referred her to a second person, who told her “It doesn’t exist.” That second person referred the receptionist to a third person, who worked in Victim’s Assistance. They said the only info was on the website. The receptionist noted that the link didn’t work — “We are unable to locate that page.”
What is available online is this bit of encouraging advice to offenders: “Criminal history, on its own, will not disqualify anyone from participating in RJ.”
Stephen Peifer is correct. Schmidt's Restorative Justice project has no basis in Oregon law and flies in the face of victims' rights. It treats victims and offenders as equals.
Exactly! What exactly are the stats regarding victims that have had to leave the state for their protection due to violent offenders now being emboldened to retaliate and “doxx” armed with their name and contact info?
Many political events pass without the media, and the affected public, knowing that they even happened.
Fitzsimmons' report of the 2019 Justice Reinvestment Kickoff is one such watershed and even as someone who was present, I did not realize the significance of what was going on.
That conference heralded the Orwellian language that Department of Corrections (DOC) and much of the sheep-like media use - "Adults in custody" instead of descriptive nouns like "inmates, prisoners, convicts."
Brown heralded another travesty I don't think they have put into effect, which may sound minor, but is not - allowing the roughly 1/3rd of felony inmates to wear civilian clothes instead of the denim issues that enable guards to differentiate citizens from cons. This will be extremely dangerous because in institutions with 2000 plus inmates and hundreds of staff, the only way to reliably identify the convict is clothing. For decades it has been denim jeans and a blue shirt with the Oregon DOC emblem.
If a third of the inmates can dress like “civilians” it will be impossible to prevent escapes or distinguish inmates from staff in riots, which happen pretty consistently in prison - because of the people incarcerated - in Oregon over 70% are doing crime for a violent felony and even more have records of violent crime!
I think the people who determine what the public sees and hears in the media know what happened. I believe they hide it intentionally, as they are ultimately Marxists too.
Marxism is so hot right now. Because it is marketed to Americans by almost every medium.
This one sentence, "Human nature isn’t that easy to fix." ought to qualify Pam as one of Portland's toughest-minded journalists.
Crime is crime. There is a subset of the human parade that will always--since humans walked upright--assume that they can steal whatever they want. Goods. Possessions. Property. Compassion. Truth.
Once again Pamela, you've put the pieces together clearly and concisely to show how this mess we have been given was instigated and maintained. I agree with Javier that we must work hard to get Nathan Vasquez elected and send Schmidt packing, just like San Francisco did in voting out Chesa Boudin last year.
Thanks Pamela. I’m not against trying to reduce prison time for low level crimes (locking people up is expensive and not always the answer) but certainly not in the manner the “Schmidt Show” has done it. So hopeful that Nathan Vasquez will be elected. Please consider a donation to his campaign if you can. https://www.voteforvasquez.com/
I am afraid he won't be much better than Schmidt. He doesn't seem tough enough on crime, based on his platform. Too many carrots (including moving the drug addicts from downtown into neighborhoods) and not enough sticks.
I wish he would talk to Lars Larson and answer tough questions he won't get anywhere else.
Peggy, What are you basing those comments on? Have you heard Nathan speak? If not you really should go to one of his events. Vasquez really is night and day in his approach as compared to Mike Schmidt. Here’s a debate link
Thank you for this! I haven't seen anything from Vasquez except for emails from him.
Maybe I just don't trust anyone in Portland or Multnomah County anymore. I will vote for Vasquez. I don't know anyone who is voting for Schmidt. Everyone I know knows what he's done.
I understand your lack of trust in the local government here. I have virtually none. My answer is to move. Unfortunately it will be a few years before I can make it happen.
Same here. Unless a miracle of money or opportunity falls on me.
But red states and counties are turning blue or purple like Oregon very quickly. The government is a corrupting force. Anyone can read their county and local government's minutes - look at what they are approving grants for and whom they are approving them to. Look at Clackamas County, Columbia County. Tillamook County, Coos County even. (For Coos County you can watch Rob Taylor's podcast and get real disheartened about the so-called red counties of Oregon.)
