Pamela Price, recalled by voters in 2024, says she’ll run again for DA

Pamela Worth will run once more for Alameda County District Lawyer within the June 2026 main election.

At a information convention Thursday afternoon in Hayward, Worth, who received the 2022 basic election by defeating a profession prosecutor however was recalled by practically 63% of voters final yr, forged her marketing campaign as a combat towards billionaires, company corruption and other people linked to President Donald Trump.

“We should present Donald Trump and his billionaire mates — whether or not they’re in Washington or Piedmont — that justice can’t be purchased in Alameda County,” Worth stated on the information convention on the Blessings of Religion Worship Middle. The reference to Piedmont appeared like a swipe at Philip Dreyfuss, the person who virtually single-handedly financed the recall marketing campaign towards Worth.

Worth accused present District Lawyer Ursula Jones Dickson, who was appointed by the Board of Supervisors after the recall, of refusing to carry native cops and federal brokers accountable for crimes dedicated within the county.

For instance, Worth cited an Oct. 23 incident during which a Customs and Border Safety agent shot an Oakland pastor within the face with a chemical irritant throughout a protest on the entrance to Coast Guard Island. The pastor rallied with dozens of different neighborhood members towards Trump’s introduced crackdown on immigration and crime — an operation that the president later halted. Oakland police and the district legal professional’s workplace have declined to say whether or not they would examine or prosecute the federal agent who shot the pastor. Worth advised The Oaklandside that she believes OPD ought to examine the incident, and that the district legal professional ought to cost the officer with assault.

“I’ll say to ICE and all different federal brokers who violate state legislation, ‘Go round and determine it out,’” Worth stated right this moment at her marketing campaign announcement.

Walter Riley, a longtime civil rights legal professional and activist, stated the recall was funded by rich elites whose pursuits don’t profit the working class, immigrants and others from marginalized communities.

“The working individuals of this nation shouldn’t permit the political and financial elite to find out who’s in energy, how a lot cash is spent on campaigns and who’s going to win,” he stated on the press convention.

Since being faraway from workplace, Worth has been outspoken in her criticism of Jones Dickson.

Jones Dickson has reversed a lot of her predecessor’s insurance policies, together with a particular directive for prosecutors to not file sentence enhancements most often, and a rollback of critiques of dying penalty instances tainted by prosecutorial misconduct.

“When our district legal professional refuses to take a look at instances that we all know are tainted with racism and anti-Semitism, she is holding arms with racists and anti-Semites,” Worth stated.

In a press release responding to Worth’s marketing campaign, Jones Dickson stated she has inherited “a demoralized workplace and a backlog of greater than 2,000 instances” from her predecessor.

“Former District Lawyer Pamela Worth was recalled by 63% of Alameda County voters. She is welcome to argue that they had been mistaken, lower than a yr after that recall. I belief the judgment of Alameda County voters,” stated Jones Dickson.

“We can’t afford to have a prosecutor who acts like Donald Trump in her administration of justice, who hesitates to guard us from Donald Trump’s Gestapo, who’s complicit in discrimination based mostly on race or faith, and who depends on billionaires and rich pursuits on this nation,” Worth stated.

Throughout Worth’s tenure as district legal professional, a federal choose ordered her workplace to evaluate greater than two dozen dying penalty instances, some relationship again to the Nineteen Seventies, that discovered Alameda County prosecutors had systematically excluded black and Jewish individuals from juries. Since then, a few of the individuals convicted in these instances have been faraway from dying row and one man’s conviction has been overturned.

Shortly after taking workplace, nonetheless, Jones Dickson introduced that her workplace was withdrawing a lot of excellent retention requests. Prosecutors appointed by Jones Dickson accused Worth’s authorities of failing to totally examine the instances earlier than looking for resentencing.

“When our district legal professional refuses to take a look at instances that we all know are tainted with racism and anti-Semitism, she is actually holding arms with racists and anti-Semites,” Worth stated right this moment.

Worth additionally appeared to decry Jones Dickson’s resolution to file a lawsuit towards Radius Recycling, a scrap steel recycling plant in West Oakland. Final yr, Worth introduced she had filed a 10-count prison criticism towards Radius and two of its workers, accusing them of beginning a fireplace in August 2023 that despatched poisonous smoke throughout Oakland. In Could this yr, Jones Dickson stated she was dismissing the case on account of “inadequate proof.”

“We can’t afford to have a prosecutor who stands behind company polluters,” Worth stated at right this moment’s press convention.

After George Floyd was killed by a Minneapolis police officer in 2020, many communities, together with Alameda County, sought to vary the narrative round crime and policing and prioritize restorative justice and extra community-based options to public security. Worth ran for Alameda County DA on a platform of prison justice reform and police accountability, successful the November 2022 election with 53% of the vote.

However the story started to vary shortly after Worth took workplace. Activists, victims’ advocates and a few elected officers accused Worth of being too lenient on crime, particularly after she instructed her deputies to not cost minors as adults and to not search sentencing enhancements, that are used to elongate an individual’s sentence except particular circumstances exist. Some residents believed that Worth’s prosecutorial philosophy drove individuals to commit crimes and tried to hyperlink Oakland’s public security issues to Worth.

Worth additionally got here beneath fireplace hire her boyfriend in her workplace with out correctly disclosing it. Some prosecutors in her workplace, based on the Berkeley Scanneradditionally accused her of making a poisonous office that led to a number of seasoned attorneys leaving. Jones Dickson has additionally made personnel modifications which have resulted in attorneys leaving the agency.

The recall marketing campaign started virtually instantly after Worth started her time period, with crime victims advocates, relations of homicide victims and others supporting her ouster. The hassle was profitable, indicating continued resistance to progressive prosecutors and insurance policies.