Hello, I'm Nick Haines.

If you live in Johnson County, you'll know that pretty much every single available space of green ground is now taken up by campaign yard signs.

And among those signs are four candidates for Johnson County district attorney.

Then they made of corrugated plastic.

But the people behind those signs are not.

They are real living and breathing human beings.

And they're with us this hour.

Steve Howe has been the district attorney in Johnson County for the past 16 years.

He is the Republican candidate in this race.

Vanessa Riebli used to call Steve Howe, boss.

Now she's running against him with the Democratic Party label next to her name.

Riebli is a former assistant district attorney who now works as a defense attorney for a Leewood law firm.

Please greet our candidates today.

Steve Howe In many respects, this is a what have you done for me lately?

Kind of a job.

You've been in this office now for 16 years.

How has my life been better off since you've been D.A.

if I'm living in Johnson County?

Well, first of all, if you look at the crime rate since I took office, first of all, when I first took office, it went down after that.

And it's remained flat despite the fact that Johnson County's increased its population by 100,000 people, despite the fact that we're butt up against Wyandotte, Jackson County, which are high crime areas.

And that doesn't happen by accident.

And so that takes a lot of hard work and dedication by my staff, along with law enforcement, to get the job done.

And I think that's a testament of my office and our ability to keep the people safe.

The last time we were together was four years ago.

In the last time you were running for election.

In the last four years, what has been your biggest accomplishment?

I would say, first of all, our efforts to get a lot of the specialty courts on line, working with the courts on that.

We had a veterans treatment court and we now have a behavioral health court as well as a drug court, which I think will help in areas which I think we are really struggling in, which is drugs and mental health in our community.

And so I think they're going to be a big part of coming up with some solutions on things that are going to be important for our office when people intersect with the criminal justice system.

Vanessa, we many of us have seen Steve how for a long time we've seen his yard signs for a very long period of time in Johnson County.

Less of us know more about you.

Tell us about why you are running for this office and why you think you should be the D.A.

for the next four years.

I am running because we need new leadership and the Johnson County District Attorney's office and voters have to ask themselves themselves to the last 16 years, justify another four years.

And I want to talk to you about some numbers.

48%.

Johnson County government sent out a survey asking, do you believe crime is competent?

We prosecute it in Johnson County.

And in 2024, the number was 48%, 16.

That's the number of prosecutors that have left the office from 2020 to 2023.

And the last month, four more have resigned.

That's a 50% turnover in the last four years.

That affects communities safety.

I had a stat that 40% of the attorneys had less than five years experience.

That is going to change with about 65 years walking out the door.

From the last month resignations.

Three that's the number of Fraternal Order of Police organizations that are willing to step into this political race and endorse Overland Park later.

Lenexa.

They all have endorsed me.

Think about that.

I'm a defense attorney.

I'm on the dark side.

I'm a Democrat.

And they are willing to step into this.

Finally, six.

That's the number of jury trials I calculate my opponent has had since 2009.

I was on three of those cases.

And if you have any other questions, talk to defense attorneys.

But practice here in Johnson County and they'll tell you we need change.

Too much turnover in your office.

The need for change?

Well, when you have a big office that is run really well, guess what?

You get people peeled off and they're taken by other law firms.

You know, the thing about us losing people.

Yes.

That when you have a big office, you're going to lose people.

But the average years of experience in our office hasn't changed throughout that.

So every time we lose people, we bring in people with experience from other offices because we're one of the premier prosecutors offices in the region.

So that really doesn't play out the way Vanessa's describing it and it doesn't play out in the results that we get in.

So since I've been D.A., our results on homicide cases is 153 in two and even Bill Self would be happy with that record of performance.

And that doesn't happen by accident, and that's experienced people getting the job done.

So there hasn't been any problem with leadership in this office.

And in fact, I had an anonymous survey the county did about how we are performing, and it included the leadership of the office and we got high marks.

Exactly 93% of the people in the office were satisfied with how the office is run and and how, you know, we perform as an executive team.

And so this is this idea that the office is broken, doesn't meet the actual facts.

Some say miserably that the Johnson County D.A.

office is really the equivalent of running a 126 person law firm.

It is the largest D.A.

office in the state with a budget of $15 million.

What experience do you have of running 126 person organization of any kind?

I don't.

But I will tell you, I have the same experience that Steve Howell had when he stepped into that role.

I was the head of the economic crime unit in Johnson County for over a decade.

Mr. Howell was the head of the economic crime unit before he was moved to the section chief of interns.

So I believe we had identical experience when we moved in.

What has been the biggest case you've tried?

Hmm.

I would say either the she's a pistol gun store case where there were four defendants that robbed a gun store in Shawnee.

We had forced three separate trials.

They asserted self-defense, if you can believe that, when they were robbing a liquor store.

But then also, I would say the Roxy Bar Homicide.

That was a case where our chief investigator had to institute a new policy for witness protection programs because the two defendants in the case were extremely dangerous.

They tried to kill one of our witnesses.

And there's a lot of satisfaction when you put folks behind bars that are at that level of criminal activity.

