Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins: Restoring Credibility in the System
Submitted by Ann del Llano on Wed, 2009-11-18 10:35
Authored by Ann del Llano
In 1986, the Dallas County District Attorney's office used an official training manual that TRAINED Dallas County prosecutors to keep racial minorities off juries. Twenty years later, people with white skin are the racial minority in Dallas and the District Attorney is a black gentleman.
Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins was the keynote speaker at the National Association for Civilian Oversight of Law Enforcement (NACOLE) annual conference, which was held in Austin this year. We caught up with the District Attorney for a personal interview. Find out what Mr. Watkins says traditional law enforcement doesn't understand, what going to prison means in some communities, and how the system has been complicit in criminalizing certain groups of people unnecessarily. Best of all, find out what you can do about it.
In the following 2-part video of his speech, the District Attorney shared his views on credibility, and how law enforcement and the criminal justice system fail us when we don't get a return on our investment. Since he took office in 2007, his office has obtained 26 exonerations - 26 people who his predecessors had convicted of serious crimes they did not commit. He breaks down credibility problems in the system, from police who charge innocent people to police unions that protect wrongdoing, from prosecutors who were rubber-stamping cases to judges who currently sit on Texas' highest criminal appeals court who campaigned that they are "pro-prosecution." Find out what his office is doing to restore credibility to the system.
