Since Cindy Stormer took over as Cooke County DA, there have been 35 jury trials in just over three years. Cindy
and her team have won 30 of those or more than 85% of those jury trials with guilty verdicts. One resulted in a plea
to guilty mid-trial, one was a mistrial with a hung jury and three resulted in not-guilty verdicts mostly because the jury
concluded the argument of self defense was sufficient to raise a reasonable doubt. What is wrong with allowing our jury
system to work??
Compare this to a total of 34 jury trials in the last eight years by her predecessor according the Texas State Office
of Court Administration. While I've heard her predecessor lost no jury trials, the state shows otherwise. They
show of those 34 trials over eight years, four resulted in "not-guilty" verdicts or about 12% "not-guilty" vs. 9% "not-guilty"
for Stormer since she has been District Attorney.
In three years time, Cindy with the same number of staff has conducted as many trials in three years as her predecessor
did in eight years. You might think if her predecessor had more than twice the time to prepare for trial, she might
have won a higher percentage of cases but according to the state, that is untrue.
The Texas State average is more than 19% of jury trials over the last three years resulted in
"not-guilty" verdicts. Cindy Stormer has more than doubled the number of jury trials with a much better win rate, losing
less than 9% of the cases that went in front of a jury. That is better than the previous District Attorney and twice
as good as the Texas State average.
So Cooke County crime is down, convictions are up, win rates are up and the efficiency of the District Attorney and jail
are up too. What is the argument for getting a new District Attorney? Is she too tough on crime? Could the
reason be that she doesn't give special favors to the rich and powerful of Cooke County?
