Committee Hearing, March 4, 1998

You are saying that finding out and following up on allegedly false complaints made against Philadelphia police officers is not a worthwhile use of the District Attorney's time, at the same time --

No, that's not exactly what I said. That's not even close to what I said.

Sir, I would 2422 BILL 980003 appreciate it if you would let him finish. Just let him finish we are all going to let everybody finish here.

You don't think that finding out whether or not those kinds of prosecutions have been made, even though your testimony last year was that you believed that they had been made, that you think that filing false complaints against police officer is serious, and the District Attorney testified that it is a crime, a violation of Title 18, but you don't think finding out whether people are actually filing false complaints and what your office has done about it is a worthwhile use of the District Attorney's Office time? That's what you are saying?

No. What I am saying is, finding out the answers to some of the many questions that you ask for, in our opinion, purely political purposes, is not a worthwhile use of our time. Prosecuting cases involving false complaints against police officers is a very worthwhile use of our time. And when any such complaints, with 2423 BILL 980003 sufficient evidence to warrant taking the case to court, come into our office, we are absolutely positive that the people charged with that responsibility carry it out and prosecute those kinds of cases.

And I have asked you, and I asked you a year ago, how many cases were prosecuted by the D.A.'s Office for such an offense, which everyone believes is significant and important? Now, there must be an answer to that question. It is either a number, or it is zero. What is the answer?

I don't know the answer. As I told you, we did not attempt to answer that question. Because you ask lots of questions that seem to have no purpose other than to attack the District Attorney and attack the District Attorney's Office.

Mr. Gordon, you have no basis for determining what the purpose of the question is under any circumstance. You have none. You have none.

I work for the District 2424 BILL 980003 Attorney, and not you.

I asked you one question in the hearing last year which came as a result of a previous hearing where it was stated that some officers, police officers, are allegedly reluctant to do their job because they are concerned that people may file complaints against them. What we were trying to determine was, are people in fact engaging in that practice, and, secondly, as the District Attorney testified a year ago, it is a violation of the law. I believe you are in the law enforcement business, the prosecution business. And if someone were to violate the law, I assume that you go after them. I asked a very simple question, how many of those cases have happened. You testified that you believe that the office has prosecuted such cases. And so whether you think the question is for one thing or think the question is for something else, I think you have some responsibility to just respond, regardless of what the motivations are and whether or not you think it is an attack or 2425 BILL 980003 not an attack. It is a very legitimate question. It has been asked by other people, including the President of the FOP, who has a tick interest in this regard. And actually, I have also tried to get that answer as a result of an inquiry by Mr. Costello. Now, maybe you will tell him, or maybe you will tell Mr. Costello that it is a worthless question and not an appropriate use of the District Attorney's time. But I don't think, if I make a legitimate request and it is a very serious issue, I resent the notion that somehow you decide over there whether it is an appropriate request, or what the basis of it is. Or how could you possibly know? You are a very intelligent man, Mr. Gordon, but you are not in my head.

I don't work for you, Councilman. I work for the District Attorney.

I understand that.

And if she directs me to 2426 BILL 980003 answer your questions, I answer them. I am also confident that --

You work for the people of the City of Philadelphia, like the rest of us, that's who you work for.

I take direction from the District Attorney. She is elected by the people of the City of Philadelphia to run the District Attorney's Office, as she sees fit, in accordance with the law and the Rules of Professional Responsibility. I take my direction --

Mr. Gordon, maybe I can get the District Attorney to respond to this question. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Let me answer the question directly, Councilman. Let me try to answer the question a little more pointedly. When Councilman Nutter asked Mr. Gordon the question in the way he placed the question, I remember Mr. Gordon's answer, and I knew right away there would come a request to go find the cases. I am not aware, in the years that I 2427 BILL 980003 have been in the District Attorney, which is almost seven years now, I am not aware of one prosecution of one person who has filed a false Complaint against an officer claiming that the officer did something improper. For example, of all the Complaints filed against officers with the Police Review Board or -- the Police Advisory Board, whatever that group is called, and who file Complaints against police with the Police Department, they are either founded or not founded. If they are founded, that is, some Complaint against the police officer, the officer may be disciplined. If they are not founded, it doesn't mean that the Police Department calls us up and says, "Arrest Mrs. X or Mr. X for filing a Complaint against Officer Y which turned out to be untrue or unfounded." Similarly, if there are any other cases where anybody gets up on the witness stand and lies about a police officer, there is almost no way you can find out about that because the cases are not referred to us for perjury. 2428 BILL 980003 If there was for a filing a false police report, we do would do that. But since a judge says, "Guilty," "Not guilty," and doesn't make a determination this witness has committed perjury we have no way of practically finding that out. So the answer to Councilman Nutter's question really is, I don't know of any, to my knowledge we haven't prosecuted any, and there is no 10 practical way of finding them. As I have said previously in this forum, all of our cases are listed by a court term and number. We don't have cases listed by kind of crime. So what we would have to do, in a practical way, in a very down-to-earth way, to find out the answer to his question, if we could find it at all -- which I suggest we would never find -- is to go through millions of cases, page by page, to try to discern whether a witness lied about a police officer. We have no way of doing that.

" And Councilman Nutter is right about that. We sometimes ask questions for a variety of different reasons, and people ask questions of us for a variety of different reasons. But sometimes we have to answer those questions. And I have asked a couple of questions of a couple of departments myself over the course of the last years. Sometimes people 14 didn't want to supply the information, but you have 15 to supply the information. 16 And I think just as a matter of 17 respect for the office that a Councilmember holds, 18 just as a matter of that Councilmember also having a 19 responsibility in all of this, sometimes if you 20 can't give a definitive answer, a Councilmember is entitled to an explanation as to why a definitive answer cannot be given. But it is unacceptable for a subordinate of yours to say, "We didn't think the question was properly motivated," because we have a 2430 BILL 980003 right to ask questions for whatever reason. And there are a number of things. And it happens, and it happens all the time. And, you know, it is a part of the give and take of being in these public offices that these kinds of things develop. And I would appreciate it very much if you would just have anybody who works with you give whatever information you think you can give to any reasonable request that comes. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I think you just put your finger on it, Councilperson. I don't believe there is any Councilperson here, except Mr. Nutter, who has had any difficulty getting any information out of us. If anything, if anything, we would bend over backwards to try to help a City Council person because they are representative of people they work for. However, I have to say that many of Councilmember Nutter's requests are unreasonable, are time consuming, and they don't address themselves to the issue that we try to address, which is fighting crime. 2431 BILL 980003 If I spent all the time and directed my people to spend all the time looking through thousands of files to get information that Councilman Nutter asked for, and it helped to decrease crime one-tenth of 1 percent, I would be in the stack myself doing it. But all the requests that he makes are not designed to fight crime; they are designed to tie up my time in endless letter writing. I have asked Councilman Nutter on numerous occasions, "Michael, you want something from me, pick up the telephone and ask it of me. " But he wants to write letters so that he can pull them out at budget time and give me fits about all of the letters that I didn't write him. I am not going to spend the time of my office answering letters that have, really, very little to do with what I do. I am here to do one thing, and this is the way I take my oath. And I am not suggesting anybody has any different oath reasons than I do. I am not ascribing improper motives to anybody. I am here to fight crime. I believe 2432 BILL 980003 the people want me to do things. I want to do them. " I believe there are men and women in this Council who are as highly motivated as I am. All I want to do is to do something. I don't want to talk about it. And I am tired of responding to letters that Michael Nutter writes me which have nothing to do with the issue at hand which I am elected to do, and that's fighting crime and preventing crime. That's all I want to do, that's all I am elected to do, and that's what I want to do. I will give him any information I can. But I am not going to spend endless hours looking for something where there is nothing there. Now, I believe that Councilman Nutter knows the answer to that question before he asked it. 2433 BILL 980003 I believe that there is no evidence, and I believe that Rich Costello know it, too. Because I know Rich very well. We work together like we work together with Council. He is not aware of any case where a police officer has been falsely accused and a citizen has been prosecuted, nor am I. So that's the answer to the question.

But I am not going to spend thousands of hours trying to find out the answer, because I don't believe there is an answer to the question.

Well, do you think you have an obligation to answer in any way, shape, or form a letter from a Councilmember? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Yes, I do. However, what I try to do, where other Councilpeople have written me letters, and I prefer not to write an answer, I call that person up and I say, "Listen, this is what the story is, X Y and Z." The Councilperson either says, "Well, can you do this or can you do that," and I will try. You can't do that with him. I have met with him privately, I have 2434 BILL 980003 talked to him on the telephone, and all I am met with is confrontation. Now, I am going to do publicly what I have done privately with Councilman Nutter. Ever since I have been the District Attorney, now almost seven years, I have met with him and said, "I am willing to extend my hand to you, to the people of Wynnefield, to the people of Roxborough and Manayunk, and every person who works with you or is in your councilmanic district. Tell me to do something for you. Tell me to help your community. You always call my office anyway. You get whatever you ask for. Why don't you accept my hand in friendship, and let's get on with the business of working for the people who put us in office." But this is beyond that, Mr. President. This is just a personal animosity against me. But I am not going to let him get personal with me because by God I am the elected District Attorney and I am going to do for his constituents the same thing I do for every other Councilperson, without resistance or with it.

The Chair 2435 BILL 980003 recognizes Councilman Nutter.