Excellent article! Thank you
Making Schmidt Executive Director of the Oregon Criminal Justice Commission was like giving every fox in Oregon a master key to every hen house in the state. Even if Nathan Vazquez wins, Schmidt will cash in on his ceaseless schmoozing to land on his feet right away in another position that will allow him to continue his war against law and order.
It's a shame that there aren't more principled and accomplished men like the former Multnomah County D.A. Mike Schrunk standing in Schmidt's way. A ladies' man like Schmidt would quickly discover that his oily charisma and soap-opera good looks don't exactly charm powerful males they way they do fan girls like Kate Brown and the other women who dominate progressive politics in this state.
Why hasn’t Schmit et al publicly touted the success of their “restorative Justice” programs that supposedly prevented incarceration and made victims whole? Where’s the transparency on how victims were “RESTORED”, were they involved at all, was it a simple apology, or not even that????
It’s all about the criminal supposedly being given a restorative opportunity, leaving victims to wonder were the hell the justice for them comes into play!!!
Stupid ideas with no actual record of success leads to stupid outcomes!
Like all anti-racism initiatives, so-called restorative justice is a form of institutionalized cheating that is intended to give members of certain marginalized groups favorable outcomes they haven't earned and don't deserve.
I’d be curious to know how many crime victims have declined Schmidt’s invitation to join in face-to-face restorative justice meetings with their offenders and end up with no prosecution. That’s one statistic Schmidt’s not talking about.
One question is whether Schmidt would even prosecute defendants if their victims declined to participate in so-called restorative justice.
The case I’m most familiar with involved the 17-year-old daughter of a friend of mine. She was physically assaulted in broad daylight on a Portland street by a stranger. It was serious enough to be classified as a felony. The police arrested him but he was released. Schmidt’s office invited the victim to come down and meet with her assailant in a restorative justice session. She refused, and there was no prosecution. It’s anybody’s guess how many other victims have had to suffer this injustice.
There is so much wrong with this state of affairs that I do not know where to begin. But I do not need to tell you that; as a former prosecutor - in Multnomah County no less - you have a much greater appreciation than I for the enormity of what Michael Schmidt has done to the institution of criminal justice in the County and the state in general.
First Schmidt effectively repeals the criminal laws that rioters violate most frequently, stating that he does not think individuals should have convictions for such crimes on their records. He thereby substituted his woke ideology for the will of the people's elected representatives in Salem. For Schmidt to claim he was exercising prosecutorial discretion is a sham defense because his policy resulted in the release of an unconscionably high percentage of the rioters who were arrested.
I submit what Schmidt did during the riots of 2020-21 was nothing short of a violation of the principle of the separation of powers. Charged with enforcing the state's criminal laws, Schmidt assumed a legislator's power to change the law.
The most problematic aspect of using so-called restorative justice when individuals are charged with violating criminal law is that nobody is representing the people of the state of Oregon in whose name and interest criminal prosecutions are meant to be carried out. Moreover, as I understand it, restorative justice is extrajudicial in that it does not even take place within a criminal prosecution under the supervision of a judge. There is no sword bearing the inscription "In the Name of the People of Oregon" hanging over the defendant's head.
In fact, unless I am mistaken, the entire point of restorative justice is to solve a problem that is apparent only to woke progressives of Schmit's ilk, namely that members of certain favored marginalized identity groups are being prosecuted at rates higher than their percentage of the population. Whether there's probable cause to believe that any given beneficiary of a restorative justice session has broken the law seems irrelevant.
Do you know whether the sort of restorative justice program Schmidt is running is governed by any sections of the Oregon Revised Code and related regulations? It's hard to believe that he and/or other progressives have ginned up the entire operation on their own without involving the legislature. There should be rules in place to ensure that similar cases are handled similarly. The only legislative action I'm aware of was counterproductive in that it cast a veil of secrecy over certain phases of the process.
