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We fight alongside people facing the effects of gentrification like Amira Moore. Our work empowers the people and communities who need it most, “We can do more than we think. There’s a path to equity, we just have to step to it.” –Ms. Moore
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Our work is as important today as it has ever been. Through your support, you can play a role in creating justice for thousands of marginalized members of our community. Together, we will dismantle injustice and pursue lasting change.
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Letters to the Editor
D.C. in Brief
D.C. Council Legislation Seeks to Divert
Truant Teens into Social Programs
The District of Columbia Council approved legislation last week that would send truant teenagers into social service programs instead of the juvenile court system.
Until now, teenagers between 14 and 17 years old were sent to a juvenile probation agency if they missed 15 days of school without an excuse.
From now on, they will be referred to the Department of Human Services for family therapy and court diversion programs. Each teen will be assigned a caseworker.
The new legislation is rooted in years of suggestions from the D.C. attorney general’s office.
Dana Edwards, an Office of the Attorney General case worker, told the city council during testimony two years ago that her office has found prosecution largely ineffective in stopping truancy.
Instead, the attorney general “has therefore shifted to using prosecution as a last resort, and OAG now looks for proactive approaches to reduce truancy—approaches that address the actual barriers that are causing kids to miss school.
“As part of this effort, OAG has increasingly looked for opportunities to divert truancy cases referred for prosecution to alternative programs that provide kids and parents with the support they need to succeed,” Edwards said.
The Council allocated $3.38 million to the program, beginning in the next school year at five of the city’s high schools.
Effectiveness of the program will be measured by determining whether truancy rates fall below the current rate that includes more than a third of Washington’s high school students.
A contributing reason for the legislation is Mayor Muriel Bowser’s effort to reduce crime. During hearings leading to approval of the legislation, city council members considered evidence that teen truancy contributes to crime.
D.C. Mayor Braces for Trump Presidency
After Threats of Federal Takeover
Washington, D.C.'s mayor is reportedly pulling together a team to figure out how to respond to a possible second Trump presidential administration.
Donald Trump has dropped hints he would overturn local laws that show tolerance toward abortion, euthanasia and transgender issues. He also said he might take control of the police department to make good on a pledge of a crackdown on crime.
Trump said this month during a speech in Florida, "We will take over the horribly run capital of our nation in Washington, D.C., and clean it up, renovate it, and rebuild our capital city so there is no longer a nightmare of murder and crime. But rather it will become the most beautiful capital anywhere in the world."
His plan for a revival of Washington was not welcomed by Mayor Muriel Bowser and other top officials in the city administration.
She has sparred with Trump previously over how the city is managed.
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Legal Briefs
We Could Use Your Help
Thousands of DC residents need a lawyer, but can’t afford one. They could be illegally evicted from their homes, lose custody of their children, experience domestic violence, and more, all because they lack legal representation.
You could make a difference. By making a donation to the Legal Aid Society of the District of Columbia, you will provide free, high-quality, zealous legal representation to low-income DC residents.
Your support could prevent homelessness, domestic violence, hunger, or family separation. In fact, if just 10 people who see this ad give $28 to Legal Aid, it will be enough to staff an experienced attorney at the courthouse for a day.
That way, DC residents like Keith King (pictured above) can get the legal representation they need to win their cases. As Mr. King put it, if it wasn’t for his Legal Aid lawyer, “I would have been homeless again.”
Here is the link to the Legal Aid website for donations: https://www.legalaiddc.org/donate-to-legal-aid/
For more information, contact Rob Pergament at Legal Aid at rpergament@legalaiddc.org
Senator Menendez’s Claims of Reprisal
Rejected by Politicians After His Conviction
Washington’s top political officials are distancing themselves from allegations by Sen. Bob Menendez that his criminal conviction on bribery and related charges last week puts all of them at risk of reprisal.
Menendez, D-N.J., repeated the “weaponization of the Justice Department” theme by some politicians who say federal prosecutors target their criminal charges against persons they consider politically unpopular.
Menendez was convicted on all 16 charges against him. They included extortion, bribery, conspiracy, obstruction of justice, wire fraud and acting as a foreign agent.
The “foreign agent” charge resulted from favors he granted to representatives of the governments of Egypt and Qatar while he was chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Prosecutors said he accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash, gold bars, mortgage payments and gifts, such as a Mercedes Benz. FBI agents said they found gold bars and more than $400,000 in cash stashed in places such as jackets and shoes when they searched his home after obtaining a warrant.
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Latest News
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Casa Ruby Founder Pleads Guilty
To Diverting Pandemic Relief Funds
The founder of a nonprofit that helps homeless LGBTQ youths in the Washington, D.C., area pleaded guilty to wire fraud last week after she diverted at least $150,000 of pandemic relief funds to her private offshore bank accounts.
Ruby Corado said in her application for the funds that they would be used to help indigent young people at Casa Ruby.
Corado agreed to return all money traceable to the fraud as part of her plea bargain. In return, prosecutors agreed to drop their six count indictment.
The one count of wire fraud in Corado’s plea deal carries a maximum 30-year prison sentence but she is expected to get about two years.
Corado claimed she diverted only 15 percent of the funds to her accounts in El Salvador but prosecutors disagreed.
“It was the purpose of the scheme and artifice that [Corado] would obtain money and other property from government-supported pandemic relief programs on behalf of Casa Ruby and misappropriate those funds for her own personal benefit,” prosecutors said in charging papers.
She also was accused of paying some of her roughly 50 employees less than minimum wage and not paying some of them their full wages.
The criminal case represents a big fall for Corado and Case Ruby, which served as many as 6,000 people a year at its peak and attracted millions of dollars in grants.
Corado admitted receiving $956,215 in two pandemic relief loans in 2020 and 2021 from the Paycheck Protection Program and the Economic Injury Disaster Loan program. As part of her guilty plea she also admitted that she “knowingly devised a scheme to obtain money by false pretenses.”
For more information, contact The Legal Forum (www.legal-forum.net) at email: tramstack@gmail.com or phone: 202-479-7240.
Asst. U.S. Attorney Accused of Ethics Breach
In Prosecuting Trump Inauguration Protesters
A Justice Department attorney who led prosecutions of anti-Trump and anti-fascist protesters during the 2017 presidential inauguration is facing allegations that she hid evidence that would have exonerated the defendants.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Jennifer Kerkhoff Muyskens faces a possible loss of her license as an attorney.
The D.C. Office of Disciplinary Counsel this month accused her of hiding exculpatory evidence from the defendants, editing videos to take out parts that would minimize their liability and then lying in court to cover up her misdeeds.
Withholding exculpatory evidence is considered a violation of constitutional rights of due process that allows a judge to dismiss charges against a defendant, similar to the dismissal last week of involuntary manslaughter charges against actor Alec Baldwin.
The disciplinary proceedings play into the rhetoric of attorneys representing protesters from the Jan. 6, 2021 riot at the U.S. Capitol. They say the roughly 1,400 defendants are being subjected to a political witch hunt by the Justice Department.