Steve Howe, what in your judgment, is the number one biggest threat to public safety in Johnson County right now?

And what are you doing to respond to it?

I would say the rise of fentanyl in our community has played a big role on public safety, and I'm very pleased with the approach that my office is taking with law enforcement to go after those fentanyl dealers.

And it's just not on the overdose deaths, but also on the cases where we seized the fentanyl pills from them.

We're getting significant savings.

Sentences.

We're talking about ten, 15, 20 years.

And so that is a huge impact on public safety.

The other thing is there's been four jury trials on overdose death cases in the state of Kansas.

We've tried three of them.

And so we take a very aggressive approach.

And in fact, the city of Overland Park is giving an award to two of my staff for their work on overdose.

The overdose death cases.

And so I think it's a testament that how hard we're working with law enforcement to address a growing problem in our community.

And it also requires education and leadership, working with the community and community partners to try to educate the youth in this community about the dangers of that.

In the past four years, Steve, the drug Fentanyl was killed 170 people in Johnson County.

Your primary opponent claimed you've been slow to respond, only charging eight people for distributing the illegal opioid.

Did he get the numbers wrong or is that another explanation?

No, it is.

And in fact, these cases are very difficult.

And it's not the fault of law enforcement that we can't put the case together some instances because you have to say this particular pill is the one that killed that individual and I'm the one who gave it to him.

And so those are difficult cases to put together.

But I will say we're doing a much better job than most other jurisdictions across the state.

And I'm very proud of the work we do as well as law enforcement in Johnson County.

Vanessa, really, the biggest single threat, public safety threat in Johnson County is what, the drug crisis, the financial crisis.

So what are you going to do to respond to that?

And how would you be different in your approach?

Mr. Steve How so?

We're going to have a new sheriff in town, I predict, here in a month or so.

Chief Roberson is here and the Johnson County Drug Task Force is going to go from one duty to participating to many.

So one of the things I want to do is have an assistant district attorney assigned to that task force.

So detectives no longer have to call the front desk and be transferred to a prosecutor.

They're going to have somebody they can immediately talk to.

I also want to start a prosecutor's fentanyl overdose working group that would encompass our federal partners who are having great success trying these cases, as well as all the local jurisdiction and in our municipal courts.

So we need to work as a team.

We need to collaborate with others because we're going to have the opportunity to try these cases and work harder with the number of investigations that are going to be increased because of this task force miserably.

What is the single biggest action or decision you would make as D.A.

to lower violent crime, to lower it?

So I will say that we have staff that in the last year, violent crime has gone up for months.

Violent crime is a combination of drug abuse, mental health and firearms.

So what we have to do, I want to bring back specialties within the office so we have subject matter expertise and we want to make sure that we work with our law enforcement partners to target problem areas.

For instance, Oak Park Mall over a decade ago, I helped institute a policy that was more aggressive on misdemeanor cases because of what was occurring at the mall high you know, people with high level of criminal activity carrying guns, battering loss prevention officers.

We want people to know that if you come to Johnson County, there are consequences.

But we have to work with the drug epidemic as well as the gun epidemic.

Name one thing, Steve, how you have done to reduce violent crime in Johnson County since you were reelected four years ago.

Well, first of all, when we've had these felony drug raps, which have caused a lot of youth to be killed and involved in felony murder, we've taken a very aggressive stance of prosecuting those individuals and been very successful at it.

That sends a message that this type of violence in our community won't be tolerated.

And I want to go back to what you said about the Oak Park Mall and going being aggressive in those situations.

I just wanted her to know that we've been doing that.

We actually have a policy that one of your predecessors, I remember Isabel, instituted with the Overland Park, the Leawood mission, Lee Lenexa, all the police departments have joined in in having a policy of being aggressive to going after those career criminals who are going after retail businesses.

And in fact, we just had a meeting in the Metro with the ARC RILA.

It's retail in inner city.

Let me see if I could say this retail Industry Leaders Association that wants to get together both across the state line, Jackson, Platte, Wyandotte and Johnson County to have a more concerted effort to go after these career criminals that are attacking businesses.

So we started that just recently.

And so we've been very aggressive in that.

We've actually implemented the policy she's talking about, and we've got great results.

And so it's not broken.

It's, in fact, working effectively with our law enforcement partners.

Can I answer that?

Of course you can.

Perhaps you misunderstood.

We have had that policy in place for over a decade.

It's a policy that I drafted that I took to you for approval.

So we could do that working with Overland Park officers.

And we've had an organized retail crime task force for years perhaps have stopped meeting since I have left, but that has all been in place.

This is not a new thing.

It actually is different.

But again, great story, not based on facts.

It's actually something that's different than what you implemented.

We've actually extended the policies.

We've actually modified some of the conditions.

And it's not just Oak of Oak Park Mall, but across the entire county.

We've implemented that policy.

New FBI crime figures show a double digit rise in juveniles accused of violent crimes.

Last year there was a 30% jump in the number of teenagers arrested for property crimes.

What's the fix, Steve?

