The progressive prosecutor movement is facing a real test in Iowa
FilterJuly 28, 2021
The County Attorney s Office in Polk County (Des Moines), Iowa has gotten little attention from criminal justice reform advocatesâat least until March 2021, when County Attorney John Sarcone prosecuted a
Des Moines Register reporter for covering a 2020 racial justice protest in a professional capacity.
Violent crime in the county has soared during Sarone s decades-long tough-on-crime tenure. Between 2011 and 2016, it increased by over 33 percent in the Des Moines metro areaâone of the highest increases during that period nationwide.
But Sarcone decided to not run for re-election next year, opening his seat up for the first time in over 30 years. Two candidates are now vying to redefine the role in Iowa s most populous county. The differences between them will show whether the progressive prosecutor movement, which has mostly taken off in big coastal cities, can gain tra
Longtime Polk County Attorney John Sarcone is retiring after three decades on the job. Now an assistant county attorney and a defense attorney are jumping into the race to replace him.
A Burlington man convicted of killing an LGBTQ teen in 2016 has lost his appeal.
Jaron Purham, 28, was found guilty of first-degree murder in a 2018 trial and sentenced to life imprisonment. Purham and another man, Jorge Sanders-Galvez, were accused of killing 16-year-old Kedarie Johnson, who was gender-fluid and often dressed and presented as female.
Prosecutors said at trial that Purham and Sanders-Galvez picked up Johnson intending to have sex, and upon learning Johnson was biologically male, killed him. Johnson s body was found in a Burlington alley with a plastic bag forced down his throat, another over his head, and two bullet wounds to his chest.