There are times when pointing out the obvious is not redundant. The situation you described is one of them. It should be obvious to anyone with the slightest sense of decency that it would be traumatic in the extreme to expect a 17-year-old girl to meet her criminal assailant face-to-face, much less listen to anything he might have to say about the assault. I guess that's why Schmidt's office went full speed ahead to put that girl in an untenable position.
You have absolutely nailed it.
An elected DA is in a unique position.
They - alone - present the people of the state of Oregon, and if they refuse to speak for the victim labeled them, there’s absolutely no recourse for the victims whatsoever. In theory a victim who knew the law might be able to show up in court and state their objection to a plea deal or sentence, but that assumes both that the case is filed and that the DA’s staff notifies the victims.
In my 40 years as a Deputy DA and DA, I was always struck by the fact the vast majority of victims did not know they could even be in the courtroom, much less be heard at “crititical stages of a proceeding.”
Schmidt’s restorative justice project has no basis in any written Oregon law. It is based purely on his understanding of prosecutorial discretion. He sees himself as the gatekeeper of the criminal justice system, and as such the sole determiner of how cases are selected for prosecution. It, of course, flies in the face of victims’ rights, which have been clarified and expanded over the past 50 years. I’m sure he would say those rights don’t accrue until he decides to charge someone. It’s a further mockery of justice.
Thank you for establishing this deeply disturbing point. I'd like to think that a creative litigator could come up with a legal theory that would shut this down. My first step would be to inquire whether Schmidt is violating nondiscrimination laws in the way he selects who's entitled to restorative justice. Are members of historically marginalized racial and ethnic identity groups being disproportionately favored?
Sure, Schmidt subjected a white cop to restorative justice as a defendant, but I got the distinct impression that he was trying to humiliate that officer and make an example of him by forcing him to engage personally with a surly leftist who has a contemptuous attitude toward police officers and law enforcement in general.
That is an excellent question, and I will have to put it to both the Multnomah County District Attorneys' Office and his campaign. Last year when I wrote about restorative justice, I was at a hearing in open court and was told I had to leave because they were moving into something confidential re: restorative justice.
This past week I have been attending a murder trial in Courtroom 10-D. I've been the only reporter in attendance. The jury went into deliberations yesterday afternoon. I gave my card to the judge's clerk and asked if she could notify me when the jury returned with a verdict.
However, I was skeptical that she would do so. Today I went to courthouse in late morning to check. A bailiff was exiting the courtroom and told me the jury was still out. There was a man sitting on the bench outside Courtroom 10-D so I sat down on the bench in front of Courtroom 10-C and did some reading.
About 20 minutes later, the judge's clerk -- accompanied by two other women -- approached me and said they had a report that I had tried to speak to a juror, that this was strictly forbidden, and the judge was going to take it up in court.
I told them I didn't know what they were talking about. I have been well aware of the prohibition on juror-media contact since last century when I covered courts in California. It felt like a setup, like they were trying to get rid of me. I spent the entire afternoon there. Got a lot of reading done.
I have so little confidence in city and county government, that while you raise an excellent question, a truthful answer may be hard to obtain.
Do you know whether Schmidt's restorative justice operation is governed by written rules of any kind? If so, where can the public find them? Surely it can't all be entirely discretionary. In a well-regulated system, the use of restorative justice by county prosecutors would be governed by a comprehensive statute and regulations if necessary.
When I was at the courthouse on Friday, I stopped by the 5th floor where the DA’s office is located. In the DA’s lobby, there is a 9-page handout with detailed instructions and forms on how to apply for an expungement to have a conviction or arrest record set aside. There was nothing available on Restorative Justice.
I went into the reception area, and asked a young woman behind the counter if there were any handouts or information on Restorative Justice. I told her the DA’s website made reference to it.
She called someone who referred her to a second person, who told her “It doesn’t exist.” That second person referred the receptionist to a third person, who worked in Victim’s Assistance. They said the only info was on the website. The receptionist noted that the link didn’t work — “We are unable to locate that page.”