How should one of those responses be trying more juveniles in adult court where the penalties are greater?

We I think he's pretty good discretion in dealing with that situation on violent crimes.

And there's also conditions on under state law about when you can waive an individual to adult status.

And it depends on the severity of the crime.

I think we do a very effective job of deciding to our discretion which cases should be waived to adult status because of the degree of violence associated with that.

And so we have taken a very aggressive approach, as I talked about, with these individuals who are committing these felony murder cases in Johnson County.

And I think it's had a huge impact.

We had an uptick.

And since then, it's not been at the level that we've had two or three years ago.

And so I think it's important for us to continue to work with our law enforcement partners to be aggressive about going after these individuals that are using gun violence.

And also, if you recall, my stats are 153 in two.

Again, if it's broken, then why, why, why is it that we're able to be so effective and have these types of results year after year in an office that I think is one of the premier offices in the country?

, Riebli what is the fix for juvenile crime?

Should we be trying more juveniles in adult court where the consequences are far greater and the penalties are greater?

I don't think that's necessarily the answer.

I think we have to get to the root of the problem, which is mental health, substance abuse issues.

I went to the Juvenile stabilization center that opened a few weeks ago, and that is going to be a great facility to help our youth.

We have to get it at the beginning.

And we also have to balance, you know, punishment with the fact that they are juveniles.

Now, I will say that if there are homicides, if there are guns used, then, yes, it's going to be a much more stricter approach.

And anybody that has worked with me knows my philosophy, knows that I am tough on crime.

But we also have to balance with the fact that we need to try to get treatment.

And you know, move them in the direction that they need to be moved early as opposed to just locking them up and throwing away the key on a first offense.

You know, when you go to Social media sites like next door in Johnson County, it seems the public has some real clear answers about what they'd like to see done.

One of them is holding parents responsible for that parent or their children's crimes.

Increasingly, prosecutors around the country are charging parents for their kid's criminal activity.

Do you support that in Johnson County?

Because there are two cases that have recently been charged where the parents were held responsible and those were egregiously reckless acts.

Their children had mental health issues.

They allowed them access to firearms.

And in one instance, they knew of a planned threat.

So and I remember listening to an attorney general saying, this is not going to be a trend because we're not going to have parents committing these types of reckless act.

And then we had another one within six months.

So, yes, I would say I would hold parents responsible when they rise to that level of reckless conduct.

Steve, how do you support charging parents for the crimes of their children?

I would agree with Vanessa.

You're going to have to show some reckless conduct on their part being put on notice and not taking steps.

If a person has a substance use substance abuse or a mental health issue and allowing them to have access to guns, or they've been warned about the behavior of their juvenile, let's say they're making threats to other individuals and you don't take any steps necessary to protect themselves and protect the public.

You're going to have to establish a pretty high standard in order to go after those parents.

While shootings get most of the headlines on the evening news, there's been an uptick in property crimes all across the county, and residents are certainly getting frustrated.

If you've had your car broken into or your vehicle stolen, perhaps it's a burglary at your house or your business.

What can you tell us you're going to do, Steve?

How to make us feel safer and prevent these property crimes from happening in the first place?

Well, these career offenders who basically every day of the week, their job is to rip off somebody are clearly a target that law enforcement is going after.

We've backed them up on that.

And basically what we have established is if someone is a career offender, they have a consistent pattern of conduct that we submit those cases in an aggressive way and try to get high bonds with our judges.

I will tell you a story.

There was a smash and grab at Oak Park, and the police took that person into custody and they looked at him and said, Give me my ticket so I can go home because they were used to how Jackson County did things.

And the detective turned over to them and said, Oh, contraire, you're going to jail today.

And so that's the message we want to send.

That's what we need to indicate to protect our businesses, to protect our community by not looking the other way when there's property crime, because that's a slippery slope.

You start allowing more and more property crime and soon you become Jackson County.

And so that's something that we've resisted.

And that's why I think our crime rate has remained low, is because of our effective leadership and also our coordination with our law enforcement partners.

bli Rie, how would your approach be different?

So it would be similar to what I will say is property crime is tied to drug abuse.

I did an interview over a decade ago that talked about that there was a direct connection between methamphetamine use and identity theft because they needed to get money for drugs.

What I will say is in visiting with the different Fraternal Order of Police organizations and finding out what's going well, what can we do better?

One of the consistent statements was you're not the office is not prosecuting these car burglaries.

It's called car hopping.

What will happen is two or three individuals or more will go down the street and they will break into numerous cars.

Because in Johnson County, a lot of people keep, you know, credit cards and firearms and purses that cost over $1,000 in cash.

It's a gold mine.

And what I'm being told is these cases are not being filed.

So that's something that's going to change because these are career offenders that are committing these crimes.

So what I also tell people is if you see somebody breaking into your car, just let them do it.

We had a business owner over in Missouri recently killed when he tried to stop that.

So you never know who you're dealing with.

And that's why we have to deal with them effectively and quickly.

I want to look at an attack on both of you.

And we're going to start with you, Steve.

