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Approach Of Berkshire DA Office Debated In Final Days Of Primary Race

Josh Landes
/
WAMC
The DA forum at Berkshire Community College on August 20th, 2018.

In the waning days of the Berkshire District Attorney Democratic primary, conflicting visions of the office and the county it serves are dominating the debate between the candidates.

District Attorney Paul Caccaviello has been defending the legacy of the office he leads repeatedly throughout this campaign, and Monday night’s candidate forum at Berkshire Community College in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, was no exception.

“As I prepared for today’s forum, the strongest consistent concern that has arisen from online comments, audience members, and people who have  talked to me about their family’s experiences with the criminal justice system is fairness," said Former Pittsfield Mayor Sara Hathaway, who moderated the televised conversation. It was sponsored by the Pittsfield Gazette and held at BCC’s Koussevitzky Arts Center.

“For instance, a man caught with 68 pounds of marijuana and a dozen guns is granted one year of probation, while a teen without a record who sells one marijuana cigarette is given two years in jail,” said Hathaway.

She was referring to Mitchell Lawrence, who went to jail for two years after a controversial June 2004 Great Barrington drug bust. Then-DA David Capeless pursued a mandatory minimum sentence against the then 17-year-old Lawrence. This provided candidate Judith Knight an opportunity to bring up her experience representing one of the other defendants charged in the bust.

“First of all, I would not impose mandatory minimums at all," said Knight. "And the reason why — and this is something this District Attorney has done consistently and since I’ve been here, the last 20 years, every opportunity they have to put on a mandatory minimum, they do it. And the two years of the school zone — the two-year minimum mandatory that goes with the school zone has been misused by this prosecutor’s office more than any other office in the commonwealth.”

The man Knight successfully defended in that case, Kyle Sawin, pleaded guilty to 11 drug related charges in a separate case the same day Knight announced her campaign against Capeless in 2006. Caccaviello, then First Assistant DA, led the prosecution in that case, which put Sawin behind bars for two years.

“I will take some issue with Judy’s account of the case in Great Barrington," said Caccaviello. “People were charged with marijuana possession in a school zone. They were also charged with cocaine, ketamine, ecstasy, and marijuana. Of those cases, 12 of them were marijuana cases. You know how many of the school zones were actually prosecuted? Two that went to trial. The other 10 were dismissed. So when I hear that story, I’ve been wanting an opportunity so that people have the whole story.”

Attorney Andrea Harrington, the third candidate, also offered a harsh picture of the county during the 30 years Caccaviello has worked in the DA’s office.

“Communities all across the commonwealth and all across the nation are trying new approaches to criminal justice because people have realized that the old way of doing things is not working," said Harrington. "And we can see that here in Berkshire County the same way we can see it across the country. We have a raging opioid epidemic. North Adams has the highest crime rate per capita in the state, Pittsfield has the ninth-highest. Our rates of domestic violence are much higher than they are across the rest of the state. One in three homicides in Berkshire County in the last 10 years were domestic violence murders.”

Her stats on per capita crime rates come from the FBI's 2016 Uniform Crime Report. DA Caccaviello challenged her characterization of the county’s opioid epidemic and domestic violence problem.

“Massachusetts — from last year, from ’16, when there was a high of opiate deaths, to ’17, Massachusetts is actually in decline in terms of opiate deaths,” he said.

In February, the Massachusetts Department of Public Health released a report that said the opiate death rate had decreased by 8.3 percent from 2016 to 2017.

“But let me just bring that down home to Berkshire County," continued Caccaviello. "29 percent better in 2017. That’s why I have hope. That’s because we have a collaboration with our treatment service providers, that’s because we do take a tough approach on the drug distributors and the people who traffic in this. That’s because we do partner with the Brien Center. It’s because we do partner with Berkshire Health Systems and provide them money out of the forfeiture accounts which are the result of drug arrests.”

He also claimed domestic violence cases are on the decline in the county.

“We’re in decline," said the DA. "That means there’s hope, and that means the ways that I hear described as ‘old ways’ — they’re working.”

The candidates have three forums before the September 4th primary:

August 23 – 7:00 PM     Hevreh, Great Barrington –  hosted by BIO and Bridge

August 28 – 1:00 PM     Berkshire Theater Group, Stockbridge, Main Stage – hosted by WAMC

Josh Landes has been WAMC's Berkshire Bureau Chief since February 2018, following stints at WBGO Newark and WFMU East Orange. A passionate advocate for Western Massachusetts, Landes was raised in Pittsfield and attended Hampshire College in Amherst, receiving his bachelor's in Ethnomusicology and Radio Production. His free time is spent with his cat Harry, experimental electronic music, and exploring the woods.
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