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While his staff combined with police officers and other city officials may have outnumbered residents at last week’s first Town Hall meeting, newly sworn in District Attorney Seth Williams introduced his staff and future plans for the office.
Williams arrived prior to the 6:30 p.m. scheduled start time and mingled with those who came out to Vare Rec Center, 26th and Morris streets, March 18.
“I’ve come to recognize as a result of either the beautiful weather and people being cooped up because of all the snow for so long, or that we chose to have this on the night that the NCAA Tournament began or that the water ice place is having a sale right now — any or all of these reasons — there are more Philadelphians out having fun somewhere else than coming to listen to this old, fat, bald guy speak,” Williams said of the small turnout.
Therefore he promised to reschedule the South Division meeting, although his office could not provide that date as of press time. Williams will visit Southwest Philadelphia 6:30 tonight at Kingsessing Rec Center, 4901 Kingsessing Ave,, followed by the four remaining police divisions through May.
The district attorney aimed to erase any real or perceived barriers by showing residents how his office will serve the community and oversee justice fairly for both sides, he said.
“We have to break down the barriers that exist between the District Attorney’s Office and the people,” Williams said. “For far too many people, they believe that the District Attorney’s Office is a oppressor of the community and not a protector of the community.”
He also wants to reverse heartbreaking statistics that not only puts Philly atop the list of most felonies dismissed at the preliminary hearing, but also the city with the lowest conviction rate among the 40 largest urban areas.
“That should be unacceptable,” Williams said of stats. “These police officers are risking their lives jumping over fences, dodging pit bulls and all types of stuff. That’s a tremendously high number.”
Williams introduced members of his staff that head programs such as the Public Nuisance Task Force and the Repeat Offenders Unit, which Williams spearheaded as an assistant district attorney in 2000, and gave an overview of some of his goals for his first term in office. From smaller goals that will lead to fewer continuances and quicker trials such as not requiring a victim who had his or her car stolen to be present for preliminary hearing to a loftier goal that will streamline cases based on their police division, residents were pleased that the district attorney had shared that information as was City Council President Anna Verna who attended the meeting.
“We — all of us together — can make this a better area than we have if everybody works together,” Verna, whose first government job was in the District Attorney’s Office, said to the crowd. “I know there have been a number of shootings in this district. I don’t have to tell you. You know, but as I said, working together and cooperation with the police and District Attorney’s Office, it will definitely make a difference.”
Residents were impressed with his day job as well.
The meeting was very informative, Sylvia Wilkins, a resident of 17th and Federal streets and chair of the 17th District Advisory Council, said.
“I don’t know that people realize the department is that diverse,” she said. “They think it’s just city prosecutors.”
“It’s fantastic. The people he has — he’s out running. He has his people out and proactive,” Eddie Wright, of 16th and Porter streets, added.
And as the executive director of the South Philadelphia Business Association, Wright has ties to the community and will help spread the news of the rescheduled date.
“I think he needs to get the word out to us being community leaders [and] community people …. Getting the word out is important. We have a good way of doing it,” he said noting giving out hot dogs and pretzels. “That’s the old South Philly style.”
Since crime occurs geographically, Williams has proposed assigning attorneys geographically, which he has done when he assigned district attorneys in the Repeat Offenders Unit 10 years ago and it has been implemented citywide in D.C.
“Where I grew up there was one family that if your car was stolen, everyone knew it was that family that probably stole your car. … When we were little kids, they stole your Nerf football. When we got bigger, they stole your bicycles. When we got older, they stole cars,” the West Philly native said.
Community-based prosecution has the ability to impact the criminal justice system acquainting district attorneys more closely to the communities. The plan has two possible options and neither will cost more money, he added.
“The Toyota [version] is just the District Attorney’s Office,” he said. “I try to find a way that all the cases are handled geographically. The Mercedes-Benz version or my favorite car is the Suburban LTZ, so the Suburban version is that the courts work with us.”
The community-based system will hopefully launch by the fall if not earlier, Williams added.
This would not only assigns some district attorneys to cases only in the South Division, but also streamline who attorneys work with and help them understand the common threads of the cases in the area.
“We can align maybe like an entire floor in the court house will only handle cases from South Division,” he said. “So then the DAs who are handling those cases know where all those police officers are going to be, it will help us know where the police officers are, it can also help us reduce times cases get continued [and] help us reduce overtime that I know the captain and inspector and the commissioner talk to us about everyday, so I’m very glad.
“[Capt. Anthony Washington of the 17th District] is looking forward to the day in which the DAs assign the assistant district attorneys geographically,” Williams added.
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