How if I could be so bold.

A Kansas City Star editorial says this of this of you while how was experiences a long time prosecute that he has not done enough to hold accountable wayward county law enforcement officials who use excessive force or break the public's trust.

Do you have an unusually soft spot for police or has the star simply got it wrong?

Well, that's so far from the truth.

So, first of all, in my career, we've charged plenty of officers with domestic violence, felony domestic violence, DUI theft.

So that's not the test.

The test is applying the law and the evidence.

And in officer involved shootings in particular, which does I know they criticize me quite a bit about that.

You have to apply the facts and the evidence and not make a political decision, but make a legal decision on whether or not the officer's justified in using force.

And I will say this.

The reason why so many of our officers are considered to have justifiable reasons to use deadly force applying Kansas law is because they are trained incredibly well by our law enforcement community.

We don't have a problem with law enforcement agencies that don't do proper training.

And so I think it's a testament actually, to how well-run our law enforcement agencies are that an officer hasn't been charged for an unlawful use of deadly force.

The other thing is, when I do this, I am transparent about how and why I make those decisions.

I am the only D.A.

in the Metropolitan.

Every time one of those cases happen, I do a press release outlining the facts and the law.

I stand before the media and answer every question they have.

And when they're done asking questions, I leave.

I meet with every family that's effective.

I answer their questions.

I give them access to the videos.

And when we have those press conferences, I play the videos.

If they're available.

So when we talk about transparency and giving the community faith in the decisions we make.

I do something that no one else does in the entire metropolitan area, and I'm proud of it.

Okay.

Since you bring up transparency, I'm going to give you a chance to respond in a moment in this region.

But actually, your opponent's web site claims she'll be rebuilding community trust by being, quote, more transparent about how the office operates.

You think that the that it's not transparent now?

Miserably.

I do not.

I was trying to find statistics to talk about during this debate and the annual reports are no longer easily accessible.

And I couldn't find jury trial stats for the last two years.

If you pay a visit to the Jackson County prosecutors website, you will see in data dashboard.

And when I am D.A., we are going to have that.

It shows the number of cases submitted.

The number of cases of charge from which jurisdictions, what types of cases?

It shows the number of jury trials that occurred.

It shows the dispositions of those jury trials.

Those statistics are not available in the Johnson County District Attorney's office.

And as taxpayers, you deserve to know what is going on in that office.

Your response to that, Mr. Harvey?

I do a year end report that outlines the specifics and the facts of what we did as an office, and that includes many things that she did not include, is in regards to the number of cases we file the cases reviewed.

What we do in each of our units in the office.

And so it's a pretty complete year end report.

The other thing about transparency is I make myself available to the media to answer questions on a variety of different subjects more than anybody else does.

And I also field questions from the general public if they have questions about something about my office.

One of the things that I preach to my staff is I don't want this office to be a black hole where you call and you never get a live person.

And so I field a lot of questions from concerned citizens.

I listen to their concerns.

I go out and speak to various groups and get their input.

I make myself available in a variety of different ways.

And if people have questions, I answer those questions.

And so I believe that this office is transparent and effective at doing their job.

I started this segment of our debate talking about the police aspect and how you balance holding police accountable.

I didn't get your response to that miserably as district attorney.

How would you balance the needs of the police to maintain order while holding them accountable when their actions harm citizens of Johnson County?

They have to be held accountable.

Just like I say that I want to be held accountable.

I was hired by the Overland Park Folkie to help prosecute try to prosecute four officers who stole money from the Overland Park Charitable Foundation.

So law enforcement hired me to prosecute four of their own.

That case ultimately was not prosecuted.

Steve had it in his office for over 18 months.

I talked to four different prosecutors who touch that case during the pendency of the investigation and ultimately, those funds were supposed to be used for catastrophic injury or death for a law enforcement officer.

If you were D.A.

at the time, you would have prosecuted those cases?

I would have, because I don't believe paying a vet bill for your personal dog qualifies as catastrophic injury or death.

We have to hold ourselves accountable.

Every profession often has what we call bad apples, and it makes all of us look bad.

The solution to that is making sure that people are held accountable, and they will be, under my administration.

Your response to that, Steve?

Well, first of all, you represented the FOP.

I'm sorry.

I'm assuming that you're speaking on their behalf at this point.

But what actually happened was there was destruction of evidence which led to us having to go do a download of various electronic devices.

It took a long time, and that's not atypical in those types of cases.

I did a 16 page report that outlined why this was not a crime.

And part of it was that the administration of the FOP and its membership were profiting from this new expansion of use of funds.

So there is no unauthorized control because everybody has blessed this.

It's not by deception.

And so not every unethical thing is a crime.

And so we did the right thing in making the right call.

I'm not going to make a political decision.

Apparently, Vanessa will.

I'm going to base mine on the law and the evidence.

And what I'm going to do is do what I did in this case, which is send it to the AG's office so they can go after them for their non for profit violations.

Sometimes you have to make tough decisions, but it has to be based on the lawn evidence and not political pressure.

How much does politics play in the office of District Attorney?

