The St. Louis Circuit Attorney’s Office refused to file charges against an armed robbery suspect who tried to steal a marked police car and pointed a gun at officers on Saturday.
Police wanted to charge the 27-year-old man, who they did not identify, with first-degree robbery, armed criminal actions, and resisting arrest charges.
Police told DailyMail.com on Tuesday that the man’s identify hasn’t been released due to the charges against the suspect being ‘refused by the Circuit Attorney’s Office, making his identity a closed record.’
The Attorney’s Office did not provide a reason why they declined to charge the suspect.
The office is headed by St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner, who was elected on a ‘woke’ platform to not prosecute many misdemeanors and felonies, police have criticized her office for failing to take on more cases. She recently sued the police for racism, but the case was dismissed.
She is also currently under investigation for misconduct, according to the New York Post.
Under her leadership, the office has only prosecuted 1,500 of the 7,000 felony cases in the city’s police department in 2019. Numbers for her full term were not available.
Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner was elected in 2016 for her ‘progressive’ platform, where she advocated to de-prosecute misdemeanors and felonies, leading to only around 1,500 of the 7,000 felony cases in the city to be prosecuted in 2019.
In 2019, Gardner pledged more court diversion and less cash bail for low-level prosecutions.
She pledged to move more criminals into diversion programs – probation-like scheme that helps them obtain jobs and have access to mental healthcare – to keep offender out of jail.
‘I know that a history of high arrest rates, high conviction rates and lengthy prison stays have not made our city safer,’ she said at the time.
‘n fact, in many respects, the heavy-handed criminal-justice responses of the past have played a significant role in destabilizing families, neighborhoods and communities in our city.’
In 2018, she ‘summoned’ 56 per cent of those with low-level felonies instead of issuing a bail. Those with criminal charges would still have to attend court or risk arrest.
She announced this change after the city was sued for its cash bail system, NPR in St. Louis said.
In addition, she is under review by the Missouri disciplinary board for misconduct in her role, and she has sued the police department for racism, which was dismissed, the New York Post reported in January.
Her staff has reported not being able to attend hearings and fully prepare for cases due to being under-staffed. Recently, Gardner appointed a case to a lawyer who was out on maternity leave and failed to assign the case to another employee, leading the homicide case to be dismissed.
Roughly 10 to 15 per cent of all felony cases were dismissed prior to Gardner’s election, but has since risen to nearly 30 per cent in her terms, NPR St. Louis reported.
A judge recently said the circuit attorney has ‘essentially abandoned its duty to prosecute those it charges with crimes.’
The office has been dogged by short staffing as lawyers flee the department for private practice – with the number of employees on board sitting at less than half that of the previous administration, according to a September investigation by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
Her 30 lawyers said they were unable to fully prepare for cases, attend court dates and hearings, while many new recruits had quit soon after being hired. The developments have also angered police who wanted her office to take on more cases, the newspaper reported.
Police had submitted paperwork to file several charges against the 27-year-old carjacking suspect – who reportedly has a rap sheet complete with domestic violence and first-degree property damage convictions – after the incident early Saturday morning.
The incident began when officers responded to reported gunshots near South Tucker Boulevard and Chouteau Avenue around 3am.
Officers, who were in a marked police car, said the man stepped in front of their car as they were moving before pointing a gun through the passenger window in an attempted carjack. He reportedly ran off after realizing officers were in the car and was apprehended about a block away in a restaurant parking lot.
Police officers were ‘able to maneuver out of harm’s way while the suspect simultaneously discovered he was attempting to carjack a fully marked police car,’ authorities said.
Witness footage showed the man being arrested by a large group of officers and he appeared to surrender peacefully and the gun was reportedly recovered by police.
Although the footage didn’t show the man clearly, he was seen being handcuffed and moved toward a police car in a restaurant parking lot.
St. Louis has seen crime rates remain static over the past year after a huge rise in violence in 2020 – when the city’s homicide rate increased by nearly 30 per cent, giving the city America’s highest murder rate per capita.
There has been 58 robberies so far during 2022, as well as 11 murders, 218 aggravated assaults, and 267 motor vehicle thefts.
Residents of the area said carjacking wasn’t the norm in the area and were happy the assistant was arrested without incident.
‘That’s goofy,’ St. Louis resident Curtis Tisdale told Fox 2 Now. ‘You’re trying to jack the people who are trying to protect us.
‘Go to church, pray,’ he said. ‘Get off the streets.’
Another local Lord Wilson said it was ‘surprising’ and ‘shocking,’ as carjackings don’t often happen along Chouteau Avenue. Although, he did say that he heard ‘a lot of people getting killed over carjackings.’
Also in the Midtown district last month, two Lyft drivers were attacked and carjacked in St. Louis, leaving one driver a bitten ear. Three men held one Lyft driver at gunpoint and stole his car, while another female suspect bit off a driver’s ear after throwing his cell phone out of the car andattempted to steal his car keys.
DailyMail.com has contacted the Circuit Attorney for comment
St. Louis is the only city that is struggling to keep lawyers in its District Attorney’s Office. Philadelphia is also struggling to hire more lawyers, despite recently hiring more.
Philadelphia DA Larry Krasner, who took office in 2018, lost 70 lawyers in December, making Krasner’s full term loss to 261. Despite his efforts to secure Ivy League and historically black university graduates to fulfill his progressive office vision, the office is said to be in a state of chaos.
The office employs 340 lawyers, but the constant turnover has made it harder for employees to manage casework, which former employees described as ‘unsustainable.’
Krasner has alluded to the rapid decline in staffing, but suggested other positions offering work-from-home options, higher salaries than $63,000, and ‘voracious hiring environments’ are caused the retention rate.
*story by dailymail.co.uk
