L.A. County Paying $5M to Settle Case Alleging Constitutional Violations in Prosecution of Election Management Company's Owner

I wrote about this back in October 2022, when the charges were filed, and then in November 2022, when they were dropped; now here's this update (NBC Los Angeles [Eric Leonard]):

Los Angeles County will pay [Eugene Yu,] the owner of Michigan-based election management software company[, Konnech,] $5 million to settle a lawsuit that alleged the LA County District Attorney's Office violated his rights when he was arrested and charged in 2022 with a criminal case that was dropped 37 days later.

"Plaintiffs alleged Mr. Yu's arrest and the seizure of Konnech's property was without probable cause and a violation of Mr. Yu's civil rights causing damage to Konnech's business and Mr. Yu's reputation," county lawyers wrote to the Board of Supervisors in a letter urging approval of the settlement….

LA District Attorney George Gascón announced at a news conference [in Oct. 2022] that Yu and his firm had criminally violated the terms of the company's $2.6 million contract with LA County, under which the company provided election logistics software to voting officials.

Gascón accused Yu and the company of conspiracy and embezzlement, by allegedly storing some data about poll workers on servers in China, rather than on servers in the U.S., but specified that there was no evidence voting or voter data had been stored offshore….

For Konnech and Yu's complaint, see here. My first reaction, I regret to say, was that the prosecutors were likely to have solid evidence behind their charges, in part because the prosecution was contrary to what one might have politically expected from Gascón, and in part because in my experience prosecutors usually (though not always) do have solid evidence. But in this instance it appears that the prosecutors erred; I'd love to know more about how all this came about.

Comments

[observer]

Fully agree with you that we need more information. Given that we are asked to vote on who should be DA on March 5, we need that information quickly. Moreover, if I were the LA Times, I would consider reviewing the decision to endorse the DA.

[Dr. Ed 2]

EV wrote "...what one might have politically expected from Gascón..."

Wiki defines the Brady Rule as requiring the disclosure of "exculpatory or impeaching information and evidence that is material to the guilt or innocence or to the punishment of a defendant." [emphasis added]

What if Gascón stumbled across something that impeached the credibility of Biden's 2020 victory? Not California's vote as everyone knows that the land of the fruit and nut would go for Brandon regardless of how the votes were counted, but say in Georgia, or Michigan where Yu's company is based.

Gascón would have to share it with Yu -- or drop the charges, which is actually what he did do. And Gascón wouldn't like to have to give it to Yu in discovery in the civil trial because it would involve a competitor to Yu and hence he'd publicize it, much as any competitive business would.

1: What would this do to the already imploding trial in Georgia?

2: What would credible evidence of 2020 fraud do to the Dem's chances in the 2024 elections?

3: What would this do to Gascón's political prospects? (A lot of Republicans that had nothing to do with Nixon's misfeasance got burned badly in Watergate and the subsequent 1974 elections.)

This has come up with the CIA sometimes electing not to prosecute traitors because of what would become public in the trial. If Gascón is as political as it appears, and on the side he appears to be on -- isn't this exactly what he WOULD do under these circumstances?

Remember that it's not his money.

Remember too what DK Stephenson (of the KKK) did nearly a century ago -- convicted of rape, murder, and generally being a smuck in the death of Madge Oberholtzer, he demanded a pardon and threatened to dump the dirt on Indiana politicians.

He wasn't pardoned and did -- it led to a lot of indictments, national scandals and combined with the sordid tale of what he'd done to Oberholtzer (who died of infected bite wounds) eliminated the Klan which had been a powerful movement earlier in the 1920s.

This is historical fact -- and I'm just suggesting that Gascón may have had a solid case against Yu, but decided to drop it for the greater good of the Democratic Party.

[David Nieporent]

What if Gascón stumbled across something that impeached the credibility of Biden’s 2020 victory? [...] Gascón would have to share it with Yu

So you don't know anything about the law, but you saw two words that looked similar and developed an elaborate legal theory about them with no basis in fact or law. Sorry, but this is yet another Billy Madison post.

That's not what impeachment means in this context, and literally has nothing to do with this case, and he would not in fact have to share it with anyone. Brady (technically Giglio, but that's a common conflation, so I'll let it slide) requires the disclosure of evidence that impeaches the credibility of prosecution witnesses.

— or drop the charges, which is actually what he did do. And Gascón wouldn’t like to have to give it to Yu in discovery in the civil trial because it would involve a competitor to Yu and hence he’d publicize it, much as any competitive business would.

Also wrong.

And none of that even addresses the fact that this case had nothing to do with the election and therefore Gascon could not "stumble across" any such thing.

If Gascón is as political as it appears, and on the side he appears to be on — isn’t this exactly what he WOULD do under these circumstances?

Isn't what exactly what he would do? He had nothing to do with settling this suit.

This has come up with the CIA sometimes electing not to prosecute traitors because of what would become public in the trial.

The CIA is not part of the Department of Justice, and does not prosecute people or elect not to prosecute people.

[myself]

Far more likely than your harebrained musings is it had to do with the incredibly sketchy GOP operative whose "hackers" supposedly found the incriminating evidence.

