In February, a standout teenage volleyball player was struck by a vehicle in downtown St. Louis and lost both her legs. The driver was out on bond for robbery and didn’t have a valid license. The man was charged with assault but that will never give back the young girl her legs. St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kimberly Gardner, the city’s top prosecutor was responsible for the man being out on the streets that day instead of in jail awaiting his trial. Now, Gardner is being let go for her soft-on-crime policies.
According to Fox:
Gardner is one of the first progressive prosecutors whom Soros, a liberal billionaire and Democrat mega-donor, bankrolled in 2016 and again for her re-election in 2020. She announced last month that she would seek a third term. Her resignation is effective June 1.
In the wake of the incident, Attorney General Bailey filed a petition quo warranto, the legal mechanism under state statute that allows the attorney general to remove a prosecutor who neglects the job’s duties.
Bailey claims that nearly 12,000 criminal cases have been dismissed by what he calls Gardner’s failures. He also says more than 9,000 cases have been thrown out as they had been about to go to trial, forcing judges to dismiss more than 2,000 cases due to what Bailey described as a failure to provide defendants with evidence and speedy trials.
Gardner had refused to leave office for months, calling Bailey’s efforts a political “witch hunt” and a form of “voter suppression.” She also suggested that racism and sexism are behind some of the criticism against her.
Gardner is just one of many prosecutors who deserve to lose their job over soft-on-crime agendas. Good people are dying and being attacked in the street everyday because the law does not stand behind common sense.
