Attorneys review Haro's past sentence, IE Law hits 3 months, feds sue Edison to recoup money
Weekly editions
Good morning,
It is September 7th. As a reminder, all articles published Aug. 24 are now free to read. Find those stories here.
Attorneys: Prosecutor made mistakes in past Haro case
Murder defendant Jake Haro was not placed in prison for his past child abuse conviction due to prosecutorial mistakes, a group of attorneys write after reviewing the case.
The Riverside District Attorney’s Office filed charges against Haro two years late, did not allege great bodily injury and did not object to multiple requests by Haro’s counsel to delay hearings on whether to send him to serve his sentence, the group says.
The San Bernardino/Riverside Chapter of the American Board of Trial Advocates wrote the letter in defense of Judge Dwight Moore. Both Riverside District Attorney Jason Anderson and Sheriff Chad Bianco criticized his handling of the case in an Aug. 27 press conference.
“Other public officials should not have attacked the judge when the District Attorney had acted passively in the handling of this matter. Comments by public officials claiming that this was an ‘outrageous error in judgment,’ ‘had the judge done his job this would never have occurred,’ and ‘San Bernardino Judges favor defendants over the victims’ appear to be made for political reasons and clearly place the role of the judiciary in a false light in the public eye,” they write.
Feds open three suits against SoCal Edison
Federal attorneys filed three cases against Southern California Edison last week, seeking payment for damages and the cost of fighting the 14,000-acre 2025 Eaton Fire in Altadena, the 28,300-acre 2022 Fairview Fire in Hemet, and a small fire in Fresno.
Although the Eaton complaint said that Southern California Edison (SCE) caused the fire, it said the investigation into the cause is ongoing, and did not provide any new facts. The federal government has filed 16 cases against SCE since 2007, and the last three resulted in undisclosed settlements.
Federal agent shooting update
I reported two weeks ago that attorneys demanded an investigation into a federal agent's shooting at Francisco Longoria, a San Bernardino man. Last week, Jacquelyn Rodriguez, spokesperson for the San Bernardino County District Attorney, said the office will not review the shooting, because each agency has their own lethal force encounter investigation.
Now, I’ve heard back from the California Attorney General’s Office: “To protect their integrity, we are unable to comment, even to confirm or deny, potential or ongoing investigations.
Local courts, interpreter union, enter fourth month of negotiations
The Superior Courts of Imperial, Inyo, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and San Diego, collectively known as Region 4, have been engaged in contract negotiations with the court interpreter union since June 2.
Riverside water rates case preempted by San Diego ruling
The question of how to remedy Riverside water rates deemed to be an unconstitutional tax has been confused by a new California law and a San Diego ruling regarding a similar policy.
A three-month-review by the editor
It has been three months since I launched the first edition of Inland Empire Law Weekly.
This wide variety of events I have reported on since then proves that legal news is human news. Whether you are a lawyer, a delivery driver, a business owner or a stay at home parent, the way the law is applied affects people just like you. This is the idea I built Inland Empire Law Weekly around: legal news about everything, for everybody’s understanding, told honestly & accurately.
Read about my ethos, find the social media accounts, and learn about the publication’s upcoming projects below.
Free civics education to be held
Reminder: The James Otis Lecture will be held Sept. 17, at the La Verne College of Law, from noon till 1:15 p.m. The San Bernardino-Riverside American Board of Trial Advocates will recreate the landmark busing case Crawford v. Board of Education, which laid the legal framework later used for the Brown v. Board of Education ruling. The judge in the case, Paul Egly, was threatened for making a ruling that desegregated the Los Angeles School District. Retired San Bernardino Superior Judge John Pacheco said that the program will compare the threats against Egly to threats against current judges.
"We will make it a direct comparison to what is going on with judges today, because they are being attacked, and they are being threatened," Pacheco said by phone.
The event is free to attend.
San Bernardino Superior judges reenact San Bernardino desegregation case
San Bernardino mayor Helen Tran and students from Pacific High School attended an Aug. 26 reenactment of the 1944 Lopez v. Seccombe pool desegregation trial.
This San Bernardino case resulted in the desegregation of the Perris Hill swimming pool, known as the Plunge. U.S. citizens of Latino descent were only allowed access to the pool on the last day before it was cleaned. Lawyers successfully argued their Fifth and 14th Amendment Constitutional rights were being violated. The case set a precedent that was used to abolish racial segregation nationwide.