And it's really interestingly on your website, you list as one of your main priorities, quote, ensuring women can make personal health care decisions without fear of being prosecuted for political purposes, all women being prosecuted for political purposes now in Johnson County.

And if not, why did you list that on your website?

Are you playing politics with the Office?

No simple answer.

I worked for Phil Kline for four months.

You his predecessor, correct.

When he came into the office or abortion was his number one issue.

One of the reasons that I left, I was cornered in my office and I was asked what my views on abortion were.

And he ultimately filed a case against that.

So I'm not calling Steve Howe Phil Kline.

But what I am saying is that there are certain officials who will do that and in my office that that's not going to be the case because I lived that for four months and saw what a political prosecutor does to the community and does to public safety.

Steve, how does the fact that you are running as a Republican influence your approach to this job?

And when I first ran, if you look at the tag on my campaign and it was the same one I used back in 2008.

Public safety not politics.

And my my pledge to the people of Johnson County was that my decisions were going to be based on the long the evidence and I will not make and have not made any political decisions.

As a as your district attorney, I feel very strongly as an American that the criminal justice system has been under attack for the last five or ten years and the credibility of our system and the D.A.

plays a big role in that.

It's essential that we base our decisions on the law and not politics.

If it doesn't make a difference.

And just remember, the Johnson County Commission that leads the county are all nonpartisan positions.

Would you support a move to make the district attorney a nonpartisan office?

I don't agree with that.

I think that's a way to hide what your true values and beliefs are.

And so I think, you know, our political system has worked for a long time, and I don't think there's anything wrong with parties.

And we have a lot of divisiveness right now, but we're all Americans and we have different views and values.

And I think we should embrace that.

And we can agree to disagree on things.

But I think the party system still is the best way to approach it.

Vanessa, would you support a move to make the district attorney a nonpartisan office?

I would.

And here's why.

When I am knocking on doors and when I'm doing phone banking, one of the first questions is, are you a Democrat or a Republican?

And depending upon what their party is, there can sometimes be hostile responses.

It shouldn't be that way.

This office is for community safety purposes.

It shouldn't matter if I'm a Republican or a Democrat, but some people will vote strictly on party lines as opposed to who is the best qualified.

li, have lots more questions from these candidates.

By the way.

You can go to our Kansas City PBS YouTube page to see more of Steve Howe and Vanessa Riebli including lots of questions from our Johnson County Bar Association members like this one.

Our district attorneys have wide discretion to decide which cases to take and which to drop.

For example, over in Missouri, Jackson County prosecutor Jean Peters Baker has refused to prosecute marijuana possession cases.

She's also notified the Kansas City Police Department to stop sending her office.

Hundreds of low level drug crimes so miserably.

Would you follow such a policy if you're elected D.A.

in Johnson County?

So I was raised under the Paul Morrison and Rick Wen theory that you prosecute the low level property crimes, you send a message to people to stay out of Johnson County.

And by prosecuting those offenders, you stop them from rising to the top.

I will say that I do not think our office should be spending a significant amount of time on prosecuting misdemeanor marijuana cases.

Justice is geographical right now when it comes to possession of marijuana, whether it's a sheriff's deputy and you're arrested, which that's going to change soon or you're in a city and you just simply get a ticket.

So we need to get it.

We need to work with our municipal court prosecutors and we need to get a uniform or at least try a uniform disposition to those cases.

But I think way too much time is being expended on these misdemeanor low quantity marijuana cases where these folks have no prior criminal history.

I would you refuse to prosecute marijuana possession cases?

Not at this time, but I would approach it differently.

I had a client who had a medical marijuana license who was prosecuted in Johnson County and spent two days in jail for possession level marijuana.

That should not be happening.

Steve Howe.

Well, first of all, we've already taken the steps that she's talking about.

We instituted a six month diversion plan for marijuana possession.

All it requires is an evaluation.

Evaluation, determine whether a person actually has a substantial substance abuse problem that needs to be addressed.

We also started the process of we no longer arrest people for possession of marijuana.

So we've already done that.

They get tickets.

We have a special marijuana docket where people go in.

We have a diversion staff that's there.

And our job is to make it easy for people to go on diversion for those types of low level crimes.

And so we've already addressed the issue that she spoke about.

And I think it's a it's well well, part of the reason why we couldn't do it is there was a Kansas statute that prohibited us from doing tickets.

We changed it in the Kansas legislature this last session, which allows us to now implement that type of policy.

We have district attorneys all around the country trying new things, younger prosecutors doing very different ways and different approaches to this.

In Boston, for instance, Ms.. Reedley, the district attorney, has a 15 charge list of decline to prosecute charges that include receiving stolen property and shoplifting.

Would you decline to prosecute those?

No, I would not.

No, I don't think you can make a list of crimes that you're not going to prosecute because you don't know who the offenders are and you don't know the impact it's having on the community.

But I do not think you should just make a list of crimes and say, I'm not going to prosecute it.

You have to use prosecutorial discretion.

Review the entire case.

The offender's criminal history and and the law and make your decision.

