Ariel Benjamin Mannes recently wrote for the Philadelphia Inquirer regarding the Philly DA Office and the Harvey Weinstein trail. Below is an excerpt from the article. To read the article in its entirety, click here.
“In following the news of the Harvey Weinstein case, I couldn’t help but wonder how the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office under the leadership of Larry Krasner would fare in prosecuting a similarly rich and powerful defendant. As someone who has worked with public safety in New York, Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles, I usually resist comparisons with New York, based on the sheer wealth of manpower afforded the District Attorney’s Offices encompassed within the city’s five boroughs — an especially big difference if considering, for example, the Cosby case that brought such a courtroom drama to the smaller, suburban jurisdiction of Montgomery County.
But Philadelphia is Pennsylvania’s only first-class city, with over 1.5 million residents. It is important to measure our capabilities against our peers. Philadelphia had 974 rapes and 355 murders last year, as documented by the FBI, giving us one of the highest violent crime rates of any major city in America with a population of over a million. Therefore, Philadelphia should have a DA’s office equipped to handle not only a high volume of daily crimes, but the inevitability of cases like Weinstein’s, which provide unique opportunities to achieve justice and demonstrate a commitment to equal and fair justice to the world.”