Thank you, Mr. President. That's a very interesting response. Madam District Attorney, the only reason that I had to follow up with a request is that, if you recall, when I asked the question last year on this tick matter, this is from the notes of testimony, I said, "Now, my question is, have you ever prosecuted anybody for filing a false complaint?" Mr. Gordon said, "Have I personally or has the office? Yes, the office has. And I don't believe I personally have." Now, I would assume that you didn't search through thousands and thousands of files to come to the answer that you came to today. And if you or Mr. Gordon had given that answer last year at this time, we wouldn't be having this discussion. But his answer in testimony was that the office has prosecuted people for these offenses. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Filing false police reports? 2436 BILL 980003

Yes. Mr. Gordon said the office has. I asked the followup question. So we are only here asking this because of his response to the question. If you had given this answer a year ago, we wouldn't be having this discussion. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, Councilman, as I have told you before, you pick up the phone. You want any information from me, just anything, I will try to get it for you. But you have taken an adversarial posture with me, and it is counter-productive to my doing my work. I will tell you as a matter of fact, I can't remember, even as a judge for 16 years, I can't remember one case that I sat on, especially in Municipal Court -- Common Pleas Court I was doing major trials in homicide -- I can't remember one time that I ever handled a filing false police report claim against anybody. I can't remember.

You could have said that last year. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: The 2437 BILL 980003 answer is still the same. I can't remember.

If your First Assistant had said it last year, I wouldn't have had to make a followup request. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, now you have your answer.

And in terms of any personal characteristics that you have attributed to any of this, I don't know you well enough to be personal with you. This is what I do for a living. I ask questions, I try to get information. And we all take the same oath, and we all represent the same people. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, I have offered -- I will say what I said before, Councilman. I have offered you my hand to help you and your constituents. If you don't want to take it, that's fine with me, but I am still going to work for your constituents. I think it would be much more productive --

Madam -- DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Excuse me. I want to finish. 2438 BILL 980003 I think it would be much more productive, since I know you have problems in Wynnefield, which I read about in the paper, I believe we can help you, including twice when your car was broken into. I don't know if I can help you with that. But I believe that I have been through the neighborhood that the people are complaining about. I personally, or one of my staff, will be more than happy to come out, meet with your community or the people who are aggrieved, and I will try to fashion some solution. And I use that word --

I appreciate all of the extra personal attention. But let me assure you that notwithstanding anything that has ever happened between us, I have never not called your office to request assistance for the district that I represent. I would never let such petty things get in the way of performing my job. So let me assure you that whether we have exchange of hands, secret handshakes, codes, or anything else, it really doesn't matter. I am going to do my job. I hope that you continue to do 2439 BILL 980003 yours. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: You have no worry about that, Councilman.

Okay. Madam D.A., I read in your testimony, and I have wondered about this for some time, on of the testimony you talked about there were 64 serious crimes per thousand of our population, and you have a Footnote No. 2. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Yes.

It says, "Serious crime is defined as covering only murder, rape robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, larceny, and auto theft." I know what most of those are. But can you provide us with your definition or a legal definition of aggravated assault and larceny? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Aggravated assault and larceny; is that what you said?

Yes. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, it is not called larceny anymore. It used to be. It used to be called theft. 2440 BILL 980003 But the figures to which I referred came from the Uniform Crime Report, the last volume. I believe that's a misnomer, that's why I put "serious," quotation marks around the word "serious." The figure that I refer to, the 96,000, assumes the accuracy of the latest recount as printed in the Inquirer of how many crimes per thousand of population there are in Philadelphia. That assumes the accuracy of that. The story was that, you will recall last year when we were here, there was a complaint about how the police compile their crime figures. And there was a recalculation as a result of that. And it came out to, I believe, 64 crimes per thousand. I think that's the figure; don't hold me to it. If you take 64 per thousand, and multiply that by the number of thousands of people of Philadelphia, that's still 96,000. Crimes that are denoted as Part crimes, which the UCR refers to as, quote, Serious Crimes, they call Part 2 crimes, I consider them 2441 BILL 980003 very serious. But if you look at the crime figures in the UCR, or on the front page of our papers, they call those serious crimes; that's what I meant by that.

I understand. What is aggravated assault? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Aggravated assault is the threatening, the putting in fear, or the actual activity which delivers serious bodily injury or the threat of serious bodily injury to a person. Serious bodily injury is a very serious injury, but not death. I mean, that's the --

So whether you actually put your hands on the person or threaten them in such a way that -- DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: If I, for example, if I had a baseball bat in my hand, and I came up to a person and if I said to them, "I don't like you and I have never liked you. And if you don't walk away or get away, I am going to take this bath and I am going to bash your brains in," that's 2442 BILL 980003 threatening the person, assuming the person I say those words to is --

Mr. President, can we make sure that, at least for the moment, there are no bats in the room? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I have to tell you one thing, Councilman, let me just answer that. In life, sometimes people who appear to be our most severe adversary wind up to be our best friend. I am working on that theory. So to get back to the answer to your question, if I said that to somebody, and raised the bath in a menacing fashion. And the person, the recipient of that remark, was threatened or put in fear of serious bodily injury, that's aggravated assault. The fact that I never hit the person wouldn't make it less of an aggravated assault. Usually aggravated assault, however, is, somebody takes a gun and shoots another person in the chest, in the stomach, in the head, that is the actual threat to a person's body which is by its very definition serious. That is aggravated 2443 BILL 980003 assault.

Okay. Who is Brian Grady? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Brian Grady, I believe, is one of our Assistant District Attorneys.

I am sure you must be aware of the incident that Brian Grady was involved in? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Yes.

I believe in a judge's chambers, did it take place? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Yes.

And he threatened a judge, and then allegedly punched a defense attorney? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: No, not correct.

Threatened a defense attorney, did some possible harm to a defense attorney? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I am not going to get into the specifics of that because I believe we have received notice that Mr. Grady is 2444 BILL 980003 being sued by the lawyer in question. Mr. Grady and a defense lawyer were in chambers with, I believe, Judge Richard Kline. There became an exchange of words, Mr. Grady acted in an inappropriate fashion. The lawyer in question, I believe it was Mr. Stanton, has sued him. There was a small article in the press about it. And Mr. Grady was disciplined by my office. He was taken back before the Judge at the Bar of the Court, and there was a proceeding before the judge on the record in open court involving Judge Kline.

On that issue? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Oh, yes, indeed, involving Judge Kline and Mr. Grady, correct.

Is that activity in any way, shape, or form considered to be misconduct or in violation of the Rules of Professional Conduct? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, again, without getting into the specifics, because there is a lawsuit pending, we certainly consider it 2445 BILL 980003 inappropriate, and Mr. Grady was disciplined for it.

Can you say what the nature of the discipline was? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Sure. I believe that in addition to a suspension, there were other corrective actions taken. If you would like to talk with me about that privately, I would be more than happy to tell you about it privately. But, again, because Mr. Grady is being sued, I don't really want to get into the specific issue of that.

Mr. President, are there other lights?

Actually, yes. Councilwoman Tasco's light is on and Councilwoman Clark. Councilwoman Clark and I are doing something else. Why don't you just continue.

Take advantage of the Chair's distraction. Lastly on the Grady matter, is the District Attorney's Office responsible for his 2446 BILL 980003 defense in this matter? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: No. 4

Who is paying for it? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I don't know.

So Mr. Grady has to cover his own legal expenses in this matter? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: You bet. That's a yes, just so I am not misunderstood. That's a yes.

I think the stenographer can get, "You bet." DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I wanted to say, "You bet," to make sure -- first of all, I shouldn't have said, "You bet." But the answer yes. He is paying for his own defense; we are not defending him.

A matter was raised with me not too long ago having to do with the District Attorney Office's use of -- you have to try to, I guess, protect or accommodate witnesses in various cases; is that correct? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: We try. 2447 BILL 980003

I understand that. I got the newspaper stories along with the testimony. Can you tell us what goes into either housing potential witness in a case? And do people get any compensation for their time or testimony, or do they get any kind of stipend or anything? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, I can't be specific about the housing arrangements that we make for our witnesses, but we try to make various accommodations. If, for example, a witness has a relative in a distant state, we might ask the witness, do you have some place else to live. If that person is not capable of doing that, we would try to make some other arrangements, and I don't want to be specific where. We have to cover meals, so we do sometimes cover meals and other incidental expenses. It is not a tremendous amount of money. And all of the money that we provide is documented. In other words, we don't put him up in some hotel or give them a false identity and give 2448 BILL 980003 them a spending allowance, you know, like the federal authorities do. We don't have a witness protection program like that. Mr. Gordon asked me to make sure that you understood that sometimes putting them in a hotel is part of what we do, but we can't give them a new identity.

I understand that. I assume you must put them somewhere. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Yes.

I mean, you pay for meals and that kind of stuff. Do they get any cash or anything? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: They get some small incidental expense money. Sometimes they get some small money; for meals, mostly. In other words, they don't pay the money out first. We give them X amount of dollars to cover meals.

Which they can use for meals, or they can use it for anything they want? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, no. No. 2449 BILL 980003 As far as we are concerned, they are not given money for any purpose other than appropriate purposes. If they are in the in some sort of protective guarded custody, with a cop standing outside their door, where they don't go anyplace -- and we don't really do that too much, because it is too labor intensive --

So you put them in a location? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: We just say, "Listen, here is money to buy your meals." It is not a lot of money. And if they wanted to use it for some improper purpose, which we hope they would not, unless we are standing over them, we don't know, really, what they do with it.

Well, by way of that answer, are you saying that it is theoretically possible that a person under these circumstances, unless they are under the kind of police-officer-at-the-door situation could be given this cash for whatever their expenses are, and that the person could possibly use those dollars for an 2450 BILL 980003 illegal purpose? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, you may be aware -- and it seems as though you are aware -- of a story that appeared in the newspapers this past week about one of our witnesses allegedly using some money for an improper purpose. We have --

Actually, I have not seen the story. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, we have had very few instances of that occurring. Generally speaking, our witnesses have been threatened with death if they testify. Some witnesses have been murdered. What we are trying to do is prevent the person from coming in harm's way. It is not beneficial to us, for example, to take a person who might be testifying against somebody involved, for example, drugs, to go out in some drug neighborhood and buy drugs, because they are going to be killed either for their money, for their testimony, or both. So we don't believe that that happens very often. But, remember, if we send somebody 2451 BILL 980003 some place and give them a train ticket to get to Aunt Tillie's house some place, could they hitch hike and take the money and spend it? Yes, they could. But we try to avoid that by buying the ticket. Could they turn around and sell the ticket for a discount? Sure, I guess they could. We hope that that doesn't happen. But are things possible? I suppose everything is possible.