Mr. Howell, That's a slippery slope.

You start saying no to those types of cases and then you see and I'm going to use Jackson County as a good example is if you have a property crime committed in their jurisdiction, they tell you to phone in the information and nothing happens.

We don't want to get to that point.

And Johnson County has never taken that approach.

You know, accountability can take many different forms.

It can be probation.

It can be diversion.

It's sending people to prison.

But there has to be accountability, because if you lack the accountability, that's when you start seeing the rise in crime.

And so that's one that I'm very proud of, is my work with law enforcement to ensure that there is some sense of accountability in these and especially in these property crime cases.

If, God forbid, there was a mass school shooting in the next four years or police were to apprehend a serial killer in Johnson County, Missouri, would you seek the death penalty for such crimes or would you refuse to do so?

I think that's a question, again, that you can't prejudge.

I will say that Kansas has a very restrictive death penalty.

There's only four or five qualifiers for that, and it should be used in very special circumstances.

Mr.. HALL And I tried or we had a death penalty case together.

And before it went to trial, I went to him and I said, we need to withdraw our death penalty notice because this is not the type crime.

And it was where the boyfriend shot his pregnant girlfriend and killed her.

And I felt that it wasn't the appropriate type of case for the death penalty.

I will say, and I know under the Biden administration, they have used and implemented the death penalty for a mass shooting.

So absolutely I will use I you know, I will seek death in appropriate cases, but it has to be an appropriate case.

When you look at Kansas, like the Carr brothers, John Robinson.

Those are the types of cases that rise to the level where it should be used.

But Steve, Kansas hasn't executed anyone since 1965 of Wood Johnson County save money in time by not pursuing death penalty cases in future.

Well, when we did the Jewish Community Center shootings, we went with the death penalty and we thought it was justified because it was a hate crime and the magnitude of damage to the community and to the victim's families.

And so there are crimes that deserve the death penalty.

The decision on whether or not to go forward with execution and the legal issues that we're running through.

A good example is John Robinson, Chris McMullen, he's in the room here, has been spent the last three years working on trying to get that approved to go forward and allow us to go forward with the death penalty.

Part of it is just the legal process.

It got it got mired in the mud at the Supreme Court level, quite honestly.

But I don't think that's a reason not to go forward with it.

On the most egregious cases like the Carr brothers, John Robinson, Frazier Glenn Miller.

Those are the types of cases that prosecutors want to use the death penalty.

And, you know, the other advantage on Frazier Glenn Miller, I talked to the corporate and Limonov family, and one of the things I told him is he may not get executed, but he's going to be in segregation on death row and he will not be able to spit all his venom about his racist attitudes to the general population of the prison.

And he will sit 23 hours a day in a cell.

And I said, that's what we need to do.

And they approved that.

And lo and behold, he went off to prison after his sentence and he disappeared.

And we never heard from them again.

So there's reasons why you do these things.

And again, prosecutor discretion is so essential.

We've had lots of capital murder cases that we've chosen, as Vanessa indicated, not to go forward with the death penalty.

And I think prosecutors across the state have been very careful about which cases they go forward and ask for the death penalty.

Homelessness is becoming a bigger issue in Johnson County, but efforts to build the county's first permanent Year-Round homeless shelter was recently dealt a fatal blow when it was rejected by the Nexus City Council, which argued it would strain law enforcement resources and harm the neighborhood.

Steve, Is homelessness causing more crime in Johnson County, and what role, if any, does the DA play in helping solve the issue?

Well, we're actually addressing, I think, the root of the problem, which is a good percentage of the homeless people that we see have either substance abuse or mental health issues or both.

And so what I think would be a more effective means of addressing that issue is a triage and assessment center that Johnson County Mental Health is opening later this year to help funnel people into that and have them assessed and determine what degree of assistance we do for those individuals.

To me, that's a far more effective means of doing it.

Bear County, Texas, has the Gold Star method of using these triage and assessments centers.

I've talked to ten DWIs from Johnson County Mental Health.

We're very passionate about trying to instill a bigger program here in Johnson County.

I actually had a meeting last week with the hospitals about doing a private public partnership to address this issue.

And it's another way for us to pull away and not send mentally ill people and substance abuse individuals in jail and instead find other alternatives for them.

Campaigns are about comparing and contrasting.

How would your approach be different, Miss Wheatley, if at all?

I will tell you that one of the differences that I will make I have talked to several municipal court prosecutors about the issue.

They're On the municipal level.

They don't have involuntary commitment statutes that help someone seek treatment.

And what they have done on cases like trespass cases and other types of things, where they have repeat offenders, where they have to come in and dismiss those cases.

They have asked the district attorney's office to take the cases because at the state level they do have the ability to provide the resources and that has not been happening.

So that's another reason why I want to work with our municipal prosecutor.

Municipal prosecutors is to help them solve this problem that I'm hearing is an issue in our community.

There's a movement across the country to eliminate cash bail.

It's argued that poor people stay indefinitely in jail, waiting trial.

Well, those with cash weight more comfortably at home, would you eliminate cash bail?

