McCulloch, 67, of Kirkwood, faced challengers in just three prior primary and general races. With 90 percent of votes counted late Tuesday, McCulloch acknowledged a likely defeat, telling reporters he probably will retire. He said he has no regrets about how he handled the Wilson case. Political observers gave Bell little chance, saying that McCulloch's 28 years in office and fundraising advantage made it nearly impossible for Bell to win. "I'm in total disbelief," St. Louis University political science professor Ken Warren said late Tuesday. Warren had predicted McCulloch would cruise to an eighth straight term, given his tenure. "Obviously Ferguson defined this election," Warren said. "Bell made his name through Ferguson, and (McCulloch) tarnished his name through his handling of Ferguson." Bell acknowledged the influence Ferguson had in his run for office, telling a reporter, "Out of tragedy, comes opportunity. ... I'm a product of that evolution."<doc-sep>Wesley Bell, a reform-minded City Council member from Ferguson, Mo., declared victory in the Democratic primary for St. Louis County prosecutor Tuesday evening, saying he had ousted the longtime incumbent Robert P. McCulloch, who came under national scrutiny for his handling of the investigation into the 2014 shooting of a black teenager by a white police officer. Mr. Bell led Mr. McCulloch by more than 13 points with all precincts reporting, bringing an end to Mr. McCulloch’s 27-year run as the county’s top elected prosecutor. There is no Republican candidate in the November general election, so Mr. Bell, 43, will most likely be a lock for the seat. On Aug. 9, 2014, a white police officer named Darren Wilson shot and killed a black teenager named Michael Brown in Ferguson, igniting weeks of chaos and uprisings in the city that gripped the nation’s attention. After a grand jury declined to bring charges against Mr. Wilson, Mr. McCulloch, 67, faced allegations that he was too close to law enforcement officials in the area to properly oversee the investigation. He has repeatedly defended his handling of the case, but in St. Louis and on social media on Tuesday, criminal justice advocates reveled in his defeat.<doc-sep>On the week of the fourth anniversary of the police shooting of Michael Brown, the prosecutor who oversaw the case — and failed to get an indictment against the Ferguson, Missouri, cop who shot and killed Brown — has been voted out of office. Voters’ decision in the Democratic primary on Tuesday means St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Bob McCulloch will not serve an eighth consecutive term. Wesley Bell, a Ferguson City Council member who promised to pursue criminal justice reform, will take McCulloch’s place after getting nearly 57 percent of the vote. (Because there’s no Republican challenger, the winner of Tuesday’s primary is presumably a lock for the office.) Much of the race focused on McCulloch’s past handling of police shootings, particularly McCulloch’s failure to get an indictment against Darren Wilson, the Ferguson police officer who shot Brown. That shooting triggered massive protests in 2014, leading to the Black Lives Matter movement as we know it today. Danny Wicentowski reported for the Riverfront Times: There are plenty of people who are tired of McCulloch. Critics say his decision to conduct the investigation into Michael Brown’s fatal shooting using the grand jury was intentionally designed to produce a no-bill. McCulloch, 66, has also thrown the book at protesters, including those arrested as part of the recent demonstrations following the Jason Stockley “not guilty” verdict in St. Louis. Then there’s this: In his 27-year career in public office, McCulloch has never prosecuted an officer-involved shooting to the point of an actual indictment. McCulloch had defended his handling of the Brown shooting. Bell, meanwhile, told the New York Times that he would do things differently, vowing to appoint a special prosecutor and provide more data and transparency in police shooting cases. But Bell, who’s also served as a public defender, municipal prosecutor, and judge, said his focus was not just on McCulloch but on reforming the St. Louis County prosecutor’s office in general. He promised to eliminate cash bail for low-level offenses, expand the county’s drug courts and diversion programs, and not pursue the death penalty. McCulloch wasn’t receptive to the ideas. He told the Riverfront Times that he already set up a drug courts and diversions program. On cash bail, he said that the issue gets too much attention — claiming, dubiously, that “[t]here’s nobody in St. Louis County in jail being held on a misdemeanor because they can’t make bond.” (Data from the American Civil Liberties Union suggests that dozens or even hundreds of people in St. Louis County are held on cash bail for misdemeanor charges for days or weeks in the course of a year.) Bail reform has become a big topic nationally, previously drawing attention from comedian John Oliver on his HBO show. The typical bail system forces people to pay some amount of cash to get out of jail while awaiting trial — a system that favors the wealthy and keeps the poor in jail just because they can’t afford bail. A will to change this system is reflective of just how reform-minded a prosecutor may be. But McCulloch ran the same kind of campaign he ran for decades — one focused on “law and order” and an old way of doing law enforcement. In the past, these local prosecutor elections haven’t gotten much attention. A previous study by Ronald Wright of Wake Forest University School of Law, looking at data for 10 states, found that about 95 percent of incumbent prosecutors — often supporters of old “tough on crime” and war on drugs–focused policies — won reelection when they sought it between 1996 and 2006. But these local elections matter. Prosecutors are extremely powerful, and are given the ability to decide who goes to trial with few checks. Some research suggests that these local policymakers have been responsible for the continuation of mass incarceration in recent years. That’s why criminal justice reformers, backed by major funders like George Soros, are now pouring time and money into prosecutor races to reshape the criminal justice system. They have already won major victories — including that of Larry Krasner in Philadelphia, whose staff, among several other reforms, declines to prosecute any marijuana possession case. And now they got another victory in St. Louis County, where almost four years ago protesters railed against the police after the shooting of Michael Brown. Prosecutors are very powerful Typically, discussions of the criminal justice system focus on lawmakers, prisons, the police, and maybe judges. Rarely, however, is