Soft on Crime, Harsh on Pronouns
Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascon suspended a deputy district attorney without pay for five days last month because prosecutor Shea Sanna was guilty of "misgendering" a sex offender. In Gascon World, the offense also can be called "dead-naming."
Violent repeat offenders have seen more mercy from Gascon than career prosecutors who just want to do their jobs.
Sanna's offense? He referred to repeat offender Hannah Tubbs, nee James Tubbs, as a male.
Sanna told the Los Angeles Times that he referred to Hannah Tubbs as a male because he believed the repeat offender was identifying as female in a bid for leniency.
It long has been my policy to call people what they want to be called. Still, there are reasons to believe Sanna got it right.
Last year, Fox News obtained audio of Tubbs bragging to his father -- yes, I am using "his" here -- "I'm going to ... plead guilty. They're going to stick me on probation."
According to news reports, Tubbs did not transition until after his arrest.
The story begins in 2014 when Tubbs sexually assaulted a 10-year-old girl in a Denny's restroom in Palmdale. Tubbs, who was two weeks shy of his 18th birthday, was not linked to the crime until years later when authorities matched his DNA to the Palmdale attack.
Tubbs was lucky on one score: By the time he was booked and pleaded guilty, Gascon was LA DA.
Gascon is the rare prosecutor who faults the system for being "addicted to incarcerating people." He ran for office pledging not to seek the death penalty and -- good news for Tubbs -- not to charge minors as adults. Previous DA Jackie Lacey, a fellow Democrat, had charged Tubbs as an adult, but Gascon moved the then 26-year-old adult repeat offender's case to a juvenile court.
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