And if so, what would you replace it with, Mr. Wheatley?

I would not eliminate it, but would try to make it more uniform.

We do have a grid in Johnson County, Kansas, that helps the judges decide the level of bond.

But I will tell you, as a defense attorney, I see clients with similar history, similar types of crimes, but have vastly different bond amounts.

So we have to work on uniformity.

And part of that comes from the prosecutor's office, Depending on who is requesting, the bond may depend on where it's said and then also on bond modification, since there are cases where there are certain defendants that we've represented that have received modifications to be able to get out, but then we see other ones that are not.

So there has to be uniformity so people feel like they're being treated fairly, whether or not they have the funds.

Steve, I have pushed back multiple times on this concept of everybody should be led out of jail.

And part of that premise is if you've got somebody who's got a burglary charge to a car.

So it's a low level felony offense, but let's say they have 20 prior convictions of similar types.

Are we supposed to just let that person out so they can do it again?

And so that's my pushback is that we have to look at their criminal history and other factors.

I will say we've used a tool that only test whether or not they are.

They will show up for court.

And that's the tool we use now.

Our Criminal Justice Advisory Council, our retail pretrial task force, is actually looking at using data to to put together an actual tool that evaluates some of those things, like the severity of the offense, the person's likelihood to re-offend, those types of things.

And so I'm hopeful that as we move forward, that we could use this new tool and actually assist not only the prosecutors but also the court in making educated decisions.

I like this new tool idea because it's one of the questions we have from Johnson County board members.

It goes like this a I is all over the news.

Could you slim down your $15 million office budget and staffing?

Steve by using artificial intelligence to do some important tasks?

For instance, some DA's offices around the country are using A.I.

to detect which offenders have the best probability of being successful as candidates for diversion programs and probation.

Would you support using A.I.

in your office to save taxpayer money?

That sounds very scary to me.

We're dealing with I'm here to represent you with your questions.

I tried that.

I mean, you're dealing with people's constitutional rights, and I want people making that informed decision.

Should we evaluate and make the decision based on appropriate factors?

Yes.

A good example.

And using some of that, you know, using technology and also facts, we evaluated our juvenile diversion and our adult diversion department to make sure that we are being fair in our applications for diversion and acceptance of diversion so that we are being so called colorblind in our evaluation process.

And we got really pretty good results.

We were actually very pleased about the that we got on those two surveys.

The one thing that we found was that we needed to make sure that we had diversion.

People there at the initial appearances in court.

And the reason for that is when people have to go back and forth to court multiple times, they lose interest in doing that.

And therefore that can create disparities.

And so the juvenile unit has already implemented that, and we're on the process of doing that at the adult level.

And I think individuals making individual decisions involving people's rights is the way to go.

Is A.I.

coming to li Rieb district attorney office?

So I will say this.

It would be interesting to have a pilot program if we could get some kind of grant funding that would do that, and we could review the statistics and see how it matched with the true experience.

We can't be afraid of the future.

We can't be afraid of technology.

I will tell you that our law firm has experimented with you, and I work with Bradford Edmonds, with A.I.

for legal research, and it was amazing.

You have to ask the right question because if you're off a little bit, you're not going to get what you want.

But it was amazing how it can come through, you know, this huge treasure trove of cases throughout the country that helped us develop cases that we could use in our legal briefs.

And it occurred within minutes.

So I think it's absolutely something that we need to learn about and look at.

We just shouldn't say no because it's technology in the future.

Steve just mentioned just a few moments ago the word term colorblind.

Studies show that black people and white people use illegal drugs at similar rates, but black people are in prison for drug crimes almost six times more often.

What role do you play, if any, in altering that disparity?

If you are the D.A., we have to do racial bias training.

You know, Kansas has a specific statute where the case can get dismissed if the defense attorney can show racial bias in these decisions.

And our office, unfortunately, has had to file several of these motions throughout jurisdictions in the state of Kansas.

We have to recognize that we have a problem and then we have to train and we have to hold people accountable.

Steve, I would say that's critically important to examine your office and make the appropriate decisions and make sure that we're doing it for the right reasons, not race based.

And so we did that that type of training in our office to make people more aware of racial biases that we might have that are and maybe not clearly there.

The other thing I'm very proud of is I have 18% of my staff is of minorities.

And so to me, that's greater than the Johnson County average.

And so I'm very I take a lot of pride in that because we have individuals of different backgrounds who can connect with people that come to our office.

And so I think we need to those are little things that do matter as far as racial disparity.

And then the other thing I just talked about, our diversion plans looking at is there disparities in our decision making processes in diversion.

And again, we were pleasantly surprised that we were doing a really good job of staying away from that dangerous situation when it comes to the public.

We are seeing a huge increase in on our roads and more incidents of near-misses because of reckless driving.

What role, if any, does the D.A.

play, Steve, in making our roads safer?

Well, that's holding people accountable for their conduct.

And I will say our track record of holding not just people who are intoxicated, but other reckless drivers.

