Saturday, December 6, 2014

Orange County Sheriff Blames Illegal Behavior on Poor Organization and Training

The home of Disneyland and the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim is also headquarters of the Orange County Sheriff's Office, under the control of Sheriff Sandra Hutchens. This agency has come under scrutiny for its extensive use of jail cell informants, awarding money and perks for testimony and recorded confessions, refusal to share information with defense attorneys, and then lying about it. As related here, Sheriff Sandra has the situation under control and it was all just a  little mistake. Everything's OK now.

Poor organization and training is the problem. It's not that the principals involved are criminals themselves or even just unethical, it's just that they don't know the regs, aren't able to tell right from wrong. With an effective bureaucracy and the correct instruction none of these sheriff's office employees, all of whom are beyond reproach, will continue to do things that are illegal. They simply didn't know that defense attorneys are to be provided access to prosecution records and they weren't aware that perjury is a crime.
 

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