Reading that guy's history is just one long list of scams. Most likely these hackers (if they existed) completely misunderstood what they were looking at. So Phillips makes the bold claim of concrete evidence of wrongdoing, the DA bites, then the DA starts looking at the "evidence", realizes he's working with the idiot cousins of Dumb and Dumber and the company never did anything wrong and he drops the charges.

[David Nieporent]

MAGA of course trumpeted this arrest when it happened as proof that our elections were corrupt. Whoops.

[Kleppe]

If you want proof that our elections are corrupt you need look no further than our election system itself. Unless you think thousands of candidates spend hundreds of millions for the chance to control billions of dollars and nobody would even dream of cheating.

[Sarcastr0]

If you want to get rich and are willing to lie a lot, there are easier and more efficient ways than American politics.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Really -- ones that don't involve going to jail?

[Sarcastr0]

Lawyer, ad-man, PR flak, lobbyist.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Sarcastro, talents vary. Easy for some is impossible for others. Also, cultural trends from era to era demand different talents from would-be officeholders. Willingness to truckle to public popular demand has not been a permanently decisive factor throughout American history. It does seem to dominate the reckonings today however. It is not obvious that a person with Lincoln's particular mix of talents does not exist today. It does seem obvious that any such person could not hope to win election in 2024, or in any foreseeable future.

[F.D. Wolf]

Typical Gascon.

He can't be bothered to go after murderers, rapists, and thieves in Los Angeles, but store your data on the wrong servers, and he'll come down on you like the hammer of God.

It is anarcho-tyranny, in which actual, serious crime goes unpunished, but hyper-technical Mickey Mouse violations are mercilessly enforced.

[Sarcastr0]

I, uh, don’t think LA is in a state of anarcho-tyranny. People living there seem to be doing fine.

[F.D. Wolf]

You sure are tuned in to the world around you. Los Angeles is a nightmare. Newsweek headline of December 29, 2023:

Americans Are Fleeing Los Angeles More Than Anywhere Else for First Time

Probably just that right-wing propaganda Newsweek is famous for.

https://www.newsweek.com/record-numbers-residents-moving-away-los-angeles-1856539

[Commenter_XY]

Don't confuse him with the facts.

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

Can't; he's already confused.

[Magister]

Yes, that sounds right. How Newsweek Has Gone Down the Far-Right Rabbit Hole

The once-esteemed magazine has been reduced to a soapbox for the far right, a new study reveals, thanks to a MAGA activist running the opinions page.

Los Angeles, and California more widely, has problems with being an expensive place to live among other things, yet people apparently still want to live there.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Is Los Angeles losing 1 of 1,000 residents, or 2 of 1,000 residents?

Have property prices declined?

Or are people who can't keep up with life in an advanced location moving to more affordable, less successful communities?

[billardl]

Your idea of "success" is a community that paints rainbow murals onto intersections to celebrate your deviant "marriages."

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

How does this blog attract so many bigoted misfits.

By design. These are your people, Volokh Conspirators. Your target audience And the reason you inhabit the disrespected, unwanted, doomed fringe of modern legal academia.

[Sarcastr0]

Yeah, that's property prices.

https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-city-rankings/most-violent-cities-in-america

LA doesn't even rank.

[Bwaaah]

There were 327 homicides in L.A. in 2023, compared to 258 in 2019...a 26% increase. Nationwide, all the reports of urban crime being down are based on the height of the recent crime surge from 2020 to 2022, and not the pre-surge baseline from before 2020.

[Sarcastr0]

That is not a great metric to prove LA is in a state of anarcho-tyranny.

You also didn't normalize for population. Which might help you, if LA is indeed losing people. But as it is your stat is shit.

And if you admit there was a recent surge only from 2020 to 2022 a bit of thought shows that implies urban crime has been pretty quiescent with a short exception, and is now returning to the mean after 3 years up.
So then where is your complaint?

[Bwaaah]

Murders are up 26% over the pre-crime-wave base.

[Bwaaah]

And people who say “crime is down” are acting like time started last year. That’s just spin. It’s offensive to read media stories that express surprise that despite the “drop in crime”, people still feel like crime is up. That’s because crime *is* up, like 25% or more in major categories (murder, felonious assault, robbery, grand theft), unless you just woke up two years ago in a U.S. city and knew nothing of the years before.

The cops-are-the-problem movement, along with major decarceration efforts around the country, have both undermined the effectiveness of urban law enforcement efforts. Thousands of additional people per year are being murdered, and many tens of thousands more assaulted.

Check any city’s crimes stats, 2023 vs 2019 (or 2018, or 2017, or 2016…).

And people like you pretend it’s a “perception” problem.

[Nige]

Defender of police brutality, corruption and incomeptence here.

[Bwaaah]

The pandemic happened everywhere in the world. The civilian attack on policing only happened in the U.S. And that's why the U.S. had, and is still having, a crime wave.

George Gascón is one of the cheerleaders of the anti-policing movement.

[Sarcastr0]

people who say “crime is down” are acting like time started last year
Or that crime didn't start in 2019 either. You're being as myopic as anyone.

