From its synth-jazz theme song to its cheesy dialogue to the sage counsel of S. Epatha Merkerson, I love Law and Order. But the best part of Law and Order is the satisfying finality that every episode brings. No matter the verdict, Jack McCoy and the gang always get a cathartic sense of closure after they solve a case.
Unfortunately, real trials aren’t so satisfying — especially when the death penalty is on the table.

McCoy never had to deal with the decades-long appeals process that the death penalty requires. To avoid the execution of an innocent person, the death penalty appeals process is long and arduous – 25 years on average. Rather than providing closure, it exacts a grueling toll on family members of the victim. For them, the appeals process must feel like a nightmare of promises made and unfulfilled.
Law and Order also never dealt with the budget constraints of real-life law enforcement agencies. When Lenny needed to run down a new lead, he never had his overtime request turned down like detectives in the LAPD homicide unit did. And the L&O Team may have felt stung when Benjamin Bratt left the show to be a movie star, but at least they weren’t decimated by layoffs like the Oakland Police Department was. Maybe because they don’t have death penalty appeals, their police department is fully funded.
That may also be why every case on Law and Order was solved. Here in real-life California, forty-six percent of all murders go unsolved in an average year, and fifty-six percent of rape cases remain open indefinitely. Meanwhile, taxpayers spend $184 million each year to support a dysfunctional death penalty system that operates like an upscale life without parole: more death row inmates die of illness and old age than they do of execution.
Change is coming: California Taxpayers for Justice has just announced a November 2012 ballot initiative called the SAFE California Act, which promises Savings, Accountability, and Full Enforcement for California. SAFE CA replaces the death penalty with life in prison without the possibility of parole. And it commits the millions of dollars we’ll save to local law enforcement.
SAFE CA is about balancing California’s spending and public safety priorities. It’s about recognizing the failure of the death penalty, which costs billions of dollars and does not keep our families safe.
We’ve already spent $4 billion to execute 13 people since 1979, and, if nothing changes, we’ll spend another billion over the next five years.
California should invest that money in proven public safety solutions, like education and crime prevention programs.
SAFE CA takes California law enforcement out of the fantasy world of Law and Order and brings it into our budget-strapped reality. Californians deserve real justice and taxpayers deserve to have their dollars invested wisely in real solutions for our schools and communities.

 
You should follow the SAFE CA initiative on Twitter, and keep connected with the SAFE CA Facebook page.

Late yesterday, the California State Senate approved Seth’s Law (AB 9) in a 24-14 vote. Seth's Law is designed to address the pervasive problem of school bullying by providing California schools with tools to create a safe school environment for all students. The bill is authored by Assemblymember Tom Ammiano (D-San Francisco) and co-sponsored by a coalition of organizations advancing LGBT equality, including Equality California, the ACLU of California, National Center for Lesbian Rights, Gay-Straight Alliance Network, and The Trevor Project. The bill is named in memory of Seth Walsh, a 13-year-old gay student from Tehachapi, CA, who took his life in September 2010, after facing years of relentless anti-gay harassment at school.

"I want to thank my colleagues in the Senate for taking this important step forward to ensuring that schools have the necessary tools to prevent any young person from being bullied, harassed or worse because of their sexual orientation, gender identity and expression. As a former teacher, I know how important it is for our students to feel safe at school. We have a moral duty to our youth to prevent bullying and Seth’s Law will help schools protect students, and prevent and respond to bullying before a tragedy occurs.” said Assemblymember Tom Ammiano.

“Public schools have tremendous power and responsibility to protect students from bullying and harassment," said James Gilliam with the ACLU of California, and director of the Seth Walsh Students’ Rights Project at the ACLU of Southern California. "Better school procedures and policies to prevent and address bullying will make a safer environment for students who are suffering."

“All students deserve to receive an education without fearing for their safety because of who they are,” said Roland Palencia, Executive Director of Equality California. “Seth’s law is an important step forward in ensuring schools have the knowledge and tools they need to prevent bullying. We thank Assemblymember Ammiano, Assembly Speaker Pérez, the LGBT Caucus and allied lawmakers for championing this critical piece of legislation.”

"All students should be able to learn in an environment that is safe and free from bullying and harassment, but that is not the reality for many lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students," said Carolyn Laub, Executive Director of Gay-Straight Alliance Network. "Seth's Law will help our schools recognize and address the serious and often devastating consequences of bullying in California's schools."

Over the past several months, “Seth’s Law” has raised an important discussion about the need to help schools protect LGBT students and other vulnerable youth from bullying. While California already prohibits school harassment, schools often do not have the tools or knowledge to adequately protect lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) students and others from bullying, which remains a serious issue across the state and the rest of the nation. Students, parents, and school employees often don’t know what the rules are or what to do if bullying occurs.

In a recent national survey, nine out of 10 LGBT students reported being harassed at school. The problem persists in California as well, with LGBT students reporting significant harassment. The California Safe Schools Coalition reported in 2010 that 42% of California students who identify as lesbian, gay or bisexual and 62% who identify as transgender said they had been harassed at least once based on gender non-conformity.

According to the California Healthy Kids Survey, 27% of students who reported harassment based on actual or perceived sexual orientation said they missed school at least one day during the past 30 because they felt unsafe. Increased truancy rates lead to a lack of funding for schools.

Besides truancy, the consequences of bullying and harassment can include falling grades, depression, and risk of suicide. Students who reported harassment based on actual or perceived sexual orientation were four times more likely than their heterosexual peers to attempt suicide.

 

This week’s Time magazine cover shows five young American veterans: one is a published author, another is a Rhodes scholar.  Notably absent from the cover is any one of the 8,000 American homeless veterans living on the streets of Los Angeles today.

Southern California’s homeless veteran crisis is not simply a matter of scarce resources in tough times: Since 1888, the Veterans Administration (VA) has owned and operated a 387-acre campus in Brentwood intended to provide shelter and services to disabled veterans.
And for more than a decade, the VA has been exploiting that land.
Instead of housing veterans, the VA has been leasing the land to more than twenty private commercial enterprises.  While veterans spend their nights on the streets of Skid Row or in parks near the Brentwood campus, the former site of the Pacific Branch Soldier’s Home now houses car rental companies, hotels, oil companies, and private schools.
In June, the ACLU of Southern California filed a lawsuit against the VA to ensure that the land donated for the benefit of disabled veterans isn’t misused for private commercial gain.
The LA Times reported this morning that the VA adjusted the lease agreements of Enterprise Rent-A-Car, Tumbleweed Charter Buses, Inc., and food services company Sodexo Inc., instructing them to move to different parts of the campus and cutting their contracts short.
The VA’s actions are an admission that these leases are an inappropriate use of the campus, but they do nothing to provide a single unit of housing to the thousands of homeless veterans in Los Angeles.  And they do nothing to answer any of the public’s questions about the misuse of land.
How is much the land is being leased for? We don’t know.
How were the deals were negotiated? We don’t know.
The biggest question is whether any of that money goes to the stated purpose of the VA campus: sheltering and rehabilitating America’s veterans? We don’t know, but we intend to find out.
 David Sapp is a staff attorney at the ACLU/SC.