This is the real answer -- it's pigs and a sympathetic prosecutor threatening someone with trumped-up charges. There are all sorts of ways to fuck up someone's life even if they're guilty of something much more minor, or completely innocent.
Going to court for the first time and walking through the parking garage seeing some lawyers with nice phones and BMWs and others with 2003 Honda Civics and whatever trac-fone they could afford from Walmart and realizing one if those is the prosecutor and the other is the PD was pretty radicalizing for me.
Some prosecutors are paid decently, but a lot are pulling public defender salaries. The folks with the BMWs were probably defense attorneys for the wealthy.
PDs make much less on average and are spread way thinner. Usually assigned several cases a week. They make significantly less because they're required and the position is usually used as a stepping stone/entry level position.
There's also the incentive to not upset the police or judges by doing too much to hurt their cases because of you want the raise that comes with becoming a prosecutor, you don't want to piss off the people you're going to have to work with in the future.
Look at the lower range, where entry level attorneys start: $55K vs. $61K. That's not a BMW. A lot of people aren't driving BMWs at the higher range of prosecutor salaries, either. Public interest law of any kind is not where you go if you want to maximize your paycheck.
It's far more likely that an attorney driving a fancy car is at a private firm. That's where the money is.
I dunno but you can afford to be in jail for several days while we figure it out right?
This is the real answer -- it's pigs and a sympathetic prosecutor threatening someone with trumped-up charges. There are all sorts of ways to fuck up someone's life even if they're guilty of something much more minor, or completely innocent.
Going to court for the first time and walking through the parking garage seeing some lawyers with nice phones and BMWs and others with 2003 Honda Civics and whatever trac-fone they could afford from Walmart and realizing one if those is the prosecutor and the other is the PD was pretty radicalizing for me.
Some prosecutors are paid decently, but a lot are pulling public defender salaries. The folks with the BMWs were probably defense attorneys for the wealthy.
Public Defender average salary in CA
Prosecutor average salary in CA
PDs make much less on average and are spread way thinner. Usually assigned several cases a week. They make significantly less because they're required and the position is usually used as a stepping stone/entry level position.
There's also the incentive to not upset the police or judges by doing too much to hurt their cases because of you want the raise that comes with becoming a prosecutor, you don't want to piss off the people you're going to have to work with in the future.
Look at the lower range, where entry level attorneys start: $55K vs. $61K. That's not a BMW. A lot of people aren't driving BMWs at the higher range of prosecutor salaries, either. Public interest law of any kind is not where you go if you want to maximize your paycheck.
It's far more likely that an attorney driving a fancy car is at a private firm. That's where the money is.
Still insane that prosecuting attorneys make significantly more than public defenders.
Oh yeah, the scales should be tilted in the other direction at minimum.
Oh yeah, no probs.