Month: February 2023

I owe an apology to Mark Maxwell with KSDK news. He contacted me yesterday to confirm Kim Gardner’s timeline and account of actions taken by her office regarding Daniel Riley’s bond. I bit his head off because this whole affair has made me very angry with our City’s journalists and reporters.

Kim Gardner’s office has been a disaster for six years and it hasn’t been some secret. Anyone who is paying attention already knows it. I’ve blogged about many of her failures. Everyone involved in the criminal justice system in any way knows about her failures. And every time she has another significant failure, I hear the same refrain from everyone I know: “I didn’t think it could get any worse than it already was.”

It’s so bad and widely known legislators in Jefferson City even know it — and have tried to take steps to remedy it. Yet, somehow this has escaped the notice of our reporters and journalists. I got a call from Elliott Davis, the You-Paid-for-It guy, saying he was doing a story on the Circuit Attorney’s Office and asking if we could talk. Where have you been for six years, Elliott? Has your head been in the sand like Tony Messenger’s?

It doesn’t take great intelligence to realize that when the Circuit Attorney’s Office is a disaster, other disasters will inevitably follow. If these reporters think the Daniel Riley situation would have never happened had Kim Gardner been competently doing her job, then aren’t they complicit in her failure? She was able to perform so poorly – and for so long – because they performed so poorly.

I owe an apology to Mark Maxwell because he has only been in St. Louis for a year. He seems sincere. And I do recognize that some news outlets have intermittently reported Kim Gardner’s mismanagement, her inability to work with her law-enforcement partners (in case you don’t already know this: it’s really difficult to get people to work with you when you call anyone who disagrees with you a racist and misogynist), and her utter lack of professionalism.

But this story is really just the tip of the iceberg. There are huge problems in the CAO that have and will continue to result in tragedies. These are not new problems, only under-reported problems. I don’t know if Kim Gardner can or will be removed by the Attorney General or whether a special prosecutor will be appointed to take over her caseload. I’m not even sure either of those is a good idea. The City voters did elect Gardner. This might be my naivete speaking, but I would like the voters to remove her. But to do that, they need to be informed of what’s really going on in the CAO and how it impacts their lives. That can only come from the press. And so far, they’ve let the voters down.

I’ve never been a fan of how Kim Gardner runs her office. She is incompetent and should never have been reelected. She has taken what was once one of the best prosecuting attorney offices in the state and through mismanagement reduced it to a barely functioning shell of its former self. And, she has done incalculable damage to the City and its residents as a result.

And now, after she has served almost six years in office, people are finally waking up to the problem. This is not because of the things I’ve outlined here on my blog or the innumerable other problems I haven’t written about: it is all because of the community outrage brewing over a car accident that left a young woman, a multi-sport athlete, critically injured with both her legs amputated.

Daniel Riley was apparently speeding (45 mph in a 25 mph zone) when he struck several cars and rolled the car he was driving. One of the cars he struck during the accident pinned the young woman between two cars crushing her legs.

The outrage is because Riley was on bond on a robbery case when the accident occurred, and he had incurred “more than 50 bond violations.” Not only that, but his case, which had been set for trial, was dismissed by prosecutors and was then refiled.

City politicians have erupted with condemnation. Mayor Jones pledged “to review the processes that led up to this preventable tragedy.” St. Louis Alderman Tom Oldenburg lamented, “You have an innocent 16-year-old lose her legs because that office can’t file a motion (to revoke bond)? Despicable.” “It just breaks my heart to think about that young woman and what she’s going to endure because this individual was still running loose,” said Rep. Lane Roberts of Joplin, Missouri (the sponsor of a legislative bill to appoint a special prosecutor to take over the City’s serious cases).

Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey has called for Kim Gardner to resign by noon today or face removal from office.

The prevailing sentiment that’s being reported is that this accident could have been avoided if only the Circuit Attorney’s Office had done their job properly and filed a motion to revoke Riley’s bond. But that’s simply not true. I know because I was Riley’s attorney for that robbery case.

The assistant prosecutor on that case did bring to the Court’s attention Riley’s numerous bond violations. We had a hearing on his violations. And based on the totality of the circumstances — none of which appear in the media stories — the Court allowed him to remain on bond.

And, yes, Riley’s case was dismissed on its trial date and refiled. This was because I thought the state and I had reached a plea agreement, but that deal fell through on the morning of the scheduled trial when we were going to conduct the plea. The state had only recently gotten in contact with the victim — who by the way was at court the day of the scheduled trial/plea — and didn’t want to proceed to trial without being fully prepared (it was a serious case after all). In view of the defense changing its mind about the plea, the state requested a continuance. This was denied by the Court and the state filed a nolle prosequi rather than proceed with a trial it didn’t feel it was adequately prepared for. None of that is outlandish, and happens in every jurisdiction.

Interestingly, no media outlet except KMOV contacted me about the situation. You’d think reporters would be interested in getting all the details correct.

In any event, this incident could very well mean the end to Kim Gardner’s stint as the Circuit Attorney for the City of St. Louis. And, if it does, the world will be a better place. However, I find it ironic that none of the genuine issues with her management has brought about her downfall, but what very well might is a situation where her office really did nothing wrong.

I never really appreciated the final straw metaphor until now.