Held to answer

An alleged rape victim recently made headines when she won $800,000 in a settlement against the University of Oregon, but other news in the same backyard was barely noticed: Lane County District Attorney Alex Gardner, who declined to prosecute the alleged rape, resigned to become a state police captain.

As one of the state’s workhorse District Attorneys, Gardner had a thankless job. No wonder he took a pay cut of $18,000 a year. Look at the absurdity of the UO case if you want to see what’s happening to America’s concept of criminal justice.

The alleged victim said earlier this year that she wanted the three basketball players accused of raping her to receive only “a slap on the wrist.” She was initially uncooperative with police. Yet she found the vengeance to go after the UO.

Our concept of criminal justice is becoming so schizophrenic it’s like everybody’s a victim, but nobody’s ever guilty. A prosecutor who wants to do his job – in other words, prosecute offenders – is almost regarded as unseemly unless the crime is high profile (white cop vs. black suspect; a publicized he-said-she-said rape).

In Gardner’s case, it’s easy to understand his frustrations. Two years ago I heard him testify at a legislative hearing on a proposed bill, which would have reduced punishment for some offenders by excluding certain prior convictions from their criminal history.

Gardner urged legislators not to do this. He said he already had a problem with criminal defendants blowing off their court appearances. The most unrepentant, recidivist property criminals don’t want to be reformed, he testified.

“They hang out in Lane County and victimize people.”

He won that round, but the pressure to reduce sentences – even on violent crimes – is an ongoing cause among the media, academia and political candidates.

In addition to those aggravations, the Eugene Register-Guard cited the budget cuts that have worn Gardner down. Because of declining federal timber funds, he has been forced to drop about 25 percent of all felony cases that could have gone to court.

He told the Register-Guard that his deputy DAs “routinely work 55 hours a week, getting paid for 40 hours, and they do it without complaining. … They’re loyal, dedicated and committed. I don’t want to lay them off anymore. I really don’t.”

The Lane County DA’s office had 85 full-time equivalent employees in 2011. It now has 63. The office is facing more budget cuts of $750,000.

“The state police has offered me a position where I can contribute and potentially be successful in a system that is not robustly funded but is not in continuing collapse,” Gardner told the Register-Guard.

What will this continuing collapse of Oregon’s criminal justice system look like?

Well, compare Gardner’s career move with that of another former prosecutor: ex-state Attorney General John Kroger, who resigned in 2012.

Midway through his first term as Oregon’s Attorney General, Kroger got tangled up in an investigation into then-Gov. John Kitzhaber’s companion Cylvia Hayes. In retrospect, given what is now known about state business being steered to her private company, Kroger probably should have pursued the investigation with the same tenacity he showed as a former federal prosecutor in the Enron case.

Instead, after clearing Hayes, Kroger later announced he would not run for re-election, citing unspecified “health reasons.” He then resigned to become president of Reed College.

Now here he is in the summer of 2015 indulging in a form of American self-absorption, a variation on the “bucket list.” In Kroger’s case, it’s a list of 100 things he wants to do in the next 25 years. He’s been sharing it on Facebook. Here are several taken from this long list:

“Live in Rome for a year.”

“Own an old Mercedes 280 SL.”

“Buy our retirement home. Muir Beach? Marin?”

“Read 2500 more books.”

“Sail to Hawaii.”

“Walk the length of Crete.”

“Keep a hypomnema… (google it, or read your Foucault, or your Marcus Aurelius….)”

Impressed? Kroger is ensconced in academia’s one percent. Of Reed College, he writes: “I love the place. Imagine an institution actually, truly dedicated to the life of the mind.”

The life of the mind also has its limits, especially when something as real as crime is treated like an abstract. Philosophical debate alone is not going to change the human condition.

In his 2008 memoir “Convictions,” Kroger recalled a defining moment at age 16 when he got caught with a friend stealing hubcaps. It led to a blow-up with his father, who ultimately demanded that he move out of the family home after graduating high school. That, in turn, prompted Kroger to join the Marines, a life-changing act.

Looking back, he wrote: “In retrospect, trying to steal those hubcaps was probably the smartest thing I ever did.”

Wrong. Getting caught was the smartest thing that happened to Kroger. What if he hadn’t been caught? What if he and his buddy had gotten away with that theft? Would there have been more and bigger thefts?

Somewhere in Lane County – or in any of the state’s 36 counties – there are a number of young thieves who will get a chance to find out.

– Pamela Fitzsimmons

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Lessons in Faking It