DA Summer Stephan says it is time to restore balance to nation's criminal justice system

Summer Stephan, the district attorney for San Diego County, was sworn in on July 15 as president of the National District Attorneys Association. The organization, now in its 75th year, advocates in Washington and in state capitals for prosecutors' priorities. Stephan has been a prosecutor for nearly 35 years and the district attorney since 2018. She took the reins of the NDAA at a time of robust debate about balancing the need for public safety with a desire to incarcerate fewer people. She agreed to answer questions from Daily Journal reporters and editors about a range of topics including fentanyl, school shootings and homelessness. But she especially wanted to talk about the $550 million Congress cut from the Crime Victims Fund in 2024. Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Dick Durbin introduced legislation last month to divert surplus funds from the False Claims Act to the Crime Victims Fund.

This is an edited transcript of that conversation:

Daily Journal: What are the goals generally of the NDAA and particularly what would you like to accomplish this year?

Stephan: Our goal is to advocate for the big issues that affect prosecutors across the United States. My goal is to elevate the voice of crime victims across the United States. I believe that our justice system has to be balanced and has to protect the rights of the accused with all our hearts and with every fiber that the Constitution provides, but also the rights of victims.

DJ: Do you believe that's not being done now?

Stephan: What I've seen in the last 10 years is a bit of erosion of the rights of victims, and it appears that we're a little out of balance, where our discussions really only focus on the rights of the accused. We're seeing this even in the area of funding. We are told that the funds for victim services that are lifesaving across the United States are being cut substantially. And that's a real concern to us.

DJ: What initiatives have you developed in San Diego that you'd like to bring nationally?

Stephan: Something that makes every prosecutor's and every community member's heart stop is a school shooting. In San Diego County we were able to formulate an excellent protocol for school threats, not in terms of response, but in terms of how to stop a school threat from becoming live. We've prevented two potential preparation-stage shootings from coming live. Bringing those models nationally to protect students is a priority for me.

Another is fentanyl. San Diego County is the Number 1 entry point for fentanyl for the entire nation, about 49% of all the illicit fentanyl comes through our port of entry. So, we've had to be very vigilant. We formed task forces and methodologies for collaborations and we're actually seeing our number of overdoses go down for the first time, by 7% this past year.

The third is this rampant retail theft that is really affecting the heartbeat of America, especially the small businesses that don't know what to do. We live in a war zone. It's really unacceptable and we need a return to the rule of law, balanced with compassion, with treatment for first time offenders but accountability for those who want to take advantage of our communities. I visited a perfume shop recently and the owner told me that he has to put his cheaper perfumes in front knowing they're going to be stolen for resale, not for food, not for sustenance, but for resale to support the drug habit or whatever else in terms of criminal organizations.

DJ: Some district attorneys in other areas of the country, including here in California, have committed themselves to reducing the number of people who are incarcerated. As a leader of a national association, how do you balance the priorities of different members?

Stephan: Shiny objects and wanting a label of being called the most progressive or the least progressive, tough or light on crime, all those labels I don't think benefit the communities. Every neighborhood craves justice and safety. What I believe is that we have to follow the rule of law, but we have to strike a balance. We have to provide treatment courts for those who are suffering from addiction and from mental health diseases as an alternative to incarceration, because those models work, and they actually make the community safer. Of repeat and habitual offenders, we must bring accountability to those situations and hold the line when it comes to hate crimes, when it comes to violent crime, when it comes to offenders who are destroying neighborhoods - cartels and organized crime.

DJ: Some DAs who have pushed for more reforms point to what they say is deeply rooted racial biases in the criminal justice system. What should be done to weed out those biases, particularly implicit biases that might not be as apparent?

Stephan: Racial bias, implicit or explicit, is really a cyanide to the justice system, it erodes trust, and it erodes justice. And I think that it is a journey, and it is something that we should always have in our sights as a work in progress to reach that idea of a fair and equal justice for all. I think we've made a lot of progress as a nation, but we are not there yet.