Okay. Lastly --

Is this the first of your last questions? Is this like Councilwoman Clark? She gets three last questions.

To paraphrase someone much smarter than myself, I think this is merely the end of the beginning. No. This is a two-part question, it is at the end. Mr. Mosey was over the other day in one of his usually enjoyable experiences over here in City Council. We asked him about the makeup of the Nuisance Task Force, as well as the larger makeup of 2452 BILL 980003 the District Attorney's Office. We did, in rather quick fashion, receive a response on both of those. I believe it was last year, we had some discussion on the record about composition of the District Attorney's Office by way of gender and race and various other demographic characteristics. I wanted to ask you about, you have, I guess, an intern program, where, what is it, second year law students? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: No; we have interns -- yes and no. 13 Yes, we have interns.

A very political answer. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, we have an intern program where we will take high school student, even, and college students from around the city, and elsewhere, for that matter, who will volunteer to work in the summer for X amount of weeks for free.

Okay. I am talking about people who are in law school. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: First year and second year. 2453 BILL 980003 First year are freebies, they volunteer. Second year, almost everybody is a freebie, other than about ten -- well, we have ten paid positions for the summer, at $300 a week. We have a program where we will hire an additional number of people for work study, which if their work study will pay, I think, percent of 9 the salary, which is $30, and the school picks up 10 the rest or gives them a credit towards their tuition. Then we have the freebies who volunteer.

Can you tell us about the past two or three years, if you consider these to be classes, I guess, of interns who, I don't know whether this program starts in September with the school year, or it is primarily geared towards the summer, when, I guess, they have more time, how many people were in the intern program the last two years? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I don't know that I have that number, because we have high school and college kids.

I am primarily 2454 BILL 980003 focused on the people who are actually in law school. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I am sure we have a list of it someplace, but I don't know whether we have it broken down by race or anything else. In other words, I can get for you, if you want me to get for you, how many people we hire, how many people, law school, who volunteer, I think I can find that out for you. I will get somebody to look that up.

Let me just make sure, since we are here on the record. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Let me make a note.

Do you consider this to be a legitimate request? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: That's a legitimate request.

And a valid use of the District Attorney's Office time? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, it is not of my time, but somebody in my office, yes. I will get somebody. 2455 BILL 980003 You want to know how many summer interns. Only law school; right?

Yes. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: First and second year?

If you can split it out, yes. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Okay, sure. By year? I can tell you male or female. I don't know if we have it broken down by race, but I will try.

Does that pool of people often become some group of folks who end up actually working in the D.A.'s Office? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Sometimes. What we do is, if a person, let's say if you are in law school and you worked for me, the first summer you volunteered.

That would be incredible. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Absolutely not, it wouldn't. You would be pleased 2456 BILL 980003 and proud to have the District Attorney's name associated with yours. And you will see that one of these days. You came to work for me --

You would never hire me, so I don't have to worry about it. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I am the eternal optimist, never mind. I am thinking positive. You came to work for me, and you said to me, I want to apply for a second-year internship. We would say, Michael, you did such a great job -- and you were evaluated. You just don't work there. You get evaluations. Because we take our first-year students. And then if they fit within the ten that we pay for the next year, let's say you would be paid. Even if you wouldn't be paid, we might invite you back for a second year work study or even volunteer. Then let's say you wanted to come back for the third and final year, where you would just come to work for us before or after the Bar 2457 BILL 980003 exam and then, you know, work for us, we try, but we don't limit it to our interns. Now, maybe by that time an intern says,"I am going to get a better job in a law firm. They will pay me 70,000 a year, instead of 34,000. I am going to work for a law firm." They may want to come to work for us, but the economics may not be with them. But we do try to give a first preference, if you will -- and I want to use that word carefully -- first dibs, to the extent that we can, without cheating other people who may not have been aware of the program, to our interns, whom we know have a track record of good work. (Councilwoman Verna assumes the Chair).

Well, I know you committed to getting the numbers. I assume you, or possibly someone at the table, or someone else in the audience, is either in charge of these interns or addresses the group from time to time or sees them, or has some contact with them? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Not really. I will tell you why. Many of our interns 2458 BILL 980003 float through the office. So you might, if you are an intern like a second-year intern or -- a first-year intern stays in one division. Let's say you are assigned to the Municipal Court Division. You would get attorneys in the D.A.'s Office assigned to sort of mentor you, for want of a better term. We might get them to ask for an evaluation of you. In the second year, you float. You spend X weeks in this division, X weeks in that division, X weeks in some other division. And we might ask for evaluations, again, especially if we know you are interested in coming back with us again, so we know how you worked in the Juvenile Unit, how you worked in the Municipal Court Unit, how you worked in the Appeals Unit, or wherever it was that you were stationed.

Let me just lastly ask, we, as I mentioned, last year had some discussion about composition of the office. The figures sent over as a result of the request to Mr. Mosey indicates that of the Assistant District Attorneys, you have 260; 42 are 2459 BILL 980003 African-American, are Hispanic, 8 are Asian. Given the nature of crime, both perpetrators and victims, in the City of Philadelphia, can you tell us what your current efforts are, if this is a goal, to increase the numbers of minorities in general, and African-Americans in particular, in the District Attorney's Office? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I believe you asked the question last year, and I told you I am interested in diversifying the office as much as possible. George Mosey is the Chairman of our Minority Hiring Committee, so I will let George answer that question again for you.

The District Attorney has given me the liberty to start special programs for minorities, especially in the summertime. I have a relationship with Villanova Law School. We are trying to develop a relationship with Temple, who we do pretty well with. And it may not be as necessary there, but we are, nevertheless, going to try to establish minority internship programs. 2460 BILL 980003 I am the Chairperson for minority hiring in the office. And I have a committee that works with me, attorneys who volunteer to help out. And we go out to the various law schools, to job theaters, and we actually make an effort to recruit minorities, at least get them in the door. After they get in the door, it is up to them. But when people demonstrate that they have the ability to do the job, they get hired.

Has anything changed from last year, when we asked this question, to this year?

The program that I just spoke about, and there is another interesting innovate that we are trying to develop. We are actually trying to solicit contributions to help pay a kind of stipend for soon-to-be attorneys who could come to work for us for the summer programs and receive some money in return. It is pretty difficult for minority students in tick to volunteer for anything. And if there is a position that pays them, then most often they have to opt for that position. 2461 BILL 980003 This program would allow public officials like yourself to commit to taking a student to lunch. And there would be an auction to win the Michael Nutter luncheon. And that money would go to help to pay for the students who want to come work in the D.A.'s Office. That's just one of the invasions. But primarily what we try to do is establish a relationship, a close working relationship, with the various black law student associations, for example, in the area. So that when they have applicants who really want to try to become prosecutors, they know who to contact.

Okay. I assume your efforts will continue to try to get the numbers up?

Yes, it will.

Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair.

You are welcome. The Chair recognizes Councilwoman Clark.

Thank you very 2462 BILL 980003 much. Good afternoon. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Yes, it is. Good afternoon. How are you?

I am fine, thank you. I wanted to talk about two matters. But before I do, I have to speak on what I think was a somewhat disrespectful manner that emanated from your presentation to Mr. Nutter. I think that whether the question was the kind that you wanted to hear or not, that the dignity of this organization should not be compromised by a person deciding which questions they will answer and which they will not. And I am a little bit distressed that you did not discipline your staff member and show him a better way to do that. And hopefully in an effort to lessen tension -- and you know that I have been involved in trying to lessen tensions, haven't I? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Yes, you have.

Because I am one who believes that our first attempts at problem 2463 BILL 980003 solving ought to be peaceful. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I think the first and the second ought to be peaceful.

You know, Lynne, and even if you can work it out, even a third. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I am really trying.

But I think that sometimes, I wish you could have seen your body language. Okay? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: My body language?

Yes. All three of you. To a lesser degree Mr. Mosey. But you and your deputy, Mr. -- tell me your name, sir. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Gordon.

You and Mr. Gordon you were loaded for bear. I mean, you were like -- I mean, this is the best place for that kind of posture, because you can always get a fight over here. But some of us are trying not to fight, and it might be useful in the future to try 2464 BILL 980003 not to add to the coals. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: May I just respond?

Of course. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Councilwoman, you and I have known each other for a long time. Let me just say how I think that we feel up here. It is exceedingly frustrating to see and hear Council wrestle with the problems of crime and drugs and privation and disorder in the community. We have solutions. I can't say we can solve every problem. It is exceedingly frustrating to come here year after year after year after year and get really what amounts to a zero base budget. In fact, really, we are off. In fact, we buy less in the way of people with the money we get today from Council than we ever had. And what happens is that when you have hearings about, let's do something about drugs, let's do something about crime, I know that you want to. So do I. So when you come here year after year 2465 BILL 980003 and you say, look, this works, this works, we have a way to do it, we can solve this problem, and you comma way empty-handed, with a lot of questions that don't go anywhere and don't address the needs of our people, it is very frustrating. And we are frustrated.

I do not doubt that you are frustrated. I simply offer you what I believe is a better technique. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: It is well noted.

And received. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: And perceived, oh, sure.

And received gratefully? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Perceived, received, gratefully.

And happily so. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Yes, yes, yes, yes. I give up. Well, not really. But all right, yes, thank you.

I am only saying, like my mama told me years ago, and yours 2466 BILL 980003 too, you can get more flies with honey than you can with vinegar. And for that matter, it is 1, 2, 3 of you, and 17 of us. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I am covered in flowers.

And it is our forum. So it might be better if you used a little less hostile approach. Only a suggestion. Now, I would like to talk about death penalty. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Yes.