the most powerful actor in this system mentioned: the prosecutor. Prosecutors are enormously powerful in the US criminal justice system, in large part because they are given so much discretion to prosecute however they see fit. For example, former Brooklyn District Attorney Kenneth Thompson in 2014 announced that he would no longer enforce low-level marijuana arrests. Think about how this works: Pot is still illegal in New York state, but Brooklyn’s district attorney flat-out said that he would ignore an aspect of the law — and it’s completely within his discretion to do so. Prosecutors make these types of decisions all the time: Should they bring the type of charge that will trigger a lengthy mandatory minimum sentence? Should they bring a charge that’s only a misdemeanor? Should they strike a deal for a lower sentence, but one that can be imposed without a costly trial? We see this in police shooting cases. Prosecutors have the power to decide whether to bring charges against police officers, and are also given enormous power over grand juries to get an indictment (hence the saying that prosecutors can get grand juries to “indict a ham sandwich”) and in the courtroom generally. This is why Black Lives Matter activists view McCulloch’s inability to get an indictment against Wilson over the Michael Brown shooting so negatively: It’s widely believed that he could have gotten an indictment if he really tried. Courts and juries do, in theory, act as checks on prosecutors. But in practice, they don’t: More than 90 percent of criminal convictions are resolved through a plea agreement, so by and large, prosecutors and defendants — not judges and juries — have almost all the say in the great majority of cases that result in incarceration or some other punishment. As one example, prosecutors have played a major role in mass incarceration. Analyzing data from state judiciaries, John Pfaff, a criminal justice expert at Fordham University, compared the number of crimes, arrests, and prosecutions from 1994 to 2008. He found that reported violent and property crime fell, and arrests for almost all crimes also fell. But one thing went up: the number of felony cases filed in court. Prosecutors were filing more charges even as crime and arrests dropped, throwing more people into the prison system. Prosecutors were driving mass incarceration. Pfaff provided a real-world example of this kind of dynamic in his book Locked In: The True Causes of Mass Incarceration and How to Achieve Real Reform: “Take South Dakota, which in 2013 passed a reform bill that aimed to reduce prison populations. The law did lead to prison declines in 2014 and 2015, yet at the same time prosecutors responded by charging more people with generally low-level felonies, and over these two years total felony convictions rose by 25 percent.” In the long term, this could lead to even larger prison populations. Now apply this story on a national scale. There is less crime compared to the 1990s. Police are making fewer arrests. Lawmakers are slowly reducing the length of prison sentences. Yet until 2010, incarceration rates had continued to climb nationwide — and, as Pfaff pointed out, the recent drop in incarceration would be much less pronounced if it weren’t for court-ordered drops in California’s prison population. Prosecutors have been abetting more and more incarceration while other actors in the system have been pulling back. By successfully campaigning for progressive prosecutors, criminal justice reformers stand to change this dynamic. It’s crucial this happens at the local and state level too, where the majority of the criminal justice system takes shape in the US. In criminal justice, it’s local and state systems that matter<doc-sep>
Politics & Government St. Louis Primary 2018: Bell Beats Bob, Stenger Will Stay Check back throughout the day for up-to-date election coverage. Reply ST. LOUIS, MO — Wesley Bell has won the Democratic primary for St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney, defeating 27-year-incumbent Robert McCulloch in a stunning upset. With no Republican challenger in November, he's almost certain to win that race too. "People here showed up and showed out," Bell said in his victory speech Tuesday night. "A lot of people contributed to this victory, and I thank you so much." Bell will be the first African-American to hold the office and has promised to eliminate cash bail and institute other criminal justice reforms. "St. Louis County voters recognized the need for smart justice reform in a significantly new way during today's primary election for prosecuting attorney," the American Civil Liberties Union of Missouri said in a statement. "For the first time in nearly a generation, the prosecuting attorney candidates engaged in a county-wide discussion about the high numbers of people in the St. Louis County Jail and the office's use of cash bail, diversion, and the alternative courts system." The group said Bell's election would make it clear that the criminal justice system must change. McCulloch said later at an event that he plans to retire, telling a St. Louis Public Radio reporter that he hopes Bell's victory doesn't equate to an ACLU takeover of the office. McCulloch drew criticism in 2014 when he declined to charge former Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson with murder after Wilson fatally shot Michael Brown, a black teenager. McCulloch said he has no regrets over his handling of the case. McCulloch also says he hopes @Bell4STL taking over doesn't equate @ACLU takeover of STL County Prosecutor office, adding ACLU is no longer interested in being government watchdogs, "they're interested in governing." — Abigail Censky (@AbigailCensky) August 8, 2018 Meanwhile, Steve Stenger edged out Mark Mantovani in the race for County Executive by just over 1,000 votes. Officials in St. Louis County reported some problems with voting machines, St. Louis Public Radio reports, forcing them to count ballots the old-fashioned (read: slow) way, by hand. But despite the reported problems and the closeness of the vote, Mantovani has said he won't challenge Stenger's victory. Maria Chappelle-Nadal defeated three challengers to win her primary for Missouri's 86th District with just over 50 percent of the vote. Chappelle-Nadal, who had been term-limited out of her state Senate seat, made a proposed taxpayer funded development in her district a key campaign issue, saying in an online ad that she has concerns about residents and businesses that may be displaced by the project. In the state's 4th Senate District, Karla May defeated incumbent Jacob Hummel, and in the 14th District, former Congressional staffer Brian Williams edged out state Rep. Joe Adams and former state Rep. Sharon Pace.