Arlen Inspecter #7 - Hearings for Headlines

THE ARLEN INSPECTER

Throughout his career, from the Philadelphia district attorney’s office to Capitol Hill, The Real Arlen Specter has excelled at one thing: getting in the headlines.

As the Philadelphia Inquirer reported in 1973: “No other local prosecutor in the country has received as much favorable publicity over the years as Arlen Specter, his words automatically preserved by newspapers, aired by radio and television. At frequently called press conferences … Specter’s statements usually go unquestioned, his reports unchallenged.”

But a seven-month investigation by that newspaper revealed the real story on Arlen Specter’s record as DA: one of the lowest conviction rates in the country despite one of the largest staffs; a poorly run office with unprepared assistant district attorneys; avoidable mistakes by prosecutors leading to dropped charges; a pattern of lenient sentences recommended for convicted rapists and violent criminals.

And yet, The Real Arlen Specter found his way into glowing headlines. The same story emerged in Washington. A 1985 investigation of Arlen Specter by The New Republic reported that the “Republican of Pennsylvania is the model of how to build a Senate career through manipulation of the media.” According to a former Specter aide, the Senator called hearings not based on what was important to the country or relevant to his subcommittee, but based on the “Big Four”: “the four major subjects that Specter knows will rope in the television cameras: kids, sex, drugs, and violence.”

Problems at the Philadelphia district attorney’s office have persisted for 36 years. Now that they are back in the headlines, The Real Arlen Specter is doing what he does best: holding hearings. Perhaps he will investigate where many of these problems originated, under the leadership of The Real District Attorney Arlen Specter.

From the 1973 Inquirer investigation of Arlen Specter’s district attorney’s office:

1. •“With all its administrative problems, it is little wonder that the district attorney’s office has recorded one of the worst conviction rates of any metropolitan prosecutor’s office in the country.”
   

2. •“Lenient sentences for persons convicted of violent crimes often are imposed at the specific request of the district attorney’s office. Inadequately prepared cases, faulty indictments and other administrative errors often result in lenient treatment or the release of persons charged with serious crimes.”
   

3. •“The Philadelphia criminal justice system is engaged in the most massive paper-shuffling operation in the nation, with the district attorney’s office supplying the paperwork, churning out indictments indiscriminately.”
   

4. •“In prosecuting serious criminal cases, assistant district attorneys routinely go into court unprepared, although they carry a lighter workload than their counterparts in other metropolitan cities. This lack of preparation leads to ... acquittals and the dismissal of cases as the time lag grows between arrest and trial.”
   

5. •“The district attorney’s office is more likely to drop a rape indictment than an indictment for any other type of violent crime. … It is this last statistic which brings us full circle, for Arlen Specter’s first crusade as the newly-elected district attorney in 1966 was the prosecution of rape cases in Philadelphia courts. … Specter embarked on a well-publicized program to dispose of ten cases a day. … All that has changed today. Instead of a convicted rapist receiving a six-year-sentence for one rape and robbery, the district attorney’s office now recommends three years for a series of rapes and robberies. … Instead of further decreasing, the rate of reported rapes is spiraling.”
   

6. •“It is the way that violent crimes are handled in the Philadelphia justice system -- casually and at a leisurely pace.”
   

From the 1985 New Republic investigation of Arlen Specter’s subcommittee hearings:

1. •“Specter brings new and impressive audacity to senatorial hype.”
   

2. •“He has been shrewd in his selection of witnesses at hearings: former porn star Linda Lovelace, the jurors who passed judgment on John Hinckley and on Cathleen Webb, even Captain Kangaroo (who criticized violence on TV), have all testified. One result has been that his subcommittee has received even more press coverage than its parent Judiciary Committee. ‘There's the big four,’ explains a former aide to Specter. ‘The four major subjects that Specter knows will rope in the television cameras: kids, sex, drugs, and violence. If you can have a hearing that combines two or more of those elements, you'll get even greater coverage.’”
   

3. •“‘The subjects he chooses often are not even the remotest bit related to anything to do with juvenile justice,’ says a senior aide on the Judiciary Committee, ‘He leaves it up to his poor staff to come up with some supposed connection.’”
   

4. •“Specter’s antics finally prompted Illinois Democrat Paul Simon to violate Senate etiquette by publicly criticizing his colleague. … ‘We should not allow the potential for a few headlines and 30 seconds on television to divert our attention from our real problems.’”
   

Sources:

The Philadelphia Inquirer, “Crime and Injustice: A series on the breakdown in criminal justice -- the jailing of the innocent, freeing of the guilty,” by Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele, 1973.

The New Republic, “Media Specter,” by Murray Waas, Sept. 30, 1985. http://www.tnr.com/article/politics/media-specter

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