I have to find my death penalty question. Does your office seek the death penalty in a colorblind manner? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Yes. Our death penalty cases --

If you believe this to be the case, then why is the death penalty given to African-Americans approximately 8.5 times more frequently than whites in Philadelphia? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, Councilwoman, let me just say this: The death penalty is fact based. In other words, all murders 2467 BILL 980003 are bad, but there are certain murders that have what are called statutory aggravating circumstances. If the facts of a given case have aggravating circumstances, we seek the death penalty, where appropriate.

In every case? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: No. You didn't let me finish. Where appropriate. It doesn't mean we always get it. But last year, for example, I believe it is 1996, we got the death penalty seven times. And, by the way, everybody -- and I haven't gone back over all of this -- but I can tell you the answer to your question absolutely is fact driven, and not race driven. In the seven death penalties last year, we got a death penalty in three cases where I think -- I think it is three and four, but I don't remember which way. All of the perpetrators and all of the victims were of the same race. And, moreover, most homicides, as in other crimes, are committed by one person against a victim usually of the same race 2468 BILL 980003 or ethnicity.

I believe that. But now let me ask you why the requests for death penalty is running 8.5 to 1, black to white? Are you suggesting that those crimes which fit your aggravated circumstances definition are committed, and the persons are convicted 8.5 times more frequently than whites? I am only asking for an answer. I don't ask you to defend it. Just tell me what your rationale is. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, remember, the death penalty is a very complex issue. Let me try to answer it in a very narrow way. As you have perceived yesterday with the big story about homicide, and with other stories about homicide that preceded it, the primary victim in Philadelphia is African-American, Latino, or some other non-white person. And, as I mentioned before, it is usually committed by a person of the same racial or ethnic background, usually. 2469 BILL 980003 The aggravating circumstances are not my aggravating circumstances; they are set by statute.

I understand that. I never was confused on that. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I understand that, because you are a lawyer.

I speak only to the number of times it is requested. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: It is not requested --

Ever? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: If we start out with the proposition that there are -- and I want to be really careful about this, because I want you to be assured it is fact driven and law driven, not race driven. If we start with the idea that we look at the facts of the case, did X shoot Y in a crowded room, with a lot of other people, in a dispute?

Causing him to die? So he is now dead -- DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Oh, sure 2470 BILL 980003 causing him to die.

-- and convicted of the crime. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Just hear me out. If the killer is in a room with a lot of people, takes out a semi-automatic pistol and shoots up the whole room, killing one or more people, and the dispute arose out of a drug deal, and there was injury, you know, committed against others, and, let's say, a police officer walked in and got shot and killed, as well, there would be several statutory aggravators, amongst which was death involving a drug transaction, if there is a dispute over a drug deal. Number two, he gravely put in risk other people in the immediate area. Number three, he killed a police officer in the performance of his or her duties. There would be three statutory aggravating circumstances. That is color neutral, race neutral, gender and ethnicity neutral. It is fact driven.

Is it a fact 2471 BILL 980003 that 8.5 times to 1 African-Americans are sentenced to the death penalty? Is that a fact? Is it equal? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I don't know.

Would you do me a favor, would you check that? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I will try to find that out.

Would you check it by race? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I mean, I think we can find it out by race. My guess is that again, now remember, if we don't have it in our computer base, that means that somebody is going to have to go through thousands of cases. I can tell you only this --

Lynne, if you don't have it in a a machine-retrievable way, tell me that. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: We don't. We don't.

I am not asking you through green eye shades. I am not asking you 2472 BILL 980003 to thumb through piles and piles and piles of cases. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: We don't.

I don't know how your data is. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: It is on 5 by 8 cards.

5 by 8 cards lends itself to green eye shades. I thought you were going to manipulate a computer base. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: No. I am going to tell you something, one of the things that I have talked to Council about is how we are operating on 1940's technology.

Well, I do need you to know that I have a continuing interest in the equity of, of the evenness, in the number of times that the death penalty seems appropriate to the D.A.'s Office, whether you liked it or not, if you had to ask for it, or if it is called for by the facts of the case. Now, I would like to go back for a second to the discussion that you and Councilwoman Tasco were having about truancy. 2473 BILL 980003 I am a very strong advocate, but I am not persuaded that everybody understands truancy. Failure to attend school regularly is not necessarily truancy; would you agree with that? There could be reasons -- DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: No; it is truancy. But instead of being, let's say, willful -- in other words, if I don't go to school because I don't feel like going to school, that may be truancy. If my mother had me tied to the Chair, it might still be truancy, but there would be a justification for the truant. I was tied to a Chair.

I think that all of us use this one little word and mean different things by it. For instance, Philadelphia does not have a standardized school day opening and school day closing; right? So that if a person encounters a young person upon the public highway at 1:30 in the afternoon, that person is not necessarily truant, is he or she? 2474 BILL 980003 You would have to know what time their school day starts, whether that student was in a school without walls, going from one building in one section of town to another in another section of town. So the question of young people upon the public highway during times which some person believes that they ought to be in school raises questions to me about the ethicacy of having somebody who is not in the school system sweep the pavement, that worries me. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I am not doing that. Let me just back you up a little bit. I would never suggest to this Council that it would be an appropriate use of the District Attorney's manpower to sweep pavements in the way you used it. The program that we are suggesting is an absence from school without cause.

Right. Now, I don't have a problem with that. I think that is exactly the definition that we need to publish about what is truant. I can't ask police officers to know 2475 BILL 980003 that, because there are at least ten different times when you can go to school in the Philadelphia public school system, including some people who don't go to school until 4:00 in the afternoon. Now, that is an unusual school time, and there are not very many people that are involved in the program. But those people have a right to be upon the public highway. And we should not get into a situation, Madam District Attorney, where Americans have to carry cards. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: No. No. 13 No. 14

See, that's what's worrying me about it, how it gets implemented. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Just remember one thing, this is palliative, it is restorative, it is not supposed to be punitive. So that if little Gussie Clark doesn't come to school for days without cause, in 22 other words, no note, Mrs. Clark doesn't call up and 23 say little Gussie is sick today, or her father was 24 sick, or she had to go some place, she just doesn't 25 show up, she is gone, and we can't find out, there 2476 BILL 980003 is no information that indicates that this person is absent with a cause, we would send a letter saying, "Dear Mrs. Clark: Do you know that Gussie has been out of school for days? Why don't you come on in 6 to the school, you will meet with us, we will talk 7 to you, we will acquaint you with the problem, we 8 will try to assist you with anything we can assist 9 you." 10 And the way that we envision this, 11 this will be service-oriented. If you need 12 counseling, help from some department of the city, 13 treatment for some ailment or illness, or your child 14 does, if there is some intervention that we can 15 offer you, more is the better. 16 And that works because what it does 17 is, it gets you the treatment or help that you as a 18 child need and it gets the treatment or intervention 19 or help that your mother might need to make sure 20 that you come to school. 21

It seems to me 22 we can't disagree on that. You and I are on the 23 same page with respect to that. It just seems to me 24 that your office is the wrong place for it. 25 If it is going to be done by some 2477 BILL 980003 institution or agency other than the schools, it seems to me that the better place is Family Court. Because yours is a charging, fault-based system. The Family Court is in local parentis; instead of the parent, you stand in the place of parents. And here everything is what is in the best interests of the child. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Let me offer you something.

I don't know how much money you are planning to devote to this effort, but I really do not think that it is the best use of your staff and your dollars. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Let me offer you something to think about. I won't ask it rhetorically; I will ask it to myself. I believe that if the school system could do something about truancy, they would have done it already. I believe that the intervention of the District Attorney's Office is appropriate because we get people's attention.

But Ms. Abraham, 2478 BILL 980003 that is the same -- DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I was Lynne just a few minutes ago, now I am Ms. Abraham.

Girlfriend. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: We are on the same page. I will tell you what I want to do --

Listen. I mean, if we use that rationale, we would say, if the D.A. could do something about crime, she would have taken care of it. So to say that the School District, the fact that they haven't fixed it means that somebody else ought to bring fresh eyes to it does not fly with me. I think that it is outside the scope of the District Attorney's Office, and I think this is an unnatural extension. A better extension, it seems to me, if you believe it ought to be outside the school system, would be in Family Court, which is a more child-friendly environment, you have to admit than, the District Attorney's Office.

I am only interested in 2479 BILL 980003 one thing, that kids come to school. We use the Los Angeles model. In my recitation of the program to you, in the Los Angeles program, the Los Angeles District Attorney's Office, which is the model that we used, has become involved in truancy prevention, this is crime preventive and education friendly. In 1993, 1994, 1995, of the over 14,000, 14,500 families got letters, 90 percent of them, once they got the letter saying, hey, guess what, your little child didn't attend school, and it is a responsibility to get your kid to come to school, they had a 90 percent improvement rate out of the 14,500 families.

So in that model they only had to have one contact. It was sufficiently high, sufficiently scary, so that parents and children -- DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Not scary; persuasive.

Persuasive to cause parents and children to change their behavior. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Correct.

I yield to my 2480 BILL 980003 colleague Happy Fernandez.

I just wanted to note for the record we did have the hearings on truancy in January, and I think a lot of folks are already working on this. And I think the question would be, I would think the D.A.'s Office could coordinate with the schools and the police, who are already taking action. And I understand you want to focus on the younger children. But the School District has really started to focus much more on attendance because schools are held accountable for the attendance of their students and their teachers. There has been a gradual increase, I think it is a 1 percent overall increase, in attendance in the system. And they are increasingly having teachers, principals, and volunteers who come into school, parents and stuff, call kids when they are absent and try to get directly in touch and nip the issue in the bud from the school side.

