With California’s new law allowing harsher prosecution for retail theft going into effect on Wednesday, Sacramento County law enforcement officials promised a measured approach they say will stop perpetrators of organized crime while not targeting people who shoplift out of desperation and poverty.
Proposition 36, which won support from two-thirds of California voters, allows prosecutors to charge defendants with a felony if, over time, they’ve stolen goods worth more than $950, and sets up a treatment-focused court process for those accused of drug crimes. It was part of a backlash to a previous law, Prop. 47, which decreased penalties for numerous non-violent crimes, by voters in 2014.
“We will be measured and fair, ” Sacramento County District Attorney Thien Ho said at a news conference Tuesday. “But make no mistake, we will hold people accountable.”…