The Informant

Oakland City Attorney

Oakland's latest gang injunction would cover part of the Fruitvale district.

Alameda County Judge Robert Freedman delayed his decision on whether to approve a preliminary injunction against the Fruitvale Nortenos by at least another week, following yesterday’s two and a half hour hearing at Oakland’s Rene C. Davidson Courthouse.

The day centered around the testimony of two witnesses for the defense team of five pro bono attorneys, who are representing 30 of the defendants, 16 of whom attended the hearing. Javier Quintero, a wiry 27-year-old painter with closely cropped black hair and a goatee, took the stand for an hour and adamantly denied his involvement with the Nortenos. Convicted for drug possession in 2008, Quintero told the court he has stayed out of trouble for 18 months since violating his parole later that year. For reasons unknown to him, Quintero said his parole level was increased last year from minimum security to “super-max,” check-ins with his parole officer increased, and he was made to wear a global positioning system device.

“I don’t see no sense to it,” Quintero said in response to questions from defense attorney Dennis Cunningham about why he ended up on the injunction. “ I’m less than a year away from finishing my parole. I’m doing everything right. My GPS will tell you where I’m going, I don’t think you need anything more than that.”

Tricia Hynes, part of a Meyers Nave team retained by City Attorney John Russo to litigate the Norteno suit, questioned Quintero repeatedly about his past contacts with police, including OPD reports that identify him admitting his affiliation with the Nortenos. Quintero repeatedly denied this claim, arguing that the only people on the injunction list he associated with were a now-deported cousin and childhood friend. Hynes cited several arrests, however, including one where Quintero was stopped in a shed down the street from his house. Police found several firearms, ammunition, and marijuana in the shed.

The City Attorney’s office has argued that the Norteno injunction is necessary to stem violent crime in the neighborhood. According to a joint report with Russo’s office, Oakland Police claim the 40 people named in the Norteno injunction had 159 arrests and 106 adult convictions between them before the injunction was filed, and are linked by authorities to 38 shootings in 2010, including 13 within the proposed safety zone.

Hynes was also successful in disqualifying Barry Krisberg, a UC-Berkeley law professor who has studied gangs and youth crime for decades, from appearing as an expert witness for the defense.

During a sort of mini-hearing where he was alternatively questioned by defense counsel Dennis Cunningham and Tricia Hynes, Krisberg failed to convince Judge Freedman that he could offer specific evidence about the defendants at hand or the gang dynamics of Fruitvale and Oakland at large.

Judge Freedman’s remarks made clear his view that while Krisberg had a broad policy background, the professor’s knowledge of gang violence and suppression programs did not touch on the legal issues at hand.

After the hearing, Cunningham said he still didn’t understand Freedman’s “off the beam” decision to disqualify Krisberg. “His testimony is relevant to the issue of whether this is the right thing to do,” said Cunningham,who unfavorably compared the gang injunction’s “safety zone” to the United States’ strategic hamlet program from the Vietnam War. The strategic hamlet program was a counter-terrorism measure undertaken by the United States and South Vietnam to decrease rural support for the insurgent Viet Cong by flooding rural villages with troops. However, the strategic hamlet initiative actually increased support for the Viet Cong in the countryside.

Deputy City Attorney Rocio Ferro said her office was pleased with Judge Freedman’s handling of the day’s proceedings. The defense, Ferro said, “wants to make this a policy discussion. It’s a necessary discussion, and we’ll be having that with the [Oakland City] Council on [February] 22^nd.”

At the tail end of the hearing, two events raised a tensions in the courtroom. Defense attorney Jose Luis Fuentes alleged that juvenile records for the defendants had been submitted to the court without the notification of the clients or sealing the documents, an error for which Hynes admitted responsibility.

More controversial was Cunningham’s assertion that a television report on the injunction earlier that morning had aired the mugshots and addresses of some of the defendants. It is not clear which station aired the report. City Attorney Spokesman Alex Katz denied releasing any mugshots or addresses of the defendants to the media. That allegation elicited angry protestations from the 16 defendants present. Abel Manzo, who was initially scheduled to testify today, stormed out in anger at Judge Freedman’s refusal to grant a protective order preventing the disclosure of the defendants’ addresses and photographs.

Manzo, who runs a barbershop in East Oakland, says his public identification as a Norteno may put his business, and life, in danger. “I cut Surenos’ hair, I cut Border Brothers’ hair,” Manzo said. “What if they come to my barbershop and shoot it up?”

By and large, the City Attorney’s office was pleased with the results of the hearing. Despite Quintero’s denials of gang membership, Deputy City Attorney Ferro stood by the evidence her office offered to the court about his activities. “We’ll get the injunction for a year, and if he’s still doing right, we’ll consider taking him off the list.”

Although Krisberg’s disqualification was a setback, the defense still has three more witnesses. Abel Manzo is expected to testify along with another to-be-named defendant and Maisha Quint of the Eastside Arts Alliance.

Deputy City Attorney Ferro said the city may call rebuttal witnesses at next Wednesday’s hearing, including Sgt. Douglas Keeley, an OPD gang officer, and two city employees with years of experience in the Fruitvale area.