There are many compelling issues involving our criminal justice system that have surfaced recently, some of which have been covered by our news media. On the federal level, there is now a new War on Terror being waged against a newly classified group of enemies of the state, loosely termed as “domestic terrorists.” This group, depending upon who is talking, could consist of all people present in the vicinity of the U.S. Capitol building on January 6, 2021, all white supremacists, all Trump supporters, all conservatives, all parents against teaching Critical Race Theory in our schools, or anyone who is not supportive of President Biden’s adminstration.

Instead of focusing on the problems involving our open borders to Mexico, the influx of fentanyl from China and other countries, the rising crimes rate, especially in urban cities under Democratic Party control, these “domestic terrorists” now seem to be the focus of Biden’s U.S. Department of Justice and the FBI. Things don’t appear much better on the state and local level. For the past few years, the California Attorney General’s Office has acted more like a branch of the Public Defender’s Office than a prosecuting agency.  Aside from handling criminal cases on appeal and exercising zero of its oversight powers over county law enforcement, the Attorney General’s Office’s main concern and focus seems to be in protecting illegal aliens and providing them with legal services to prevent their deportation. Since the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs vs. Jackson which overturned Roe vs. Wade, providing “reproductive care” and transgender rights to the rest of the world apparently will be its next primary role.  
 

As far as the Orange County District Attorney’s Office is concerned, those who thought there would be improvement after Tony Rackauckas was ousted from office, are bound to be disappointed. District Attorney Todd Spitzer has revealed in his public appearances and statements, an inordinate desire for media exposure as well as an apparent lack of both legal knowledge and ethics.  His interventions in a number of serious criminal cases have proven detrimental to their final outcomes. During his first term, the unsolved homicide project TRACKRS (for a short period called OCHTF) has ceased to exist.  TRACKRS was a worthy and publicly lauded project, gutted by Rackauckas and finished off by Spitzer.

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Excerpt from TRACKRS

                        C H A P T E R TWO:   TH E FIRST TWO CASES

He probably shouldn’t have taken them with him. When Mel Jensen was

transferred out of the Homicide Unit of the Orange County District

Attorney’s Office in 1991, he took two unsolved homicide case files that he

had been reviewing and packed them with his books and personal belongings.

Technically, as the new supervisor of the Felony Panel, a separate division

of the office, Jensen should have left the files in the unsolved cases

cabinet drawer of the Homicide Unit when he was transferred. That’s where

they would have remained, and it is likely no one would have ever paid any

attention to them. But he didn’t.

          For a government employee, a civil servant, this was somewhat unusual

conduct. Within most government agencies, in my experience, the

 characteristics of being conscientious, innovative, or even being above

 average in productivity are not necessarily frowned upon but aren’t exactly 

encouraged either.

          Mel Jensen had been a deputy district attorney in the Orange County

District Attorney’s Office for a number of years when I first joined the office

in 1975. By then, he was somewhat of a legend. He probably had prosecuted

more cases than anyone else in the office. As a result, he had acquired the

surprisingly rare and respected reputation of a deputy district attorney who

would try any kind of case, anytime, anywhere.

          Jensen looked like the former Marine that he was: tall and heavy set

with a square jaw, graying short-cropped hair, and blue eyes. Outside of the

courtroom, Jensen was one of the calmest, most soft-spoken attorneys I’d

ever met. He never seemed to be in a rush. You couldn’t tell by watching

him walk down the hall whether he was going out for lunch or up to court

for final argument in a murder case. I first met Jensen when we were both

assigned to the Homicide Unit. My first two tours in the unit between 1981

and 1989 overlapped with the time he was assigned there.

          In 1993, Jensen recruited me to assist him in supervising the Felony

Trials Panel. From time to time, when the two of us would meet, Jensen would

bring up the two unsolved case files. The 1977 homicide of Deborah Liem,

although it had occurred over eighteen years earlier, was still being actively

investigated by Detective Dick Lewis of the Fullerton Police Department.

The other case involved the 1988 homicide of Malinda Gibbons, in the city

of Costa Mesa.

          Detective Lewis was a bulldog of a policeman. Muscular and balding,

his nickname was “The Crusher.” Lewis often spent time with Jensen

reviewing the Deborah Liem case and discussing potential leads he was

investigating. Lewis had a suspect he had been looking at for a number of

years. Another suspect had been arrested shortly after the homicide had

occurred, but the case against him was dismissed during the preliminary

hearing. From what Jensen had told me, the chances of solving the case

didn’t look very promising.

          On a day in early August 1995, I walked from my office in the center

of the window offices facing Civic Center Drive, down the aisle towards Mel

Jensen’s office. Jensen probably had one of the best offices in the District

Attorney’s Central branch in Santa Ana, the county seat. Situated on the

northeast corner of the second floor of the Orange County Courthouse, it

was larger than most of the other offices and had windows facing in two

directions, a great view of Civic Center Drive and the driveway into the

courthouse to the north, and the usually empty reflection pool just below

the east-facing windows.

          Jensen was sitting at his desk, with his back to the windows, looking

down at two brown files in front of him. I had a good idea which cases they

were. As I came in, he looked up and motioned for me to take a seat in front

of his desk. He had just heard from Detective Lewis. There had been a new

development in one of the cases. It wasn’t a positive one. Lewis’s prime suspect

in the Liem homicide had been excluded as the perpetrator.

          “I think we need some new ideas and maybe some new blood to

jumpstart these cases,” Jensen stated. Sitting across from me at his desk, he

nudged the two brown files in my direction. “Read them,” he said, “then tell

me what you think.”

          That was it. Jensen oftentimes was a man of few words. I took the files.

And that’s how our project got started.


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