You don't get to just declare causality because it sounds right. America is in a rare space in a lot of ways when it comes to crimes and criminal justice.
And your causality really condemns the police force as petty assholes if true.

[Bwaaah]

And though a 25% increase in crime could have only a subtle effect on perceptions, PETTY CRIME HAS GONE THROUGH THE ROOF. Petty offenses, like shoplifting and disorderly conduct, when combined with no-cash bail, “diversionary” programs, and already overwhelmed police forces, effectively carry no meaningful punishment anymore in many urban jurisdictions. In our modern culture, *nobody* is responsible for stopping people from engaging in petty criminal behaviors. Even if a retail store hires a security guard to stand at the door, the guard is almost always under orders to not in any way physically engage a perpetrator. The perps know the rules of the game as well as the cops, and they exploit them with impunity.

[Sarcastr0]

F.D. Wolf - the prosecutor in LA doesnt go after murderers, rapists, and thieves, and thus LA is in anarcho-tyranny.
Me - that's quite wrong.
You - But murders are up
Me - Doesn't make FD wolf right? And your stats are not well baselined.

You - What if I picked a convenient timeline? And what if I attacked a strawman no one in this thread said? Point is, this is all 'cause people are being mean to cops.
Also have you considered PETTY CRIME?

You got enough theses and strawmen here to keep yourself occupied with your resentment-based storytelling. I'll leave you to it.

[Bwaaah]

Carjacking in Washington D.C. in 2019: 152 Carjacking in Washington D.C. in 2023: 959 (source: Axios)

More of my “strawmen” (per Sarc).

Sarc's rich explanation of the surge in crime: "America is in a rare space in a lot of ways when it comes to crimes and criminal justice." That's it. That's what he's got. And me: "strawmen."

[Sarcastr0]

Do you even know what a strawman is?

Causality, especially when it comes to humans, is almost never simple.

Always be suspicious of what your priors spit out and back them up with something to keep you honest.

[Nige]

Does that coincide with the discovery of that weird little hack that made jacking particular cars trivially easy?

[David Nieporent]

That's rather disingenuous. You're taking the single lowest year for homicides — 2019 — as the baseline comparison, rather than, say, comparing to the average homicide rate over the last 10 or 20 (or longer, if you want) years.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Gaslighto -- it appears that train robbery has returned and remains a major problem in LA.

With the newly widened Panama Canal, one wonders how long it will be for ships to take the longer route to Gulf Coast and even Atlantic Ports in saner states.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/autos/news/inside-a-modern-day-train-heist/ar-BB1h8OZK

[Sarcastr0]

it appears that train robbery has returned and remains a major problem in LA.

You think this is because of anything under the control of LA? The story does not so indicate.
And by it's nature this seems a federal issue.

You just saw a crime story and LA was mentioned and decided it was relevant.
Close, but you need to do more homework.

[Dr. Ed 2]

The railroad is considering rerouting trains around LA.
Not other cities.

[Sarcastr0]

Still not showing it’s an issue for local law enforcement.

And still a really specific corner issue to prove LA is in a state of anarchy tyranny,

The urban crime ranking seems like where you might check if you wanted the truth,

[billardl]

https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/26/opinions/e-jean-carroll-verdict-trump-defamation-cox/index.html

Typical bitter, single woman.

[Bored Lawyer]

So who is paying these damages?
Hint: not the people who screwed up the case and caused the false arrest.
So the penalty for bad behavior is nothing.

[Armchair]

Not sure it was bad behavior. Reading the complaint, it carefully never denies the election poll worker data being held in China.

If the company is violating its contract and keeping the election poll worker data in China, a potential risk is that the election data could also be kept there.

[fred1955ny]

Actual innocence or guilt is flatly irrelevant. Period. Its not a debate. No reputable lawyer will say otherwise, not in my opinion. The sole question is was this man arrested and his property seized without probable cause. The US constitution prohibits federal, state, and local governments from doing this. See NIVENS, US Supreme Court, 138 S.CT. at 1727. There would be no reason to deny it and frankly to bring it up would in my opinion be tactically stupid. I will assume you wrote in haste and did not stop to think what would happen if we allowed arrests of those with respect to whom there is not sufficient reason to believe that criminal charges could be sustained or as you impliedly suggest who decline to deny their guilt and don't want to speak. I hope you have a good long talk with yourself about whether even if he is guilty you want to live in that world where that vitiates an illegal arrest and seizure as illegality is measured at the time.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

That might have crossed a lawyer's mind...

[Kenneth Almquist]

Well stated. Yu did deny holding election poll worker data in China in Konnech Inc. v. True the Vote Inc., because it was relevant to that case.

[Sarcastr0]

Come one, man.

You had to have learned the institutional reasons for no individual liability for judges and prosecutors.

It sucks, but the alternative is worse.

And having your office and boss appear in headlines for a failed prosecution won't do wonders for their professional prospects, I'd wager.

[Armchair]

Sounds like someone in China called in some favors in LA...

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Does the Volokh Conspiracy generate disaffected, delusional, un-American conspiracy theorists, or does it merely attract them?

[Dr. Ed 2]

It might not even have been that complicated -- see above.

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