I am saying it is a school responsibility. And I wonder -- 2481 BILL 980003

Could I just finish, Councilwoman? The other piece -- because I think it needs to be hit from a number of angles -- the other piece is, the police have had two officers in each police division who have been rounding up kids who are truant, getting them back to school, getting them to their homes. And they have had a dramatic decrease in crime already, petty crime, auto theft, and overall crime, like 40, 50 percent. So some progress is being made. And I think the issue would be, how does this fit in with all these other options.

I know we are all grappling with the same problem and we all have the same concern. But we have to have a school system that is left that is worthy of respect. Now, I guarantee you if you strip one naked to the waist an flog him, you would make all the rest of them go to school. But do we want to go there? Are there not some things that we don't want to do to the learning environment? Since you and I went to school, we 2482 BILL 980003 have already got uniformed police officers in schools, we have some children walking through metal detectors, we have things that you can't carry in your pocketbook and your book bag because somebody thinks it is bad. And I am not arguing against that. When it finally gets down to it, though, we have truancy court and the D.A. charging kids? This is taking education too far afield. Now, whether it is effective has not -- the statute says we have the right to do it. I think we have always to be concerned with what is best for the children; not just the right, do we have the right. And, Madam, Lynne, I think we are going too far afield. I don't give you bad motives. I think that all of us are task driven, and we want to see children go to school regularly and do well. But I want you to know that everything we do takes us away from that little red schoolhouse where children were respected and everybody expected them to do well. And I just am worried that we are going in the wrong direction. 2483 BILL 980003 And I promised to yield to my friend -- DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I will tell you what, Councilwoman, if you fund L.I.N.E. and PNTF, you can have truancy.

Well, I don't agree to all of that, but I do appreciate your willingness to rethink some of the directions that we are taking public schools in.

Is this the same issue?

You might have missed it, but yesterday I went to a press conference that Judge Panepinto from Family Court, he had the Truancy Court, and they are going to have a Truancy Master and they will have all the records in one place. And these are for chronic truants, chronic. It is not somebody who missed two days. I appreciate Councilwoman Clark's idea on this, and I understand that little red school house idea. It wasn't quite as little and red when I went there, but it is probably getting bigger. 2484 BILL 980003 I don't know what will happen ten years for the people that have to go to school with the metal detectors, what that's going to cause in their sight 10, years down the road remains to be 6 seen. 7

We are headed to 8 a detention cell in a school; that's the next step. 9 We are headed to having a detention cell in a 10 school. 11 Now, you know, people always rise or 12 sink to your expectations, always. And if we turn 13 schools into armed camps and holding places until we 14 can get them to jail, the stupidest kid in the class 15 will pick up that message. That's all I'm talking 16 about. 17 If we really love children, the way 18 we all say we love children, then let's treat 19 children in loving ways. 20

Councilwoman, the only thing I can relate to are my two sons, and one is 17 and one is 13. The 17-year-old, he is up at 6:30 looking at his cords for what he is going to study. When the alarm rings at a quarter of 7:00, ten of 2485 BILL 980003 7:00, I am pulling 13-year-old Vincent out of bed by his feet. I have to take him over to the shower, put the shower on, help him get out of his bed clothes. So there are two brothers, and that's how different they are. If I didn't pull Vincent out of bed -- and that's my responsibility as a parent -- he would probably still be in bed how. Ricky would go to school. So I don't know where we are going with this eventually, and I don't see your vision being probably much different than what I see is going to happen. But I do know every day when I drive past Frankford High School, there are people sitting on the wall, people going in the door and out the door, and that makes it hard for people to constantly pay city taxes, for real estate taxes, for school taxes, and all these taxes, and they feel like, what's going on. I know Frankford High School has two policemen patrol there, which is an incredible thing. I can imagine policemen being in a high school when I was in high school. 2486 BILL 980003 I don't know that answer. Again, that's a rhetorical answer to your question. But hopefully we can go a little between both of them, where people are going to be safe.

I am not going to stretch this record out any further, because we are not that far apart in what we are saying. We are not that far apart. If we keep ourselves in local parentis, if we stand and face the parents in everything we do, if we do what is best for the child, we will swing that pendulum back in this direction, rather than go to the extreme measures which I see public education going to. That's all I am talking about. Madam Chair, I thank you for your forebearance on the record.

The Chair recognizes Councilwoman Tasco.

Madam Chair, last year we talked about computerization of your office. Can you tell me what progress you have made towards that goal? And how has the 2487 BILL 980003 Administration assisted you in computerizing your office? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, we are trying to make sure that we have not only sufficient computers -- we have had some, I can't give you the exact numbers, maybe somebody else can. The real problem is that with computers, requires data entry clerks and an interface between our office, the court system, and everybody else. The problem with computer buying is that lots of people buy systems that don't interface. We need an overall system that will interface all aspects of what we do, plus we will be able to keep our own statistics. And I can ask somebody from my office who knows how many computers we have, how many are outmoded because the computer technology changes, and all the other stuff. And if I don't have it here, I will tell you. But I can tell you, many of our D.A.'s do not have a computer. For example, in the courthouse, where 2488 BILL 980003 our D.A.'s sit in the courtroom, it is computer ready, but there are no computers. So if we needed some information about a case, we can't use a computer because it is not there. And some of our courtrooms don't even have a telephone, so we can't even find out where we are. So the technology is here now, everything is technology based, but we are still operating with cards, I mean, with 3 by 5. Everything that we do in our system is based on a cardboard file like this by court term and number. So if you said look up Marian Tasco, we might be able to look up on a computer criminal record for Marian Tasco. But in order to find the file, we would have to go to the warehouse and pick up a paper file out of the warehouse. We wouldn't have anything on-line. Unless we have the file in house, in which case we would say, here is the file and here is the paperwork inside of the file. But it is not computerized.

Do you foresee 2489 BILL 980003 in the future when that might happen? I am talking about an integrated system. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: The idea was, when the new courthouse was built, the CJC, there was supposed to be, what? We were supposed to have, I thought it was, 100 million, but there was supposed to be a computer in every courtroom, Judge Shapiro said no, so she cut back on that. We have 300 usable computers, and we are short about 150. But that's just hardware; that doesn't mean integrated systems. For example, Councilman Nutter sent me a thing about VINE, Victim Information Notification System. It would be great. Everybody could notify victims by way of computer. And they could call up and say, "Hi, I'm Marian Tasco. I need to know when the case of Commonwealth versus Smith is coming up or when he is being paroled, you can get it by computer. But it all has to be integrated into one working system. It, unfortunately, doesn't work like that now.

Well, we have a 2490 BILL 980003 new Information Chief. So maybe some dialogue can begin with him to talk about -- he seems to be fairly progressive. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Show me the money. It is very nice to have a good computer person. I am really happy. That doesn't mean anything if he says, we have this great system, but, unfortunately, we have no money to give it to you. Is very nice, but it doesn't -- and we never get it, and that's the way it is.

Okay. I think I have one other question. This question refers to a Daily News editorial on Monday that there is a proposal that by State District Attorneys, and your office included, to be able to have the District Attorney request a jury trial in a tick case. What is the purpose of this, and does this demonstrate that the District Attorney does not believe that a judge will deliver a fair ruling? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: The law of Pennsylvania up to a few years ago was that a person could give up his right to a jury trial with 2491 BILL 980003 the District Attorney's consent. That was changed. We want it changed back. Because sometimes it means that people do judge shop, and that does happen. So, therefore, the Attorney General of Pennsylvania, Mike Fisher, and District Attorneys from around the state, testified in Harrisburg -- let's see when did I go up there? -- two weeks ago or so. And I testified that it would be appropriate for, in those limited circumstances -- and it is not going to be every case, and it is not going to be even nearly every case, because the system would break down -- in certain cases that we would either ask for a jury trial or it would have to require our consent to give up a right of a jury trial, either one. But we have asked for the Commonwealth's right to have a jury trial, where we think it is either judge shopping or judge maneuvering.

I am not a lawyer. I am not familiar with all this court -- DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Stuff. 2492 BILL 980003

-- stuff. But who determines whether or not a defendant is shopping, judge shopping? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well --

Doesn't that require a subjective decision? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: There are a variety of ways where we find out where defendants are forum shopping. It happens from time to time. Where we believe that a person is forum shopping, and comes in front of a judge who is known to give out lenient sentences, we asked for the right to have a jury trial. We have not been successful in this effort thus far. I don't know what success we will be met with this time. It is just a bill. It hasn't passed yet.

Thank you.

Thank you. The Chair recognizes Councilman Mariano. Did you finish your questioning?

No. 25

Thank you, Madam 2493 BILL 980003 Chair. Madam D.A., when you put up that map there, that big red box that you had up there, that's my district, mostly. So when you look at that other map you have here, there are so many reds and greens, it almost looks like my part is all red and green. So to me, that tells me there are a lot of homicides. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Keep remembering, the green is a forfeiture petition being filed against that property. So all these, let's see, you are in the 24th, 25th, and 26th?

The whole East. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Do you see where these little green triangles are? Our office has filed to forfeit that property; that's a drug property. The blue circles with the dots in the middle are a combined agency action. That's Liquor Control, Licenses & Inspections.

ATF, everything? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: 2494 BILL 980003 Everything, all the agencies. Maybe not TF, but agencies.

