Tipsheet

Madness: Violent Felon Gets No Jail Time in CA for This Crime Spree

Guy Benson
Guy Benson  |  May 23, 2023 10:25 AM

A left-wing, pro-criminal, Soros-funded prosecutor in Northern California has agreed to a plea deal that allows a violent felon on a crime spree to avoid prison time entirely.  Some on the Left insist that it's some sort of bigoted dog whistle to notice such things -- and especially to point out who is proudly and publicly funding the campaigns of various 'law enforcement' officials around the country, who too often appear to care more about offenders than victims.  But many of the legal outcomes they engineer are indefensible, leading to more danger for innocent people.  One such official in nearby San Francisco was so awful, he was recalled from office.  Another such official in St. Louis has been pressured into resigning.  Will there be consequences for the Bay Area District Attorney who agreed to this?

There is surveillance video of the assault:

Additional details of the attack and subsequent confrontation:

During a preliminary hearing in January, witnesses linked McGlone to arson fires outside two Southside businesses on Sept. 14, 2020, and described several disturbing interactions on Durant Avenue between McGlone and community members before events culminated at a local boba shop. According to court testimony, McGlone told a man sitting at a Durant Avenue parklet that he "wanted to light someone on fire," saying, "If I don’t get to see my family tonight, someone else doesn’t get to see their family tonight. And I choose you." ... At some point, McGlone began chasing the man down Durant and sprayed him with WD-40, according to testimony. Another man also ran from McGlone to escape being set on fire after being sprayed with a liquid while waiting in line at Taco Bell Cantina, according to testimony.

McGlone's next stop was Feng Cha Tea House, at 2528 Durant Ave., where he found students waiting in line to order food and drinks. He sprayed two of them with WD-40 and used a lighter to ignite the gas, creating a massive fireball, witnesses said. The students managed to pat out the flames and escape injury. Members of their group then confronted McGlone and fought with him in the street. During the fight, according to testimony, McGlone first pulled out a knife and then pulled out a hatchet...When he was arrested, according to court papers, McGlone "was in possession of matches, two lighters, clothing that smelled of gasoline, a can of WD-40, and four glass bottles filled with gasoline subsequently identified as Molotov cocktails.”

Beyond those disturbing specifics about a string of alleged crimes, there's even more context to this man's violence: 

In addition to the boba shop attack, McGlone had also been charged with felonies related to a domestic violence case in Berkeley from Sept. 1, 2020, two weeks before the disturbance on Durant Avenue. In that incident, police said he attacked his wife, striking her repeatedly with a pistol and punching her in the face. He then fled the scene, leaving her with an open head wound, according to court papers...(McGlone was not allowed to own or use guns at the time because of a conviction for federal bank robbery in 1999, according to charging papers)....McGlone's wife testified that she didn't know how long he held her [inside the house]. "It was the longest, scariest thing that has ever happened to me," she said. "So time, I don't know." Then he punched her in the face and told her to "shut up" over and over as she repeated "oh my God," she said. He said he didn't want their daughter to hear what was happening. Then McGlone pulled out the gun, she said, and pointed it at her face, just 2 inches away. The black Glock had an Air Force logo on it and was McGlone's favorite gun, she said. As she looked down the barrel, she said, she thought she was going to die. She also testified that, although she is "not very religious," she prayed to God in those moments to take care of her daughter.

Obviously, this man is deeply troubled. Just as obviously, he is very dangerous and a menace to those around him -- both loved ones and compelte strangers. This is also an important point:

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The DA, who campaigned on equity and against 'systemic racism' (and has been defiant in the face of criticism over the handling of multiple cases) considered this pattern of conduct and decided that a government "diversion program" was the appropriate course of action, instead of prison.  Some career prosecutors have had enough.  We shared a blistering resignation letter from a Chicagoland prosecutor earlier this month.  It's no surprise that other professionals who've dedicated their lives to the rule of law cannot abide working for people who undermine their core mission:

A fed up veteran prosecutor ripped a radical California District Attorney for neglecting victims’ rights in a scathing resignation letter. Danielle Hilton, who had been with the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office for nearly three decades, told embattled DA Pamela Price that she could no longer perform her duties in good conscience last week. “Victims deserve better,” Hilton wrote, asserting Price’s radically progressive agenda has tipped the scales away from providing justice to those “devastated by violent crime.” “I am not leaving because I want to,” Hilton wrote in the missive posted to Twitter. “In fact, I want nothing more than to be an African American woman continuing to serve the citizens of Alameda County in a fair, unbiased and professional manner.” Elected to office in November, Price has come under increasing scrutiny for doing away with most sentencing enhancements in a bid to lower jail terms...She caused outrage last week after declining to attach enhancements to a case where three gangbangers were arrested for shooting a 5-year-old dead on a freeway in Fremont last month. In a leaked memo, Price had previously urged her prosecutors to embrace probation for most crimes, including felonies, according to reports.

...“I have spent my career picking up the pieces and gathering the fragments of lives shattered by violence,” she wrote. “I encourage you to look at crime scene and autopsy photos, meet the victims of the robberies, sexual assaults, home burglaries and other crimes within the county. It is their voices you were elected to empower,” she wrote in the resignation letter. Price has pushed back on criticism of her term, arguing she is under attack because she is Alameda County’s first black DA and unabashedly progressive. Price said she is attempting to undo entrenched inequities within the county’s prosecutorial conventions. “If you are a Black person in Alameda County, you are 20 times more likely to be incarcerated than a White person,” she said last month. “Racial injustice in this county is what we all need to be firmly committed against.”

Unfortunately, victims are often cast aside as secondary nuisances for people pursuing an ideological agenda.  And while outrage is growing over Price's decisions, she's doing her job the way she advertised she would.  Alameda County is adjacent to San Francisco, where a woke DA was so destructive that the city's infamously left-wing electorate pried him out of office with a decisive recall.  Months later, Alameda residents elected someone from the exact same political mold.  Nobody should be caught off guard or surprised.  This is exactly who they elected.  I'll leave you with various responses to California Gov. Gavin Newsom barging ahead with his red state fixation, especially over Florida: