For the first time in 16 years, the incumbent top prosecutor in Maryland\u2019s largest county faces primary appointments \u2014 three of them \u2014 who say the very nature John McCarthy\u2019s established status as Montgomery County State\u2019s Attorney underscores why new blood is needed.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a disconnect between what the community wants and the status quo,\u201d says Bernice Mireku-North \u2014 a lawyer in private practice and a former line prosecutor in nearby Anne Arundel County \u2014 who is seeking to unseat McCarthy.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
The other challengers \u2014 Tom DeGonia and Perry Paylor \u2014 have been making similar pitches in a region of 1.1 million residents just north of Washington. All three cite local incarceration rates that they say disproportionally tilt toward minorities and stressing to voters they\u2019re far more willing to drive fundamental change.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\u201cLongevity in itself isn\u2019t bad,\u201d says DeGonia, a private attorney and former prosecutor. \u201cThe problem is when you start to take the office for granted \u2014 as opposed to serving the public \u2014 and can\u2019t acknowledge what you\u2019re doing is not state of the art.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Adds Paylor, a top ranking prosecutor in neighboring Prince George\u2019s County and a former private attorney: \u201cThe pursuit of criminal justice is evolving across the country, but it\u2019s not evolving at the appropriate pace here in Montgomery County.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
McCarthy calls the assertions nonsense, saying he has led Maryland\u2019s prosecutors in reforms since taking office. And he says their views reflect a limited understanding of what voters want during times of rising gun violence.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\u201cWithout any question, people who are interested in public safety see me as their best advocate,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Residents have already started making their choice for the office as part of Maryland\u2019s early voting process. Election Day looms on Tuesday. Their selection for Montgomery State\u2019s Attorney will be the final word, as no Republicans are running, which is not unusual in the highly Democratic county.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
The office prosecutes everything from misdemeanors to murders, employing about 82 attorneys along with other staff.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
McCarthy, 70, taught high school briefly after college, took night classes at the University of Baltimore, and eventually joined the Montgomery County State\u2019s Attorney\u2019s Office in 1982. He rose through the office, handled a number of high-profile murder cases, and in 2006 sought to lead the office \u2014 an elected post in Maryland.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
He sailed to victory, and has been rarely challenged since \u2014 going unopposed in the 2010, 2014 and 2018 primaries, and facing a Republican challenger in only one of those races \u2014 eight years ago.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
He has received endorsements from several Democratic leaders including, Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh, former Montgomery County Executive Ike Leggett <\/b>and current Montgomery County State Sen. Will Smith. Leggett was the first Black county executive in Montgomery County, and Smith is the first Black chair of the state\u2019s powerful Judicial Proceedings Committee.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Maryland elections: Here\u2019s where the gubernatorial candidates stand<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cJohn\u2019s record and my relationship with him \u2014 that\u2019s why I endorsed him,\u201d says Smith, who has pushed for criminal justice reforms.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Of the three challengers, DeGonia, 51, has proposed a detailed structural shift for the office. He would decentralize operations in favor of \u201ccommunity-based prosecution\u201d by placing prosecutors in each of the county\u2019s six police district stations. That approach, DeGonia says, would allow prosecutors to better inform police officers of reform measures, get prosecutors engaged earlier in their cases, and enable crime victims to know who was handling their cases.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cIt\u2019s much of more of a community-engagement model,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n DeGonia, a native of Missouri, graduated from American University\u2019s Washington School of Law, and worked as a prosecutor in Montgomery\u2019s State\u2019s Attorney\u2019s Office for eight years, eventually running a felony team before going on to private practice in Rockville. DeGonia recently served as president of the Montgomery County Bar Association.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n In his campaign, DeGonia said, he has knocked on the doors of more than 5,000 residents. He promises to attack the proliferation of firearms in Montgomery, particularly ghost guns \u2014 which are often assembled at home and are hard to trace \u2014 by setting up a detailed, multidisciplinary firearms task force<\/a>. It would prosecute cases, looking to impose stiff sentences where possible, but also support youth conflict-resolution programs and work with state and federal agencies to try to halt the trafficking of illegal guns into the county.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n DeGonia also emphasized racial justice and says he would \u201coverhaul systems set up to dehumanize defendants.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n He says that under McCarthy, the State\u2019s Attorney\u2019s Office has no way to track if minority defendants are treated differently along the many steps of the criminal justice system: How they are charged; how often they\u2019re given a chance at diversion and treatment programs designed to avoid jail; what kind of plea deals they\u2019re offered; and if convicted, what kinds of sentences are imposed.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cYou can\u2019t know if your programs are working if you\u2019re not tracking who is succeeding and who is not succeeding,\u201d DeGonia says.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n The assertion got a boost this week by the release of a report by the Montgomery County Council\u2019s Legislative Oversight Office that was critical of data collection in McCarthy\u2019s Office.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cThe State\u2019s Attorney\u2019s Office (SAO) has not prioritized top-line data reporting or performance measurement,\u201d the report found. \u201cThe SAO is unable to report data that makes comparisons between racial and\/or ethnic groups in a consistent and transparent way because their data is housed in an outdated case management system that contains erroneous and inconsistent data.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n McCarthy said he agreed with many of the report\u2019s findings while noting the report detailed how complicated data collection can be in the criminal justice system. Demographic information about defendants comes in from different sources \u2014 police, jails, courts, his office \u2014 and cannot be synthesized on software systems designed years ago to manage cases and not parse out such data.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n It is for that very reason, McCarthy said, that he is upgrading his data management systems and last year commissioned a study of his office by a group called Prosecutorial Performance Indicators,<\/a> which has also studied prosecution offices in Chicago, Tampa and elsewhere.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Challenger Paylor, 53, who serves as a deputy state\u2019s attorney in Prince George\u2019s County, said about 61 percent of the inmates in Montgomery\u2019s jail population are Black, Paylor says, while the percentage of Black residents in the county is <\/b>about 20 percent.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n