From Jim McDougal, Troop A

After being a gang prosecutor for the City of Los Angeles forever (Fall of 1996 to May 2023), our most recently elected City Attorney (my 5th!) decided to shut down our office's Gang Unit (um, did we solve the gang problem?), so now I'm in our office's Filing Division, deciding what if any charges our office is going to file on people named in the reports we receive from LAPD, LASD, CHP, and other agencies. And after a 1/4 century as a nationally recognized gang expert (teaching gang enforcement and gang prosecution all over California, 15 other states, D.C, El Salvador and the Honduras), I now have to learn all about all the other charges our office files other than the charges I'm used to with our gang knuckleheads, so tomorrow I have to rotate and work in our Metro office, which files all the DUI and other Vehicle Code charges in downtown LA. I do have to say, if any of you have a few adult beverages during the zoom meeting, please don't drive home. The last DUI jury trial I did was before I joined the Gang Unit, which was the 2x DUI jury trials I did way back in 1995, and I don't want to have to put a case on any of my classmates. And of course the hazing that was OK back in 1973 on us, is no longer OK today: don't do it. On a serious note, all I got is good memories of Culver [editor’s note: really???], and of Troop A counselor Timothy Warrick doing 10 years fed time (BOP Inmate 11100-027, released 7/19/2019), and I can't wait until our 50th Reunion!