This is the box with the homicides. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Now, this homicide map, what I have tried to do -- and I have asked George and Joe Whitehead -- and come on up for a second, Joe. This is Joe Whitehead, he is the chief of the L.I.N.E. unit. I said to Joe yesterday, I said, you know, this map is so effective to show where the PNTF action is. Could we get one made up to show where L.I.N.E. worked, only in the 18th District. But I guarantee you -- and I think I have no fear of contradiction -- that the L.I.N.E. map will cover virtually the same area as this area over here. The 18th District, the lower six sectors of the 19th District, and a little bit of the 12th District, the L.I.N.E. effort is virtually the same. So the point of making this box, Councilman Mariano, was really the Police Department's, not me. 2495 BILL 980003 The Police Department wanted to demonstrate that percent of the homicides in 4 Philadelphia are committed in the East Division. 5

That's where all 6 the drugs are sold. 7 DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Not where 8 all the drugs are sold, but where a lot of drugs are 9 sold. And I asked them to try to take it off, but I 10 didn't have enough time. 11 So 178 homicides, 21 percent .4 12 percent, of '96, '97 of the homicides were in this 13 box. 14 So with L.I.N.E., Councilman Mariano, 15 L.I.N.E. -- and Joe Whitehead, who is standing 16 behind me, can tell you -- L.I.N.E. depends on its 17 ethicacy upon community, home ownership, church, 18 political, state leadership, all those workers, all 19 the pieces that fit together to make it work. 20 I would tell you it would be difficult, not impossible, but very difficult, to get L.I.N.E. working in certain areas of that box where there is very little infrastructure, very little neighborhood cohesiveness. We would probably have a better 2496 BILL 980003 chance of it working in the 24th, rather than in -- I will be honest with you; I am not going to lie to you -- the 25th or the 26th.

There may be some infrastructure in the 25th. But the reason I ask you these questions -- DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: We would select an area; we wouldn't pick an area.

The reason I ask you these questions, Madam D.A., is, the people I remember from Girard Avenue to Grant Avenue, they don't watch these hearings, some of them read the paper, they are not interested about any Councilpeople and D.A.'s talking back and forth, what happens; it is results. The Public Nuisance Task Force, I have seen that work. I worked with Carl Anderson and the new gentleman in the East, whose name I forget. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Give me a second. The East Division is Mr. Wolf.

Right, Mr. Wolf. It is result orientated. 2497 BILL 980003 DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Yes, it is.

I would have no 5 problem, if I was king of this Council, let alone king of the world, I would be in favor of that. Because results, these people are going through the same thing every day, going out in the street, getting to school, going to work. Hopefully they don't get shot or killed on the way. And it is very dangerous, and I am not trying to belittle that. If this works as good as the Nuisance Task Force works -- and I have seen that work from Kensington up to Cottman Avenue -- I mean, it works, and I would be favorable, and the people in my district would be happy to see it. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Joe, who is the head of L.I.N.E., the Chief of L.I.N.E., and Ed Jaramillo, the Chief of PNTF, work together, because they are all looking for the same things, things that tend to rip the community apart. And this works. I am telling you, this works. It works.

Hopefully next 2498 BILL 980003 year we will do this, next year you will come back and tell us what a success this was, and we can have this dialogue, and I can tell you how successful this was in the East, and maybe even the Northeast In the Northeast, things are happening. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Northeast, I spoke to Brian O'Neill, it is a little bit different up there. But there are special problems that need to be addressed up there, and that's why we would tailor make a program that would work in the upper part of your area and portions of Councilman O'Neill's.

I appreciate it. And then just to quote Councilwoman Blackwell, she said it, but she didn't know it was James Brown, "Please, Please, Please." We need that. Thank you. That's all, Madam President.

Thank you. The Chair recognizes Councilman Cohen.

Thank you, Madam Chair. 2499 BILL 980003 I kind of enjoyed the exchange between the District Attorney and Councilman Nutter. My one regret was that I wasn't in the middle of it. I am not used to sitting on the sidelines when there are those kinds of battles. But I am respectful to you very highly, and I am hoping that a lot of air has been cleared. But just as an introductory question, how is it for the District Attorney's Office when the Mayor is also a former district attorney? In one sense one would expect it to be very helpful, but I didn't gather that that was the case in discussions, at least, of the budget. It might be helpful in other ways. I don't know. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, you know I like Ed very much. You know we are friends. And we talk all the time. Well, not all the time, but from time to time, about issues about crime. Let me first observe that when I first became the District Attorney, we were broke. He asked me to come in and not only take a cut, but asked for nothing for that year and the year after. 2500 BILL 980003 And I said okay, you know, Ed, I am here to help the city. Whatever I can do, I will work within my budget. I think those problems still continue today. I mean, I think we have gotten a little bit out of the bottom. But I shouldn't say this, I don't think we are in as safe as place as other people do; I think we still have a lot of problems. However, I will tell you, in my considered judgment -- I am going to use this board. Because I am a teacher, you know, or at least I was. I always like to use a device. This city's future is going to depend on jobs. Jobs depend on safety and being crime free. People want to feel safe and they want to be crime free. The number one issue, according to a recent survey -- I don't know how reliable it was, but I think it is pretty reliable -- you and I go around, Councilman Cohen, to a lot of meetings. I see all of you everywhere. The one thing people want is a sense of safety and a sense of being crime free. You can't have jobs and industry and 2501 BILL 980003 taxes and goodies and people coming here if they feel unsafe or they feel that there is a sense of lawlessness. And that's why, to me, quality of life has a much more inclusive feel to it. " What can I say? He is the Mayor now. A. hat -- and I will use the word petitioners -- people are petitioning to you as the Mayor for everything, as you ladies and gentlemen have, where do you put your resources? So unfortunately, and I do mean this, if I had more money, if I had had more money and had put in these programs earlier and kept them up and running, you do have a leg up. Now, you need other things. You need not only prisons, you do need prison space, but you need programs. Okay? So we are looking at prisons and programs now. The prison is full, it is overfull. We just released in the past couple of weeks everybody that we could release or that was -- we 2502 BILL 980003 didn't release anybody, because that's not my gig. But we agreed, we agreed that the 6300 hundred cap, that's the cap that the city agreed to, 6300. So hundreds of prisoners are let out. Many hundred don't get in, so they are out on the street. So, all right, we will try electric home monitoring. That costs $1500 a unit. Now, it doesn't prevent me from permitting a crime. If I wanted to sell drugs, I will just sell them inside my house, instead of going out on the street. But at least the probation department knows where I am, sort of, maybe, maybe. So we don't have prison space, we are trying programs. We have a drug court now that's operating two days a week. We are trying to do intervention. But when it is all said and done, the best District Attorney in the world, I am going to tell you the best District Attorney in the world, which I am trying to be, I might add, is if you can do this. If you can prevent the crime from happening before it happens, which is the best 2503 BILL 980003 District Attorney in the world.

No District Attorney is ever going to, quote, solve crime by convicting somebody of a crime and sending them to jail maybe. You do the best if you prevent crime. , PNTF, are all prophylactic. They also are crime abating. But if we can move in and prevent -- we are not going to get everybody. We are just going to miss some people. There is going to be crime in every major city. But if we can prevent, make our crime go down, you can do it. Remember New York -- and I listened very carefully to Mr. Timoney's statement yesterday -- what he didn't say -- maybe I missed it, because I didn't listen to all of it, I couldn't, I was waiting to come over here, and I watched part of it -- New York passed a special tax and I am not saying you are going to pass a special tax. Now, I am not saying that you are going to pass a special tax, Councilman -- but David 2504 BILL 980003 Dinkins, when he was the Mayor of New York, he got the legislature of the State of New York to pass a special tax, a special tax for New York. I think they collected like $400 million, some figure that sticks in my head. But of that money, I think it was 180 million, that's what sticks in my head right now, don't hold me to it, but 180 million went to the City of New York. 's Office. A. didn't have to go to City Council and say, "Please Mr. " Cyber crime. In a couple more years, I can tell you there is going to be more money to be made in taking a computer and transferring money out of your account, into my account, generating phoney checks, phoney signatures, encryption information, stealing information, stealing, frauds galore. I won't be asking you so much, if I 2505 BILL 980003 am here then five or ten years from now, saying give knee money for street crimes, stick them up, that will always be there. But it is going to be cyber crime. We are doing nothing about cyber crime. 's Office and the Police Department have the benefit of New York, of a very rich city, with a state legislature and a Governor willing to pass a special tax. I am not asking you to do that, because it is unrealistic. But that's what makes innovation possible, so you can go an deliver something to a community that wants it. Do you want a special prosecutor assigned to David Cohen's district office? You got it. Every forward-thinking District Attorney should be doing what I am doing, and some of them are.

But when you use the words "prevent crime," aren't there different levels at which one can prevent? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Sure.

For example, I think that, when nobody else think of me in that 2506 BILL 980003 fashion, I think of myself as the most vigorous crime fighter there is. Because I start with the concept of prevention at a much earlier level, of the education, of making jobs. What you said about jobs is extremely important. But until we develop a means of providing enough jobs for people, so that when they graduate, they can go into a job, or if we are going to prune the Welfare rolls, to take steps to provide that jobs exist, we create a situation which helps. I don't say in any individual case it causes a crime, but it helps to breed a situation from which crimes come. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Let me observe. Look, the best crime prevention effort is if you had a great relationship between a mom, a dad, and a child. Okay? However, I am not a social worker; I am a prosecutor. All right? I am not going to go, I can't, it is not my role, to do that.

That's true, that is not your role. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: So my 2507 BILL 980003 tools are relatively limited. And the best way I can prevent crime, really, is if I take a dangerous predatory offender, prosecute him to the hilt of the law, and stick him in jail for years. At least 6 that is a salutary effect. 7 Would it be better if we had no 8 crime? Yes. Are we going to? Never. 9 So I am left with imprisonment, which 10 I do. And that's what I believe in. I believe in 11 long-term incapacitation, I practice it, I believe 12 it. There are a lot of people incapacitated. 13 But if in addition to prosecuting and 14 incapacitating, which is what I get paid to do, I 15 can be a little more creative and say, okay, we are 16 going to start with these programs that prevents -- 17 well, which picks up some time after a kid starts to 18 go to school and starts to do proactive 19 community-based prosecution, that will help. 20 It is not the only answer. I am not the only person in this equation. I can't do anything if we have no prison space and bad judges. I mean, you can prosecute everybody in the city. If we don't have a system that works, it doesn't work. 2508 BILL 980003

But when one talks of prison space, is it only to put somebody away and to incapacitate him? Don't we have to take into account that the likelihood is that people are going to return to prison? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Sometimes. Most of our defendants are recidivous. And Philadelphians represent about 40 percent of the criminals in state prison. That's a pretty big chunk from Philadelphia.