DJ: On June 28, in a case called City of Grants Pass v. Johnson, the U.S. Supreme Court gave local authorities broader authority to arrest and prosecute people who are sleeping on the streets. San Diego, like many cities in California, has been grappling with what to do about a growing homeless population. How do you plan to you use the authority provided by Grants Pass in San Diego?

Stephan: Our office filed an amicus in this case that was cited on Pages 3 and 4 the Supreme Court's decision. We believe that homelessness has become both a humanitarian issue and a public safety issue. Half of our fires set in San Diego County are set by folks who are experiencing homelessness, and we are a very fire prone area. Homeless people are dying at 117 times higher rate from overdoses. So, while we know that there are issues of poverty and trauma and PTSD that drive homelessness, we know that addiction is a very large part of it yet in the states where there's been almost a decriminalization of drugs, it hasn't helped in terms of the homeless population. In San Diego, what we're proposing is, of course, more housing, more safe shelters, but we also need to really look at solutions in terms of addiction and crisis stabilization centers, expanding mental health treatment and expanding the ability to incentivize drug treatment through the court system, if needed, in order to eliminate and reduce some of the homelessness.

DJ: In 2021, in In re: Humphrey, the California Supreme Court ruled that courts could no longer require cash bail from defendants without an ability to pay, and there have been other efforts to eliminate cash bail entirely. What are your thoughts on cash bail?

Stephan: I don't think the court should consider whether somebody is rich or poor but should consider as primary factors what is the threat to public safety and what is the reality of them returning to court to face more charges, whether they're going to be a flight risk. That's the law in California.

DJ: How do you think DA offices might improve their relationships with the communities that they serve?

Stephan: I think it's about being in the community and listening to the community. It's one thing to talk and it's a harder thing to listen, especially for lawyers. Many of the reforms and innovations and ideas that we've brought into our office were because of our humility and the fact that we listened intently to all the voices in our community. Now, I think we have to be careful not to only listen to the loudest voices. Sometimes when you listen to the loudest voices, you hear political jargon, you hear headlines. You have to actually talk to the people that are busy working, trying to put food on the table, but they aren't going to go to you.

DJ: How do you think that that your job, the job of a DA, has evolved since you started as a young prosecutor? And how do you think it needs to evolve to meet the needs of a changing society?

Stephan: Early in my career it was all about the case analysis and trying those cases, looking into the victim's eyes, and fighting their individual battle for justice - case by case, and that remains very important. Every harm, every woman who's raped, every girl abused and sold like a slice of pizza; they're important. But I think where the role of prosecutor has evolved is that we are taking more of a lead in terms of prevention. Once the harm has taken place, it's done. We really can't fix it.

I think for the future, we need to build and expand family advocacy centers. They bring the ability for a victim to restore her life or his life and their children's life, thus interrupting what could become a cycle of violence, of trauma, where children grow up to think of domestic violence as normalized, of being sold into trafficking and prostitution as normalized, drug dealing as normalized. I opened the Family Justice Center, the second one in San Diego County, and over the next two years 5,000 victims walked in, half of them were children. I view that as the best kind of criminal justice reform where you're fixing the problem from its root.

DJ: Are there other changes to the criminal justice system that you want to see in San Diego or nationally?

Stephan: Fighting the rise of extremism and hate in our nation. Crimes targeting our Black and African American communities sadly is one of the highest categories of hate crime. So, championing the enforcement and the expansion of hate crimes laws that protect our communities of color.

DJ: Are there other priorities you have president of NDAA that we haven't discussed?

Stephan: To advance a restoration of the funding for crime victims. It's really unconscionable to cut the funding. This is a lifeline for victims. Can you imagine if you're a victim of crime and your main support, the husband or wife who sheltered and housed you, has been killed? Now you're left without all of the resources that you need as a crime victim for emotional trauma and or the real needs, medical needs, all of the other things. So that's going to be the fight.