What is available online is this bit of encouraging advice to offenders: “Criminal history, on its own, will not disqualify anyone from participating in RJ.”
Stephen Peifer is correct. Schmidt's Restorative Justice project has no basis in Oregon law and flies in the face of victims' rights. It treats victims and offenders as equals.
Exactly! What exactly are the stats regarding victims that have had to leave the state for their protection due to violent offenders now being emboldened to retaliate and “doxx” armed with their name and contact info?
Many political events pass without the media, and the affected public, knowing that they even happened.
Fitzsimmons' report of the 2019 Justice Reinvestment Kickoff is one such watershed and even as someone who was present, I did not realize the significance of what was going on.
That conference heralded the Orwellian language that Department of Corrections (DOC) and much of the sheep-like media use - "Adults in custody" instead of descriptive nouns like "inmates, prisoners, convicts."
Brown heralded another travesty I don't think they have put into effect, which may sound minor, but is not - allowing the roughly 1/3rd of felony inmates to wear civilian clothes instead of the denim issues that enable guards to differentiate citizens from cons. This will be extremely dangerous because in institutions with 2000 plus inmates and hundreds of staff, the only way to reliably identify the convict is clothing. For decades it has been denim jeans and a blue shirt with the Oregon DOC emblem.
If a third of the inmates can dress like “civilians” it will be impossible to prevent escapes or distinguish inmates from staff in riots, which happen pretty consistently in prison - because of the people incarcerated - in Oregon over 70% are doing crime for a violent felony and even more have records of violent crime!
I think the people who determine what the public sees and hears in the media know what happened. I believe they hide it intentionally, as they are ultimately Marxists too.
Marxism is so hot right now. Because it is marketed to Americans by almost every medium.
Who are some of Portland's leading Marxists?
Thank you Pamela for writing this. Excellent.
This one sentence, "Human nature isn’t that easy to fix." ought to qualify Pam as one of Portland's toughest-minded journalists.
Crime is crime. There is a subset of the human parade that will always--since humans walked upright--assume that they can steal whatever they want. Goods. Possessions. Property. Compassion. Truth.
They are ever with us.
The only question is: do we cave or do we resist.
Pam, I think, is onto the answer.
Once again Pamela, you've put the pieces together clearly and concisely to show how this mess we have been given was instigated and maintained. I agree with Javier that we must work hard to get Nathan Vasquez elected and send Schmidt packing, just like San Francisco did in voting out Chesa Boudin last year.
Thanks Pamela. I’m not against trying to reduce prison time for low level crimes (locking people up is expensive and not always the answer) but certainly not in the manner the “Schmidt Show” has done it. So hopeful that Nathan Vasquez will be elected. Please consider a donation to his campaign if you can. https://www.voteforvasquez.com/
I am afraid he won't be much better than Schmidt. He doesn't seem tough enough on crime, based on his platform. Too many carrots (including moving the drug addicts from downtown into neighborhoods) and not enough sticks.
I wish he would talk to Lars Larson and answer tough questions he won't get anywhere else.
Peggy, What are you basing those comments on? Have you heard Nathan speak? If not you really should go to one of his events. Vasquez really is night and day in his approach as compared to Mike Schmidt. Here’s a debate link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wehZ548c-OY
Thank you for this! I haven't seen anything from Vasquez except for emails from him.
Maybe I just don't trust anyone in Portland or Multnomah County anymore. I will vote for Vasquez. I don't know anyone who is voting for Schmidt. Everyone I know knows what he's done.
I understand your lack of trust in the local government here. I have virtually none. My answer is to move. Unfortunately it will be a few years before I can make it happen.
Same here. Unless a miracle of money or opportunity falls on me.
But red states and counties are turning blue or purple like Oregon very quickly. The government is a corrupting force. Anyone can read their county and local government's minutes - look at what they are approving grants for and whom they are approving them to. Look at Clackamas County, Columbia County. Tillamook County, Coos County even. (For Coos County you can watch Rob Taylor's podcast and get real disheartened about the so-called red counties of Oregon.)