The reenactment was the second of three case reenactments scheduled with San Bernardino schools. On April 4, the court recreated the 1924 case of Piper v. Big Pines School District, in which Alice Piper, a Native American, challenged her exclusion from the school district in Inyo County. The third event, to be held in December, will focus on the 1946 Orange County case of Mendez v. Westminster.
Judges Joseph Ortiz, David Tulcan, Judge James Taylor, Erin Alexander and Rasheed Alexander participated in the reenactment.
“By offering civic engagements we help students understand the principles of justice, due process, and constitutional rights—cornerstones of a democratic society. When judges step outside the courtroom to educate, they humanize the judiciary and demystify legal processes. This transparency fosters trust and confidence in the judicial system, especially in communities that may feel disconnected or underserved,” Alexander wrote.
Alexander said the reenactment was inspired by the San Bernardino-Riverside American Board of Trial Advocate's 2022 reenactment of Lopez v. Seccombe. Their reenactment was spurred by the dissertation of University of California, Irvine, student Mark Ocegueda.
Newsom promised real progress on mental health with CARE Court. Here’s what the numbers show
In the most-comprehensive look yet at whether people are using Gov. Gavin Newsom’s CARE Court, CalMatters found that far fewer Californians are enrolled in the mental health program than he projected.
In the nearly two years since Newsom launched CARE Court, it has reached only a few hundred people. That's barely more than the law he criticized, and certainly not the thousands he promised.
CalMatters requested CARE Court data from every county in California and conducted more than 30 interviews to compile the first detailed, statewide look at the program.
They were convicted of gang crimes. New California Supreme Court rulings trim their sentences
The California Supreme Court handed down two decisions last week that could impact decades of sentencing for gang-related offenses and allow thousands of people to petition courts to reexamine their cases.
Both rulings turned on a 2021 law that raised the standard of evidence for proving that someone broke a law as part of “criminal street gang activity.” In different ways, the Supreme Court chose to apply the new standard to past convictions.
One decision took an incarcerated person off Death Row; the other sided with two incarcerated people who contested past “strikes” on their records that set them on course for lengthy sentences.
Commentary: California law silences abuse victims in court. Why won’t the Legislature change this?
"When I confided in my brother and explained what was happening, I believed I was taking a first step toward freedom. I never expected my husband would be killed and that I would be charged with his death, accused of plotting to collect a life insurance payout.
"I believed the truth would protect me, that if the courts knew about the years of abuse, they would understand. However, at trial I was barred from discussing the years of trauma, fear and violence. Antiquated laws meant my truth was silenced."
Commentary: Trump’s deployment of the National Guard to fight crime blurs the legal distinction between the police and the military
Luke William Hunt is an associate professor of philosophy at the University of Alabama.
"As a policing scholar and former FBI special agent, I believe the plan to continue using National Guard troops to reduce crime in cities such as Chicago and Baltimore violates the legal prohibition against domestic military law enforcement.
"Federal judges are frustrated by defiance from the Trump administration and fuzziness from the Supreme Court."
John E. Jones III, president of Pennsylvania’s Dickinson College:
"The integrity of our system of justice and the judicial system is based on the trust that people place in the jurists that populate that branch, the third branch of government. And as Alexander Hamilton said, the judiciary has neither the sword nor the purse, so it is the credibility of the judiciary that, at the end of the day, carries weight."
Three states push to put the Ten Commandments back in school – banking on new guidance at the Supreme Court
Charles J. Russo, Joseph Panzer Chair in Education and Research Professor of Law, University of Dayton
"As disputes rage on over religion’s place in public schools, the Ten Commandments have become a focal point. At least a dozen states have considered proposals that would require classrooms to post the biblical laws, and three passed laws mandating their display in 2024-2025: Louisiana, Arkansas and Texas."
News from elsewhere
CA considers dozens of proposed laws to thwart Trump’s agenda // San Francisco Chronicle
CA’s largest ICE detention center quietly reopened and is receiving detainees // The Fresno Bee
Blue states that sued kept most CDC grants, while red states feel brunt of Trump clawbacks | NBC News
Here’s what you need to know about Fresno suing the Trump administration | FresnoLand
The biggest antitrust case against Big Tech in decades turned out to be kind of a flop | Nieman Lab
Merced man brings down district attorney | Mariposa Gazette
D.C. grand jury declines to indict another defendant amid Trump's crime crackdown | NBC News
Members Discussion