LOS ANGELES (AP) — Ten years ago, Alley Bean joined 3.7 million Californians in voting for a measure that downgraded many nonviolent felony crimes to misdemeanors, such as petty shoplifting and drug use, hoping it would lead to a more equitable criminal justice system and help end mass incarceration.
Since then she has seen an increase in crime in her beloved Venice neighborhood of Los Angeles, with some homes robbed in broad daylight. Meanwhile the sidewalks are occupied by tents of homeless people and dotted with people passed out from drugs. The opioid crisis touched her personally when she lost her 25-year-old granddaughter Zelly Rose to a fentanyl poisoning.
“I thought there was going to be rehabilitation” with criminal justice reform, said Bean, a lifelong Democrat. “I didn’t think there was going to be no consequences.”
A decade after Proposition 47 passed, Bean’s grievances are increasingly shared by Californians, with smash-and-grab store thefts captured on videos that go viral feeding a sense that the state has become lawless. And more and more, voters are pinning the blame for that on efforts to advance criminal justice reform, Proposition 47 and progressive district attorneys.