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The Alameda County District Attorney’s Office is set to be under new leadership, with Pamela Price formally conceding her recall loss and announcing the temporary appointment of her chief assistant district attorney to lead the office ahead of the Board of Supervisors’ appointment of a permanent successor through 2026.
Price gathered with her supporters and the press at noon Monday in downtown Oakland for a news conference in which she sought to highlight work she was proud of during her less than two years, affirm her commitment to ongoing criminal justice reform work and officially recognize the results of this month’s election.
“I am heartened knowing that when I leave this office, I will do so immensely proud of the work we’ve done both to improve the office and move criminal justice reform in Alameda County forward,” Price said.
While some ballots remain to be counted and election results are not yet certified, a vast majority had been counted as of the most recent update from the county as of Nov. 15, with each update continuing to be nearly 2 to 1 in support of the recall measure.
Although the pro-recall campaign, Save Alameda For Everyone (SAFE) claimed victory less than a week after the Nov. 5 election, Monday marked the first time that Price and her supporters had offered public remarks on the results since Election Night.
“I thank you for the honor of serving you as your district attorney, and I applaud you for going to the polls in 2022 and believing in the possibility of reforming the criminal justice system after a hundred years here in Alameda County,” Price said.
Price concluded her remarks with the announcement that she was tapping the office’s chief assistant DA, Royl Roberts, to take the helm as she steps down next month after the election results are certified — with Roberts now serving in the role on an interim basis ahead of the appointment of a permanent successor by the Board of Supervisors, which is expected early in the new year.
“I feel confident that with Chief Roberts at the helm, the DA’s office is in good hands until my successor is in place,” Price said.
Roberts began his current position with the office when Price took the reins of the DA’s office at the start of 2023, departing his previous position as general counsel with the Peralta Community College District, having served in other positions at the district prior to that, and as director of operations for the Martin Luther King Jr. Freedom Center from 2015 to 2017.
Price said that she was committed to making the leadership transition in the office as seamless as possible, and that this was in contrast to the previous leadership transition when she was elected in November 2022 and took the reins from her longtime predecessor Nancy O’Malley.
“My team and I are working internally to ensure a smooth transition and with the responsible County officials to provide my successor with as much information as possible,” Price said. “I will not abandon the residents of Alameda County as my predecessor did by simply walking away. I appreciate the opportunity to serve my community and to have made history in Alameda County, and I leave this office in a much better place than how we found it.”
Amid ongoing and escalating criticism from the recall campaign and its supporters, Price sought to emphasize Monday and in other public statements during election season that the office was in disarray when she took the reins from O’Malley at the start of last year, and that addressing issues discovered under the previous leadership had been a focus of Price’s during her short tenure.
A primary example of this, according to Price and her campaign, was finding and addressing decades worth of prosecutorial misconduct during and prior to O’Malley’s 12-year tenure — which Price highlighted at an in-person press conference hours after O’Malley held a media availability announcing her endorsement of the recall campaign.
“We created a public accountability unit and exposed decades of prosecutorial misconduct excluding Jewish, Black and LGBTQ residents from juries,” Price said Monday. “This huge constitutional scandal was glossed over by my predecessors, and there is evidence of an attempt to cover up the misconduct by discrediting the whistleblower who first exposed it back in 2005.”
Price and her supporters also sought to highlight the charges she announced last week against nine sheriff’s deputies – seven of whom have since been placed on leave – and two employees at Santa Rita Jail in the death of Maurice Monk, who was found in his cell at the jail in 2021 after being deceased unnoticed for at least three days. Monk’s family reached a $7 million settlement agreement with the county in a wrongful death lawsuit in the time since then.
They also pointed to the recent sentencing of former sheriff’s deputy Devin Williams Jr. to 50 years to life after a jury found him guilty in a criminal trial for the 2022 murders of Maria Tran and Benison Tran at their Dublin house.
“This is a moment to ask ourselves how many more Maurice Monks are out there right now,” said Laurie Manning, reverend at Skyline Community Church. “How many more children of God are lying unattended, uncared for, unseen? When did feeding the hungry become optional? When did caring for the sick become someone else’s job?”
In addition to highlighting the fruits of reform efforts that Price said she has taken pride in during her short tenure – and which were a pillar of her campaign platform in 2022 – Price and her campaign sought to fire back against ongoing characterizations of her time in office as having been “soft on crime” compared with her predecessor.
“My team and I prioritized reducing gun violence, the fentanyl drug crisis, and tackling human trafficking,” Price said. “We prosecuted murderers and other violent persons at a higher rate than my predecessor and processed more than 12,000 cases.”
Psychologist and professor Tony Jackson, a longtime supporter of Price’s, noted that the recall campaign and critiques of Price had been launched nearly immediately after she was elected in 2022, and said the rhetoric of the recall campaign was part of a broader, ongoing backlash against criminal justice reform.
“These same millionaires and billionaires spent money on propaganda against national healthcare for Black and poor workers, against a social safety net for Black and poor workers, and those same millionaires and billionaires that fund propaganda against criminal justice reform, and to maintain the status quo, to continue to use public funds to feed the prison system, rather than to divert resources to stopping crime, which is exactly what Pamela Price is doing,” Jackson said.
“This is the essence of the attack on Pamela Price,” Jackson added. “This is why they attacked her even before, and those plans of attack were crafted before she even got into office. This is why they continue to hide their intentions behind cute acronyms like SAFE.”
Nonetheless, supporters of the recall campaign continue to see the passage of the ouster as a victory for public safety in Alameda County, and a brighter future ahead without Price in office.
“Congratulations Alameda County, we have a safer future ahead of us,” SAFE said in a statement last week.
The margin sits at 63.13% in favor of the recall to 36.87% in support of retaining Price.
Despite the success of the recall campaign, the organization added that they “still have many bills to pay” and asked for supporters to continue donating. As of the most recent campaign finance report filed ahead of the election, the campaign was $130,775.63 in debt despite more than $1.25 million in total campaign contributions as of that point.
The pro-recall campaign is also seeking potential candidates to succeed Price to recommend to the Board of Supervisors, who are set to appoint an interim successor early in the new year to hold the office through November 2026, at which point voters will elect a permanent replacement to serve through the expiration of Price’s original term in 2028.
“We created a public accountability unit and exposed decades of prosecutorial misconduct excluding Jewish, black, and LGBTQ residents from juries,” Price said.
In criminal cases, the percentage of prospective jurors dismissed by defense council versus prosecutors by way of “challenge for cause” ( where they must provide a reason) and “peremptory challenges” (where they don’t need to provide a reason), to dismiss potential jours they believe may be biased or unfavorable to the case.
It’s common for defense attorneys to be more aggressive in using peremptory challenges to ensure a fair trial. Thus, the defense council typically dismisses more cases than the prosecution.
Example: Defense counsel for a criminal charged with murder, asked potential jurors for their feelings regarding alcohol use. The juror responded I am tired of people using alcohol as an excuse for their actions. The prosecutor had no further questions, defense council dismissed that juror.
“Price and her campaign sought to fire back against ongoing characterizations of her time in office as having been “soft on crime” compared with her predecessor. “My team and I prioritized reducing gun violence…”
Anyone referring to (or rationalizing) premeditated and deliberate acts of violence by criminals as “gun violence” is appropriately characterized as being soft on crime.
It is already against the law to abuse firearms and objects (guns, knives, swords, etc.) do not cause nor do they commit acts of violence. Yet another example of the irritating “everyone is a victim” and “society is to blame” mentality of so-called progressives that is jeopardizing the public safety of residents. These are the same people that want law abiding people disarmed – and left defenseless against criminals.