Well, and I am concerned about the fact that the prison population has apparently trickled, over the last maybe less than 20, 10 or 12 years, the community, with all the great work done to incarcerate and kind of put prisoners in jail and throw the key away, and make sure you remove all luxuries, like maybe napkins at the dinner table, you know, or availability for TV and classes, people don't feel safer. And I think that when people return, when they ultimately get out of jail -- which most of them still do; you know, a small percentage I think stay in forever, but most of them get out -- I think they represent a bigger menace. 2509 BILL 980003 So I am just suggesting -- I am not disputing; I am just suggesting -- that fighting crime is a very big fight that all of us are engaged in. Your job is, after the damage has been done, to try to remove people from the scene so that they can't commit more damage. But I am looking for additional ways to prevent it at a much earlier stage. I see nothing really useful in the long range of society to have the state budget go from about 150 million for corrections to over a billion dollars in the period of 10 or 12 years. It seems to me we have to combine a whole host and a big range of different activities. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Councilman, look, as I told you --

And I think what marked the discussion between you and Councilman Nutter is, I think what Councilman Nutter is trying to do is to also get in at an earlier stage, to find ways to prevent crime by eliminating crime-breeding conditions like the lack of a good educational system or an effective educational system, like the 2510 BILL 980003 lack of jobs, like the fact that we passed Welfare legislation at the federal level, say everybody has to get a job, but do nothing to make jobs available. I am not asking you to be a social worker. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I am not a social worker. I don't want to be a social worker.

And I am not a social worker, either. But I am trying to get into the point that would make your job much easier ultimately. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Look, I am only a key; a key, but not the entire player. 451 killings last year. We are only a little bit behind where we were last year. We had seven murders, seven murders. Now, many of those were submitted with a gun after some kind of dispute. Maybe drugs were at the heart of them. Some were domestic violence. Some are just random killings. But mostly, mostly they are committed with guns, and usually after some dispute over sometimes drugs, 2511 BILL 980003 maybe not. Okay. We have an increase of workplace homicides. Store keepers, taxicab drivers, and the like, armored car drivers, police. A lot of shootings, a lot of armed robberies. So when you tell me about what I want to do, I can't do anything with these people except prosecute them and ask for the maximum sentence. I don't want to hear about any problem about their mother didn't love them. I can't listen to it. And I think, frankly, Councilman, we get too much into the root causes. Forget the root causes. You robbed me, I don't want to hear it, you are going to prison. That's all I want to hear. And I think people are right. What I am saying to you is, the 451 murders, and people feeling this sense of dis-ease about where they live, if you think that this city, which has lost 100,000 people, 100,000 people in the past five years, has seen the last of its exodus, if we as a city -- and I am sort of talking to the choir here -- all working together, on the same page, don't stem the exodus of this 100,000 people 2512 BILL 980003 with jobs and taxes, why would anybody want to come here? And that's what I am trying to do. I live here, too. I lived here all my live. So all I am saying is, I don't want to be a social worker. I can't climb into the womb and tell a mother not to abuse drugs. But if I can get to her early enough with anti-violence prevention, if I can get her boyfriend, husband, significant other to stop beating up on her, her kid, and her mother, I won't have her killing her husband, I won't have her husband killing her, I won't have either one of them prostituting themselves or killing to get drugs. So there is a payback in crime prevention.

Of course, there is. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: And I will use Bill Gates' famous saying from Microsoft, and that's the bottom line, and this is really the end of the line for me.

I am just trying to broaden the scope of crime prevention, because I think it begins at a very early stage. 2513 BILL 980003 DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Where do you want to go? This is Bill Gates' Microsoft logo, "Where do you want to go today?" So where do you want to go? And I only want to ask one thing: Show me the money; that's all I am here for. Show me the money. All this talk is wonderful. But if you don't accede to my fervent request for programs that I can crime prevent and interact with the community, I will go back to my --

I think the program that you have presented in L.I.N.E. is a superb program, and I hope it will be put into effect. And as I advised another group, it will be much easier if you convince the Mayor in the first place. Because it is kind if difficult, in dealing with the District Attorney's budget, to have to overcome a Mayor's opposition, who has been a Mayor who has been the District Attorney. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Different realm. 2514 BILL 980003

We are very much interested in that program. Because I know in the Northwest was where the Victim Witness Program started. And we convinced all the community organizations to participate. It has been a tremendous success, as you know. Let me ask you one other question. Because this other thing that I am raising is not in opposition to what you are talking about, but trying to get all the crime-fighting forces together. Because I think if we all can work together, we are going to be much more successful. I read an article in a magazine very recently which dealt with the subject that has perplexed me a long time, and that's the area of forfeitures. And this article put forward the proposition that, in many areas, what seemed to be guiding prosecution forces was the promise of what money they get. And they said that in some areas of the country, some District Attorney's Office, whatever they may call their prosecuting offices, 2515 BILL 980003 financed themselves entirely on forfeiture money. Because we have economic problems, some other areas have them much worse. And that what was troubling was, the conclusion the article had was judgment as to prosecution, as to the choice of what cases to prosecute, might be influenced by forfeiture, you know, by the promise of what funds you might get by forfeiting the property of people arrested. Does that have any relevance at all in the Philadelphia area? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: No. And for this very simple reason: Last year, when I was asked about forfeiture, we showed how forfeiture money has gone down from about 4-point-something million to about 1-point-something million. Because drug dealers are smarter. And not only that, but now they wire their cash around the world. They Internet their cash to foreign depository banks. It is a rare occasion where you find a lot of drugs and a lot of money now. And also, I have to tell you how I operate. I am a public servant, and I am a real 2516 BILL 980003 flag waiver. I can't be motivated by how much money I think I am going to get at the end of the tunnel. I can tell you we do make some money from forfeiture. But the money that we get from forfeiture pays our overtime. And, frankly, if forfeiture was as great a tool as you say it was, why would I be here? I wouldn't be asking you for money, if it was that great. We could pay for maybe a good chunk of our budget by forfeiture. It just doesn't happen to work that way. Drug activity, which allows asset forfeiture, does pay for overtime and it pays for the labor-intensive costs. But if you are dealing with, for example, the City of Philadelphia, you almost never get a big chunk of dough out of a little house in neighborhood X or Y that gains us anything. Sometimes the house is in terrible disrepair, it is overloaded with taxes. All we want to do is get it out of the hands of the person who took it. If it is in decent repair, it will go up for auction, and a decent citizen would go and 2517 BILL 980003 buy it and fix it up and move into it. But we are not motivated by how much money we are going to make. It is sort of like found money. If we find some money or get assets, that's another way of attacking a problem. Because the law is very clear that you shouldn't be able to profit from your own wrongdoing. And civil asset forfeiture is a tool that we use, but it is not our driving force. We are only looking at activity. If we come by some money, swell.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

The Chair recognizes Councilman Nutter.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam District Attorney, I do want to return to one of the issues that I raised at the beginning of the first round of questions. And I think Councilman Cohen, upon his arrival, raised a similar question. And I would just like to get your perspective on it. It is perplexing, and this has 2518 BILL 980003 happened, I think, just about every year that I have been here, and you described the process, I guess, that you go through with the Mayor. Although by your description, it may not sound like much of a process on the budget, but that's more of an issue between you folks. But there is some kind of process. And what strikes me is that no matter what you propose, or even the display today -- which I think this is the first time we have had the expanded display with the board and all of that -- I mean, did you make that presentation to the Mayor? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Not the board, but we talked to the Mayor about a variety of things. And we told him some of the programs that we believed that we needed. You know, with all due respect to the Mayor, he has the attention span of a gnat. And to try to get him, you know, sitting still for, you know, a half hour is difficult. However, what we did was, we talked to him about narcotics, juvenile, and the other things. So we concentrated on narcotics, on juvenile crime, on manpower. 2519 BILL 980003 And the $500,000 that we talked about has nothing to do, the $500,000 that you mentioned has nothing to do, with any of these programs. This $500,000, you will forgive me, in the world that I operate, is this. It is a little tiny dot. All this does is, this allows us to hire a number of attorneys to cover our courtrooms. You heard Ms. Greenlee testify, maybe hours ago, about covering. We have to cover every court. They only cover -- and I say only -- what is it, 53 percent? Somewhere around 53 percent of the cases. We cover 100 percent of the cases. So what happens is, you have a District Attorney with 30, 40, 50 cases a day. This money that the Mayor very graciously agreed to give us -- and I am happy, happy, happy -- will only allow us to push.

She was happy. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, she is happy, too. But I am really happy, how is that? I am really happy that we will get some relief for our D.A.'s in the courtroom. That's all this does. 2520 BILL 980003 It allows us to put two people in a courtroom with 50 cases a day, instead of one poor D.A.. And then we have the other thing, we have the combined major trial homicide list. So there is no more homicide calendar. We have to have a D.A. trying 5 or 6 or 8 major cases today, who, if the cases all break down, they say, we'll get your murder case on. I mean, this is not good for victims.

I understand that. And I have said a number of things about the Mayor, although I have never made any characterizations about his attention span. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: He has a lot of things on his plate.