You know, the the other big component is running from police and smashing into a citizen who is just at a red light at at a specific time.

We've been very aggressive filing reckless second degree murder charges, which is the highest charge we can file and go after those individuals for in many instances, just an absolutely tragic situation.

And we see it play over, over and over and over in my office has had an incredible record of success, of holding those accountable and getting victims and the community justice.

But that's really I think we have to give credit where credit is due.

And and Henderson is at my table.

She's also another prosecutor.

The last in 2021.

But she was the one that started those procedures in the DA's office to do the second degree murder cases.

Another key part of holding people accountable is making sure the investigation action is proper.

And as a defense attorney, I have had cases with local jurisdictions not within Johnson County, but a larger jurisdiction who is not doing the proper work.

We had a case that went from a second degree murder case to leaving the scene of an accident because the trooper did not calculate the accident reconstruction statute correctly.

So we need to make sure that every investigator that works a crime in Johnson County related to this reckless driving, DUI is properly trained.

We have some wonderful police departments in our county who are top notch.

We have to make sure everybody is on this issue.

When you said to give credit where credit's due, I thought you were going to compliment Steve Howe for a moment there.

So sad.

So let me go to this question, which actually came from a number of you here in the audience from Greg and Laura and others.

You said you know each other well, having worked together for years.

What is a characteristic of your opponent that you respect and why?

Vanessa He's always been very kind to me.

And I think he is a great father.

I was in the office when he was raising his kids, and he was always fully engaged in their sports.

And as far as I know, they've done well.

So that's what I would say.

And Steve, Vanessa is a top rated lawyer.

And this this race, it's really good in the sense that this isn't about whether or not you have a D.A.

who can try cases and do the tough stuff.

Both of us have been down that road.

Vanessa is an incredible lawyer.

And so I am very proud of what she's become as a trial lawyer.

If you're so impressed, you're actually still considering voting for her, Steve.

Well, maybe not that far.

Thank you.

Okay.

Thank you.

Let me ask you, I just got back.

Let let's move this along here.

We are going to wrap up this program.

But if I happen to see you in the cereal aisle of Costco later today and a was to come up to you and say, Steve, why on earth should I vote for you?

You've been there forever.

What is the best explanation you can offer to voters to say you deserve another four years?

I would say a record of performance and leadership.

And so, you know, people say, well, you've been there for six years.

Maybe we need a change.

And what I would answer to that is that would be the equivalent of us saying, you know, Andy Reid, you need to head out the door.

You've been there long enough.

Two Super Bowls is enough.

We need to move on to somebody else.

If you look at my record of performance, the fact that we have not increased our crime rate, that the crime rate has remained flat for 16 years.

Think about that.

16 years.

That's remarkable.

And I'm not going to take all the credit.

But, you know, I was part of the leadership of that office for those 16 years that worked with law enforcement, that kept our community safe.

I've already told you what my record is on homicide trials.

You you take those those numbers and match it against any office across this region, and I doubt you'll find a better result.

We get the job done.

And the thing about it is I have the passion to do this work.

From the first day I was a prosecutor.

Some 34 years ago till now, I still have that passion.

That passion to protect the community, to help our victims get justice.

And that is the reason why I'm running again.

And That is the reason why I'm so passionate about this.

This opportunity for a real action.

Vanessa, Riebli, I've just transported my heart over to the snack aisle with all those huge potato chip bags and running to you and say, Why should I take a chance on somebody who hasn't done this job before, who hasn't been the D.A.?

Why do you deserve four years as a chief law enforcement officer in Johnson County?

Because I have the vision.

I have a plan, and I have experience.

We have to deal with employee retention.

That is a critical issue in the DA's office.

We have to rebuild specialty units.

Steve moved the office away from a subject matter expert to assigning assistant attorneys to court.

So you have seven different district courts that are managed by seven, seven different district assistant district attorneys, and it's become very decentralized and it's not uniform.

I want to bring back more training, mentoring, and I want to move a slot to a chief of staff so we can encompass that.

We've got to rebuild relationships within the criminal justice community.

I can do that, and I've done it before.

I've talked about prosecutors working group on fentanyl.

I want a KC Metro elder abuse task force that we work with investigators all over the area.

And we've got to work with our Johnson County Drug Task Force.

We need to be more mindful of individual cases not having to set policy when it comes to mental health and drugs.

You have to look at these cases individually and deal with people that have issues.

So you reduce recidivism.

We have to be transparent.

So the community trust us and we have to engage the community more.

When I was a prosecutor, I would go out to care facilities and I would talk about different types of scams.

Hey, if your grandson is calling and says he needs $10,000 to get out of jail, you better call your son or daughter because that's probably a scam.

We have to do more for the community.

I have the trial experience.

I can do this.

You have been watching the two candidates who want to be Johnson County district attorney for the next four years.

Republican incumbent Steve Howe and Democratic challenger Vanessa Riebli, From everyone here at the Fiorella Events Space in Overland Park and from our terrific partners with the Johnson County Bar Association, I'm Nick Haynes.

Well, keep calm and carry on.

Okay.

And.