Editor, Gazette-Journal:

With the election of a new prosecutor for Gloucester County, now is a good time to address an issue that shows weekly in the pages of this paper. That issue is the number of cases coming before the court that are dismissed outright or nolle prossed, which usually means there’s not enough evidence for conviction, but charges can be reinstated later. The latest issue of this paper provides a glaring example that something is amiss in the county justice system. Reading the court proceedings in the Gazette-Journal shows that eight defendants had charges dismissed or nolle prossed, all for similar crimes. A sample follows:

—1 defendant: grand larceny, possession of burglary tools, possession of stolen property. Nolle prossed.

—1 defendant: Two counts of grand larceny, possession of stolen property with intent to sell. Nolle prossed.

—1 defendant: Grand larceny, possession of burglary tools, possession of stolen property with intent to sell (two counts). Nolle prossed.

—2 defendants: Felony charge of grand larceny. Dismissed.

—1 defendant: Felony charge of obtain credit card number/larceny and credit card fraud. Nolle prossed.

I am not a lawyer or jurist, and there may be things going on in the background that the public is unaware of. But every week the number of cases dismissed or nolle prossed outnumber the convictions, and the crimes are usually related to burglary or theft. And I’m willing to bet that these defendants are not making their first trip through the justice system. A regular reading of the newspaper’s court proceedings shows that in Gloucester we are very good at convicting shoplifters and drunk drivers, but not so good at anything else. And every week we read in the sheriff’s report of another batch of burglaries committed on county homeowners/business owners. Something is wrong here. Either the sheriff’s office is not collecting the evidence it needs, the prosecutor’s office is unprepared for court, or the judges are out of tune with what is going on in their community.

Few crimes violate a person’s sense of security and privacy more than a burglary or robbery. At election time, the sheriff made reducing property crimes a primary point in his platform. The newly elected prosecutor also promises to do her best to reduce the crime rate. Whatever is going on in the county justice system regarding its conviction rate for property crime needs to be fixed, and quickly.

Bill Wallace

Gloucester, Va.