Well, I understand that. But I also understand that he is not the only person involved in this process. He has the ultimate responsibility. But what has always perplexed me over the years is that Ed Rendell is a former two-time District Attorney, hard-charging, anti-crime person, 2521 BILL 980003 yes, with a lot of things on his plate. But, I mean, it seems to me that if anybody would understand all of the things that you have discussed today, it would be him. And so what I have never understood is that we go through this process, you pass a slip of paper, I guess, back to them, or you throw it back or mail it back or do whatever you do with it, it apparently never comes to exactly meet what you say you need, and then you leave that process and end up over here. Whereas, every other entity, small, medium, and large, that is a part of this government called the City of Philadelphia, all somehow figure out how to get even their increases in the budget. And they are not doing it in late February or early March; it is in October, November, December of the previous year. And so, you articulated earlier that you are frustrated. We are quite possibly a little perplexed as to why the one agency that the Mayor actually knows an incredible amount about -- all of his previous experience is in law enforcement -- why you can't seem to figure out how to get the numbers 2522 BILL 980003 right before you get here is perplexing to me. It is beyond my understanding. Which then results in you making the request. Then you either criticize or complain about the Council not supporting programs, when no 7 one else goes through this kind of tortured process. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I think the Mayor has done an extraordinary job. However, one of the problems that he faces is with a presence of police on the street. So I think he has concentrated his efforts on police on the street. He knows what I need. I mean, I have spoken to him enough times. I think the problems are so acute that sometimes you make decisions because they are the best decisions you can make. So I am not here to criticize the Mayor. And I am not going to criticize the Mayor. He is my friend and my colleague, and he helps me out a lot. You will really have to ask him why, because I don't know why. I can tell you that this year I wrote 2523 BILL 980003 him a letter back in November, early November, and said, "I would like to come sit with you."

You wrote the Mayor a letter? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Yes, I did. Sure. And I have spoken to him on the telephone, I see him on the street. As far as I have been able to tell, the process has always been this way. I said, why do we do it this way? You get the figures that the Mayor is going to give, and we figure our budget figures out to the exact dollar that we think we are going to get, and then we have to go through this process of coming to City Council. And the answer I was given is, it is always done that way. I don't want to do that. And that is why this year, more than in other years, I have tried to start the process in a different way, to show you -- "you" meaning all of you -- that the programs that I have work and that there is no magic to it. All you need is the resources and the dedication of people in my office, working with people like you and people like the commissioners 2524 BILL 980003 and the community leaders. We can get a lot done.

Let my ask you this question: Where do you think we should take the $3 million from? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Hey, that's not my job. Sorry. I mean, I know that it is always difficult making choices. But I can tell you, if it is true -- and I believe it is true -- that people are worried about crime as the over-arching reason of their dis-ease or their complaints, if they don't feel their quality-of-life crime is going anywhere, you cannot have a system where you don't have a prosecutor or involved in a crime. You can't. I mean, none of the prophylactic programs that I have read about depend on themselves; they need prosecutors. So that when this Partners In Progress started out in your councilmanic district, in part, they made hundreds of more arrests. Well, who is going to cover the courtroom? Nobody thought about that. So 7,000 cops or 20,000 cops is good. Who is going to prosecute the cases? 2525 BILL 980003 So the question I am coming to you with is, if it does no good just to make an arrest if there isn't a prosecutor, or if you have a prosecutor in a courtroom with 50 cases which they can't handle, where are we going? So it is all inter-related. That's where I am saying, I play a very vital role in policing, in prevention, in all of the restorative things that Council wants to accomplish. Where you guys get the money from is not for me to decide; that's for you all to decide. How much is crime worth? How much is it worth?

Well, I don't know. I think this year it is going to be, for you, worth about $30 million. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I beg your pardon?

I said, I don't know. I think this year, for you, it is going to be worth about $30 million. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Sounds good to me. Sounds very good. 2526 BILL 980003

That's what the budget is. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Well, it is not really 30 million. No, it isn't. If it were 30 million, I would be out of here two hours ago.

That's what the little book they gave me says. I am just telling you what the page says. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: That's with benefits. What is it? It is around $23 million, and that's only $3 million more than it was seven years ago. We are not even keeping the rate of inflation up. So the answer is, it is really nothing, not a whole lot. I am grateful for the 500,000; it is just insufficient.

I understand. Your testimony this year is fairly similar to your testimony last year with regard to the L.I.N.E. program, although last year you didn't explicitly state that you would have to end the program, but you did decry the apparently long ago lost federal and state money. 2527 BILL 980003 In light of that, how is it that you are paying for the program now? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Out of our General Funds.

Why can't you continue to do that? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Because what has happened is that we have an up-tick in drug-related crimes and all kinds of crimes all over the city. And it is appropriate, I think, that we deliver the maximum amount of services possible to all districts. We just can't keep a program in one district. The demands are just too great on our manpower. It is very manpower and labor intensive to keep seven district attorneys out in the community. And as much as I want to do it -- and, believe me, I am here to tell you, this program is phenomenal. You have seen the benefits of it, as has Councilwoman Blackwell. But, remember, the grant was only a grant so that it could be funded later on. It was a 2528 BILL 980003 pilot project.

All right. One last thing on that, and then I will move on. We do have one outstanding issue with regard to a forfeiture. I would take it as a legitimate request made about something that does affect the community. If you could respond to that, I would appreciate it. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Yes. The request that you made, so that the record will be clear, was that we -- I think I can characterize it; and if I am wrong, you can correct me -- we share assets with some community group to fix up a playground. We cannot do that.

Let's make sure the record is absolutely clear. This process started and the discussion about the sharing of those assets started prior to my involvement in that whole issue. Your office and the community out in Overbrook have proceeded down that path a long time ago, and apparently commitments were made. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I don't 2529 BILL 980003 believe so. I think what happened, if I remember correctly, that was --

I am sharing with you what I was told. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Okay. They are not accurate. And I think Mr. Minges made it quite plain in the letter that he sent back to the community that we agreed that we would provide them with some equipment, like I think it was sort of some kind of in-kind contribution. But we did not ever promise that we would split asset forfeiture proceeds with them, because it is a violation of the law.

I mean, whatever the answer is, I think they need a definitive answer. That request, I believe, has been outstanding for some time. Lastly, in light of an exchange that we had earlier about worthwhile use of time or valid use of time, I do want to, I guess, get a better understanding of, if that is the general policy -- and there was discussion back and forth between either yourself and the Council President or 2530 BILL 980003 yourself and Councilwoman Clark -- if that's part of the decision-making process about whether to respond either to Councilmembers' letters or whatever the District Attorney's Office may do, can you just briefly explain to me what, I guess, the general benefit is to the citizens and taxpayers of Philadelphia as it relates to the activities of the District Attorney's Office in the Judge Massiah-Jackson situation? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Very briefly. If you have a judge who denigrates the rights of police officers and victims which results in a conviction, if at all, for a lesser included defense than the something warrants, and if the judge does not have a proper judicial demeanor, then justice isn't served.

And out of that, it is your belief that the use and expenditure of time by the employees in your office, who are paid by the citizens of Philadelphia, is an appropriate use of their time as it relates to someone in their appointment to a federal position? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: As I said to you before, Councilman, when the Senior 2531 BILL 980003 Pennsylvania Senator and the Junior Pennsylvania Senator, or anybody else in the position of authority, requests information from us, we will provide it.

Well, I appreciate that answer, although it does conflict with the earlier answer -- DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: No, it does not.

-- that at least Mr. Gordon provided about what is a worthwhile use of time and effort by the District Attorney's Office. Your answer is, if anybody of any position or authority makes a request, you will respond. His response was, we will make a determination based on the request of whether it is worthwhile to use our time to get an answer. DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I don't think he said that. But whatever the record said, that's what he said. I am not going to try to characterize. I am speaking for me now. When people ask me for information, I 2532 BILL 980003 have to decide whether or not and to what extent I can devote manpower to it that doesn't take away from our essential mission. And our essential mission is to prosecute crime and to deal with a variety of issues that relate to that. It is an appropriate use of time, when the Justice Department asks us for information, or the Senate asks us for information, it is an appropriate use of time to give the Senator what he or they wish to have from us bearing upon the issue of a confirmation of a federal judge to a lifetime tenure, which includes sitting on criminal cases.

Just because I don't know -- and you may have much more experience -- do you have any sense of what the caseload of a federal district judge is in any proportion of criminal matters versus other matters that come before them? I mean -- DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: No. 21

-- are they seeing -- DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: They don't have caseloads like we have. They have selective jurisdiction, they have trial 2533 BILL 980003 jurisdiction, they have post-convictions, habeas corpus. They have all kinds of cases in Federal Court. We refer hundreds of cases to the Federal Court for their trial; narcotics, violent crimes, gun-trafficking crimes. So they handle a significant load of criminal matters. I am not in a position to say how big their caseload or how many cases they have. But I am sure the Court Administrator in the Federal Court would be able to tell you numbers or any other information. I have no way of knowing it, but I know it is important.

And you think under the current circumstances, it would be inappropriate for that individual to serve on the federal bench, as compared to Common Pleas Court? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: Councilman, I was asked by the Senior Senator of Pennsylvania to take a position, and I took a position.

Right. Well, but I think your own -- 2534 BILL 980003

Councilman Nutter. Didn't you say that the Massiah-Jackson position you took was requested from you by Senator Specter? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: I was asked by Senator Specter in December what my position was with respect to Judge Jackson's confirmation for Federal District Court judge. The first time that that Senator has ever contacted me about that issue was when he called me on the phone on December the 9th.

He held hearings in Philadelphia in the summer, did he not? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: No. 16

Didn't he hold hearings in Philadelphia? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: October.

October. In October. And at that time didn't he request other folks that had an interest in this case and in this situation to come forward? And you did not feel compelled at that time to go forward? DISTRICT ATTORNEY ABRAHAM: No, 2535 BILL 980003 that's not correct. What happened was -- and the record is very plain on this -- his office called my office on I believe it was the 1st of October, about 4:00 or 4:30 in the afternoon, to announce that he was holding hearings on Friday morning. This was the night before the Jewish holiday. I was on my way out the door. I instructed my secretary to tell the Senator's staffer who called, whoever it was -- I didn't speak to them -- I would be out of the office on the following day, and on Friday I had a full day, including a news conference which I held and was unavailable. I never heard another word, not another word, not a followup phone call, not a letter, not an inquiry, until December the 9.

Continue, Councilman. I just wanted to clarify that.

I appreciate that.

Would you yield to me?