Mary Moriarty\u2019s career has been dedicated to \u2018seeking justice and changing the system\u2019. She began her \u2018making a difference\u2019 journey as a public defender in Hennepin County in 1990 working her way up the administrative criminal justice ladder to serving as the county\u2019s Chief Public Defender for six years and leading the second largest public law office in Minnesota. Working with 120 lawyers gave her an opportunity to be a leader. She was also chair of the behavioral health committee for six years. Her stepsister died of an accidental overdose having taken some medication while also drinking alcohol. That\u2019s been a particular issue of the candidate, that of concern for people who struggle with mental illness and also substance abuse. An independent evaluation found the county office to be one of the most effective and highly regarded public law offices in the country. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cFor the first 20 years of my 31-year tenure at the county, I tried criminal cases. And unfortunately, in doing so, I represented a lot of young Black men. I learned about their social histories and about the trauma they had suffered before they got into the system. Our office realized if we had intervened at some earlier time in their lives, they might not have been sitting next to me. I also watched how some people were harmed who were victims. I was a victim of a violent crime myself, but I watched how they were treated in the system which was not very well.\u201d She probably could have remained longer in that position had it not been for backlash that came about after her bold but true comments at a forum she had attended with former police Chief Arredondo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There was a white prosecutor on this pretrial bail panel I attended. He kept referring to the people being held as \u2018thugs\u2019 and he continued saying it over and over. My friends of color who knew me well looked at me. I knew as a white person I\u2019d be perceived as complicit if I just sat there and said nothing. So, I asked for a microphone during the question and answer closing segment. I tried to think of a way to say what I wanted to say so the prosecutor would not misunderstand my intentions. He was like the GOP today. He, \u2018they\u2019 would never understand the impact of decades long oppression of Black Americans, and most didn\u2019t care.\u201d She goes on to describe how she asked him to rethink his use of the word \u2018thug\u2019 because it is very racially charged. The panelist absolutely \u2018lost\u2019 it and it took a member of the foundation to grab a microphone and ask him to take a deep breath and calm down. During the break, the man came up to me again and began screaming until others close by intervened. \u201cThere were no consequences for his behavior. I was accused of calling a \u2018justice partner\u2019 a racist in public. That was used against me, so I have this history of calling it as I see it; doing the right thing for the right reason, but often at great personal and professional liability,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What white people won\u2019t accept is that this country was built on the backs of Black people who were brought here against their will. The impact of that trauma carries on through generations. We have a huge problem in acknowledging that we white people still benefit from enslavement here. I also think we have the resources to have a positive impact in disenfranchised communities. We need to stop falling into the trap of pitting people against each other, she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When asked how she would assess the condition of the community, of our society, of our country, and how the overturning of Roe. Vs. Wade is just one of the bellwether issues pertaining to respect of freedom and the protected rights of individuals, especially women, she said we\u2019re in a very critical time at so many levels. \u201cWe have a U.S. Supreme court that has taken a big step in removing the right to legalized abortion, but the right to abortion was based on a right to privacy and there are a bunch of other individual rights founded on that same premise. We\u2019ve been warned by the dissenters and those who made the recent decision to control a woman\u2019s body that they\u2019re coming after our other rights, too, including contraceptives and same sex marriage. The gutting of the Miranda decision preventing illegal search and seizure went under the radar of other major decisions. The only right not under attack is the second amendment.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
She said Minnesota\u2019s constitution protects abortion, but that could change if justices get challenged in elections and we get a Republican governor. \u201cAs county attorney, I will not prosecute anyone for seeking reproductive health. I will not prosecute anybody who comes here from another state. Attorney Keith Ellison and I both take the position that if somebody comes here from another state, we will not assist another state in having them go back to face any kind of prosecution or lawsuit.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In addressing the subject of police accountability, Moriarty cites from the Human Rights report that prosecutors were having a hard time prosecuting cases because of the behavior of the police. \u201cIt\u2019s imperative to be able to prosecute violent crimes when police do a good job investigating. I have an advantage having served as a public defender, having watched body cam and video, and police behavior for years. I\u2019ve worked with police. There are good police and then there are others who shouldn\u2019t be on the force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Several years ago, at a procedural justice training sponsored by an Obama national initiative, Moriarty sat with 20 police officers split among several discussion tables. She said, \u201cthe Chief Public Defender wanted to understand what police were doing and assess whether it was working or not. There were three tables and right before the session got started, she was shocked to hear the highest-ranking officer said, \u2018This is f_____b.s. and a waste of my f____ time.\u2019 He attempted to sabotage every small table exercise the group was assigned to do. At the end of the day, the facilitators asked the police, what are your goals for next year? The Lieutenant stood up and stated unapologetically, \u2018I want to maintain the warrior mentality because that\u2019s why I became a cop!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe have an opportunity to define values around criminal issues. After the murder of George Floyd, we have an urgent call for change. We must end the cycles of mass incarceration that have decimated communities of color and broken up far too many families,\u201d Moriarty says..<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Mary Moriarty\u2019s career has been dedicated to \u2018seeking justice and changing the system\u2019. She began her \u2018making a difference\u2019 journey as a public defender in Hennepin County in 1990 working her way up the administrative criminal justice ladder to serving as the county\u2019s Chief Public Defender for six years and leading the second largest public […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"off","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,13],"tags":[904,1975,267],"class_list":["post-3007","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-top-story","tag-hennepin-county","tag-human-rights","tag-racism","et-doesnt-have-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3007","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3007"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3007\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3010,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3007\/revisions\/3010"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3007"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3007"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3007"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}