Opinion: A Crisis of Leadership in the D.A.’s Office

We are sexual assault survivors and plaintiffs or class members in the civil rights class action filed two years ago against the Austin Police Department and the Travis County District Attorney's Office. The D.A.'s Office is currently under the administration of incumbent Margaret Moore, who is in a run-off election on July 14 with José Garza for the job. We write this open letter to once again lift up the concerns of survivors in the midst of Austin's crisis of leadership.

Our case is currently on appeal to the 5th Circuit, but the problems in Margaret Moore's office remain. Rather than make meaningful efforts to change the degrading and discriminatory policies and practices we were each subjected to by her office, D.A. Moore has instead focused her efforts on trying to make the public believe that her office has done much more than our lawsuit asserted. But whether D.A. Moore's office has tried or obtained guilty pleas from 30 rapists or four rapists in each of her three years in office is hardly relevant – the number of reported sexual assaults is roughly 1,000 per year. D.A. Moore's first assistant repeatedly lied about one of us and was caught on tape doing so. She was not reprimanded, she was not removed from her post, she was not even required to apologize. Women continue to come forward to be a part of our lawsuit and effort to change this system, and the patterns of discrimination continue unabated.

No effort whatsoever has been made to actually rectify the problems in D.A. Moore's office. Instead, when confronted with the problems, D.A. Moore claimed she was responsible "for justice" and not to victims of crime – as if those two things are somehow incompatible. But justice requires fixing a system that almost never imposes consequences on rapists and constantly undermines the credibility of rape survivors. In any event, despite the years – in some cases, more than a decade – that have passed since we first made our complaints and names public, no one from D.A. Moore's office has made any attempt to talk with any of us or to make even a single change to the office that would actually make the system better for the next survivor who has to be a part of it.

José Garza, on the other hand, did reach out to us to seek input on how to change the D.A.'s Office in ways that would be meaningful to survivors and more likely to obtain justice. He incorporated our concerns and proposed solutions into his plans. In full disclosure, several of us have worked to help his campaign, seeking change in the only other avenue available to us. José has embraced a platform of reform – not just for survivors of sexual violence, but also for victims of racial injustice and police brutality in our city and county institutions. If this time demonstrates nothing else, it is that change is desperately needed. It is imperative that "the system" serve the people of Travis County, including women, communities of color, and LGBTQIA citizens.

We had hoped we would see change by now. When you vote early or on July 14, please remember the people the current system has failed. Vote for change, and a D.A.'s Office that listens and respects all of the people it is intended to serve.

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This op-ed is signed by Mary Ruth Reyes, Julie Ann Nitsch, Marina (Conner) Garrett, Heather Sin, Emily Borchardt, Hanna Senko, Kristen Troken, Whitley Degollado, Angela Fielding, Amanda Day, and Jessica Ragsdill, the named plaintiffs and several individual class members in the sexual assault class action litigation that was filed against the city of Austin, Travis County, and the current district attorney (among others). That litigation is currently on appeal.

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