County Prosecutors Seek Lesser Charges on Property, Drug Crimes

Amy Radil
09/26/2008

Starting next month, King County prosecutors will seek lesser charges in nonviolent offenses like property crimes, identity theft and drug possession. They say they have little choice, given this year's budget shortfalls and a spike in violent crime. KUOW's Amy Radil reports.

TRANSCRIPT

FELONY PROSECUTIONS ARE EXPENSIVE, AND THE KING COUNTY PROSECUTOR'S OFFICE NEEDS TO CUT $5 MILLION FROM NEXT YEAR'S BUDGET. SO KING COUNTY PROSECUTOR DAN SATTERBERG SAYS HE HAS NO CHOICE BUT TO DOWNGRADE MORE NONVIOLENT CRIMES TO MISDEMEANORS, AND SEND THEM THROUGH DISTRICT AND MUNICIPAL COURTS. NORMALLY SOMEONE IS CHARGED IN MUNICIPAL COURT FOR A PROPERTY CRIME OF $500 OR LESS; NOW THAT LIMIT WILL BE RAISED TO $1,000. THESE CRIMES INCLUDE FRAUD, BURGLARY AND IDENTITY THEFT. BUT SATTERBERG SAYS THE MOST SIGNIFICANT CHANGES WILL BE TO DRUG CHARGES.

SATTERBERG: "It means that people who are charged with possessing small amounts of drugs will not go to the state prison system, they'll stay here locally, be sentenced locally. That's just one of the changes we've had to make in order to focus our efforts on the serious violent crimes that are filling our courts."

SATTERBERG SAYS THERE'S BEEN A HUGE SPIKE IN HOMICIDE CASES IN THE COUNTY. HE CURRENTLY HAS 69 MURDER CASES AWAITING PROSECUTION.

SATTERBERG: "That's a tremendous number. We filed more murder cases in 2008 by July than we had in all of 2007 and all of 2006. So we have a huge load of serious, violent cases and those are going to continue to be our priority."

SATTERBERG SAYS HIS OFFICE HAS ALREADY CUT MORE THAN TWO DOZEN POSITIONS, MOSTLY PROSECUTORS. EVERY COUNTY AGENCY IS REQUIRED TO CUT ITS BUDGET BY 11% NEXT YEAR TO COVER THE COUNTY'S $90 MILLION BUDGET SHORTFALL.

AMY RADIL, KUOW NEWS.

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