On May 1, a man in Anchorage, Alaska, called 911 to say he had “beat” his wife. When police stepped through the door of Vernon Booth’s apartment, they found the victim’s face bloody and her eye nearly swollen shut. You’re late, the charging document says he told officers. “She could have been dead by now.” Four months later, prosecutors dropped the charge. The city said it did not have enough lawyers to take the man to trial, reports ProPublica. Defendants in at least 930 Anchorage misdemeanor cases have walked free for this reason since May 1, the Anchorage Daily News and ProPublica found. These include people accused of crimes ranging from violating a restraining order to driving drunk with children in the back seat. In one case, prosecutors said a mother told police she’d beaten her 5-year-old daughter with a belt. The girl, who was found with bruises across her back, told police she’d also been struck with a wire and a stick. Prosecutors accused one man of animal cruelty after he allegedly punched and choked a dog, while another allegedly raised fighting roosters found tied to barrels.
A grand total of three defendants have gone to trial since May. The cascade of failed prosecutions is especially disturbing in a state with the nation’s highest rate of women killed by men. More than 250 of the cases dismissed since May included charges of domestic violence assault, such as men allegedly punching, kicking or threatening to kill their wives or girlfriends. They include charges dropped against a state official accused of elbowing his girlfriend in the nose. Two factors are at work in the mass dismissals. Alaska’s overloaded court system has limped along for years by allowing extensive trial delays, defying a state requirement for speedy trials. Also, the Anchorage prosecutor’s office, as in many cities and states, is struggling to hold onto lawyers. When a judge this year tried to clear out a backlog of Anchorage misdemeanors by having them brought forward as a group to regularly check which ones were ready for trial, defense attorneys began demanding speedy-trial rights for their clients. The city couldn’t keep up, and cases started dying.
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