WHAT MAKES DA's SO POWERFUL?

When to pursue charges against a youth or instead allow their families or schools to address that youth’s behavior.
When a kid’s behavior gets addressed through the state juvenile system.
When a kid’s behavior gets addressed using adult criminal punishment.
Whether a person who has been arrested should be kept in jail or set free.
Who gets charged with a crime and who doesn’t.
The seriousness of the crime or crimes charged against a person.
Whether or not to charge a person with a crime that has a mandatory minimum prison sentence.
When charges should be dropped or dismissed because of a lack of evidence.
When a witness should be held in jail even if he/she committed no crime.
How fair the plea offer is.
When a person should get the opportunity to enter a diversion or treatment program.
What recommendations the state will support for a person’s probation.
The amount of cash bail the state wants to put on a person in jail awaiting a trial.
When a person will face a death sentence.

How fair the offer is.
What type of charges and consequences are threatened when making a plea offer.
Whether the threatened charges accurately reflect a person’s behavior.
Whether or not a person has the option to keep their record clean.
What conditions or restrictions get imposed when a person completes jail time.
Whether or not a person has the option to avoid the future life-barriers that come with a felony conviction record.
Whether a plea offer gets withdrawn even after the parties have agreed to the terms.

Who becomes a prosecutor.
What policies and practices prosecutors should adhere to.
Whether and how prosecutors are trained.
Whether and how prosecutors are held accountable.
Whether a prosecutor is investigated for misconduct.
Whether and why a prosecutor should be fired.
Whether and why a prosecutor should be promoted.
What priorities prosecutors will focus energy and resources on.
What the public knows about criminal prosecutions in their county and what they don’t.

How to explain crimes to the police.
If allegations of police misconduct should be ignored or taken seriously.
If and to what extent a police officer or sheriff’s deputy should be investigated for misconduct.
If a police officer or sheriff’s deputy should be charged with misconduct.
If allegations of police misconduct should be brought to a grand jury.
Whether to decline charging someone with a crime even if police officers want them to.
Whether to correct or continue racial disparities in police arrests.

Whether to summon a grand jury to make a charging decision.
What evidence to present to a grand jury.
What evidence NOT to present to a grand jury.
Whether the evidence presented to the grand jury is weighted in favor or against the person charged.
How the job of the grand jury is explained to inexperienced jurors.
If a grand jury proceeding is recorded for later review by the defense attorney or the public.
If a grand jury proceeding is done in secret, with no recording of it. (This is how most grand jury proceedings are done in Oregon.)