By Jannat Alam
WOODLAND – Probably a pretty good court day for alleged UC Davis burglar Dustin McGuire here this week in Yolo County Superior Court—he is expected to be transferred to “neighborhood” court and rehabilitative care rather than incarceration.
Plus he gets his bicycle back from the police, too.
McGuire allegedly committed a series of burglaries on the Davis university campus in early 2020. He was arrested on April 8 last year on charges of burglary and possession of stolen property. He has since been released on bail, and attends his hearing via Zoom.
Deputy District Attorney Amanda Zambor previously approved the defense’s application to transfer the case to neighborhood court, but recent developments proved difficult to locate one of the victims of the crime to sign off on the program.
Additionally, there has been difficulty obtaining appropriate paperwork from the university itself, and Zambor asked the court to meet again regarding McGuire’s case in six weeks.
Deputy Public Defender David Hutchison similarly admits to not having adequate paperwork; however, he assured the court that he will have the defendant fill out the appropriate forms.
Hutchison asked for the defendant to be “re-referred to PC 1000,” which is California’s pretrial diversion program for drug crimes involving simple possession. This is a request for McGuire to be transferred to rehabilitative care rather than incarceration.
Judge David Rosenberg approved the request to reconvene in six weeks, and accepted the defense’s request for McGuire to be referred. Both admittance to the neighborhood court program and arrangement of an orientation date for the PC section 1000 program will be decided on March 17 at 9 a.m.
Before the court could adjourn, DDA Zambor addressed one of McGuire’s concerns regarding his bicycle, which was confiscated by Davis PD upon McGuire’s arrest.
Zambor said the bicycle was booked as “property” rather than “evidence,” so McGuire can retrieve it at any point from the Davis PD Property and Evidence unit.
Jannat Alam is a third year at UCLA, majoring in English. She is from Fontana, California.
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What is “neighborhood” court? (was in quotes in the article)
Serious or sarcastic question? (In other words, you’ve never heard of neighborhood court or are you asking something else?)
I don’t know what it is. I think I’ve heard the term before.
FYI: https://yoloda.org/progressive-programs/neighborhood-court/
I am on same lines as Alan M… ‘neighborhood court’ has been mentioned, ‘highlighted’ as an alternative to Co Judicial proceedings… but never fully clear as to its scope, ‘power’, and whether it has “morphed” for fiscal, other reasons at this point. [heard of the concept years ago, but can’t recall anything within the last 2-4 years… and a lot has changed since then…
Davis used to have a ‘neighbor conflict resolution’ thing years ago… actually particpated in it as a neutral 3rd party witness years ago… last I heard, it was DOA… and it was not very effective a majority of the time… concept good… but it relied on good faith from both parties… often absent…
So yeah, a primer of current scope, authority, make-up, funding, etc., would be real useful. Or even a “link”…
Or, David, are you being sarcastic about possible Alan M sarcasm? Thought his was a very fair question, which is now my question, as well…
Maybe omnicience is getting the better of you?
I could see how one could think this “Alan M” fellow were being sarcastic, even when not the case 😐
I simply asked rather than assumed one way or the other.
OK, thanks. So it’s the Yolo name for ‘restorative justice’. OK, sounds good when the victim agrees. Maybe volunteer when not bound by the shackles of employment.
What would be appropriate is if the so-called homeless people who dump and pile up trash in our neighborhood would improve conditions in the area by cleaning up after themselves in the area impacted by their crime, however low mass dumping be upon the criminal totem. If they conducted this one simple, civil act of treating the neighborhood with respect instead of as a convenient trash dump, I’d have a lot less animosity towards them, and maybe even feel them worthy of being called ‘neighbor’.
And yes, towards this particular segment of the so-called homeless I do indeed have hostility #gasp!#; and with them I share this hostility with their homed brethren who flick cigarette butts on the ground, Jack-in-the-Box lunch wrap remains out the window, or a pickup load of no-longer-wanted belongings over the tailgate into a ditch or alongside the road.
“So it’s the Yolo name for ‘restorative justice’. ”
I cringe on that characterization. My biggest problem with the program is that a lot of the crimes are not really crimes and it puts people into the system in some way who wouldn’t ordinarily be involved in any sort of criminal matter. They have expanded it somewhat since they began it six or so years ago, but I don’t see it as a way to reduce the scope of the system.
Well, there are “crimes” and “offenses”… the latter still being ‘offensive’ and ‘wronging’ others…
So we should just let “boys be boys”? So consensual sex that is regretted becomes “date rape”?
Burglary is a minor form of ‘rape’… invasion of personal space, and ‘taking something’ that is important to you.
Given the context of your comment, the implication was that the buglary was not a crime at all… nor an offense…
Clarification?
And Alan, I’d feel the same way about the folk that show those behaviors, ‘so-called’ homeless, or not (and there are some who show those behaviors who are housed and middle class… mainly students, particularly when inebriated)… a different kind of ‘troll’… the homeless folk I’ve interacted with, are similarly upset about those behaviors… it ‘fouls their nest’ (particularly the folk hanging on the Nishi property), and they know it reflects badly on them (albeit, have only really gotten to know about 6 of those folk)… have actually heard some of ‘those folk’ telling others to “cleanup your s#!t”… probably meant both figuratively and literally…
Perhaps their own version of ‘neighborhood court’…