Josh Katcher just became Commonwealth’s Attorney in Arlington

[jsteele]

There is a poster who continually reports posts related to the crash that killed the son of the mother featured in the ad in the original post of this thread. The person is very protective of the other driver. Since that person does not provide contact information in the reports, I have no way of responding privately to the person. So, I will do it here. First, here are the two reports that I received today:

I received this post at 1:00 pm

You are allowing a teen offender to be doxxed by allowing the parent's name to be published. She has not gone public or sought publicity, unlike the parent of the student who died, who has written public articles and appeared in public commercials to support a particular candidate for state office.

You need to remove this immediately.

I had no idea who the person mentioned in the reported post was. I Googled the name, which did not provide any connection to this thread, and then began reading the thread to try to understand what was going on. I removed the reported post at 1:09, or nine minutes after I received the above report.

At 1:12, I received the following report from the same person:

As you may be aware, xxxx xxxx is the mother of a juvenile involved in a tragic auto accident. You are allowing DCUM to be used to doxx the family and identify the juvenile, when a court specifically decided he should tried as a juvenile and not publicly identified. I think you are setting DCUM up for potential civil or criminal liability by allowing your forum to be used for these purposes. While I have no connection to this matter, I do believe strongly that decisions by local prosecutors to treat juvenile offenders as such, and not identified, should be respected. Your delay in deleting this post is only increasing your own potential liability as the number of posters reading the post increases.

There are several points that I would like to make in response:

1) First, these reports are rude. I was very close to ignoring both of them on that basis alone. I am not your personal staff to be ordered around.

2) Second, this website received thousands of posts per day. I don't come close to reading all of them. The fact that a post exists on the website does not give any indication of my attitude toward the post. Rather than suggesting that I "allowed" it, it is likely that I haven't read it and don't know about it.

3) The post that was reported did not identify the individual as anyone's mother or as having any other role in the death of the young man. As such, I am not aware of any possible civil or criminal liability that anyone, let alone me, might suffer. Given the current legal environment regarding social media, which was just reinforced by the Supreme Court, it is very unlikely that I personally, or DCUM as a company, would be under any legal threat. I resent your attempt to bully me with such threats, hollow though they may be.

4) I removed the post within 9 minutes. Even if we add 3 more minutes to cover the time of your second report, 13 minutes is hardly an unreasonable delay. I think most people would actually consider that to be a fairly timely response. As such, your second report is completely uncalled for.

If in the future you continue this bullying and threatening attitude, your reports will likely be ignored.

[Anonymous]

This race sets a record for the amount of political mailings I've received for one election. By far. Today's from Katcher is viscerally shocking, with a picture of the mother of the deceased boy on the front saying "When a drunk driver killed my son, Parisa didn't even listen to us."

I cannot begin to imagine this woman's pain and grief.

I have been undecided about who to vote for, but this kind of ad doesn't sit well with me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This race sets a record for the amount of political mailings I've received for one election. By far. Today's from Katcher is viscerally shocking, with a picture of the mother of the deceased boy on the front saying "When a drunk driver killed my son, Parisa didn't even listen to us."

I cannot begin to imagine this woman's pain and grief.

I have been undecided about who to vote for, but this kind of ad doesn't sit well with me.

Isn't this whole situation shocking? The accident, the sentence, and then the way his mother was made to feel? I live in McLean, so I don't get these mailers, but I think about how shocking this whole tragedy is almost every day. I just don't know what to do about it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This race sets a record for the amount of political mailings I've received for one election. By far. Today's from Katcher is viscerally shocking, with a picture of the mother of the deceased boy on the front saying "When a drunk driver killed my son, Parisa didn't even listen to us."

I cannot begin to imagine this woman's pain and grief.

I have been undecided about who to vote for, but this kind of ad doesn't sit well with me.

The CA position serves the entire community. The election shouldn’t be centered around this one family.

And pushing this tragedy so prominently into campaign marketing materials feels slimy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This race sets a record for the amount of political mailings I've received for one election. By far. Today's from Katcher is viscerally shocking, with a picture of the mother of the deceased boy on the front saying "When a drunk driver killed my son, Parisa didn't even listen to us."

I cannot begin to imagine this woman's pain and grief.

I have been undecided about who to vote for, but this kind of ad doesn't sit well with me.

The CA position serves the entire community. The election shouldn’t be centered around this one family.

And pushing this tragedy so prominently into campaign marketing materials feels slimy.

Parisa isn't exactly running a clean campaign this time and she was super slimy 4 years ago.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This race sets a record for the amount of political mailings I've received for one election. By far. Today's from Katcher is viscerally shocking, with a picture of the mother of the deceased boy on the front saying "When a drunk driver killed my son, Parisa didn't even listen to us."

I cannot begin to imagine this woman's pain and grief.

I have been undecided about who to vote for, but this kind of ad doesn't sit well with me.

The CA position serves the entire community. The election shouldn’t be centered around this one family.

And pushing this tragedy so prominently into campaign marketing materials feels slimy.

Yes, I'm the PP, and it makes me feel really uncomfortable, like he's using this woman's pain for his own advancement.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Her son’s wealthy killer essentially received a year of house arrest. She has every right to be upset at Parisa.

That said, it seems the judge was the bigger problem.

Why? Josh said he would've done the same thing and not have charged him as an adult, because that's the law in Virginia. And Parisa's office asked for the maximum punishment of 3 years detention, it was the judge who downgraded it.

Watch the video. She never talked about the sentence, she talked about how she was treated by the CA’s office.

So it's a personal grudge?

No it’s not a “grudge.” She wasn’t treated well by the CA and is sharing her experience. You can evaluate it however you like - it’s a free country. She can speak up and you can choose to ignore her. That’s how America works, remember?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This race sets a record for the amount of political mailings I've received for one election. By far. Today's from Katcher is viscerally shocking, with a picture of the mother of the deceased boy on the front saying "When a drunk driver killed my son, Parisa didn't even listen to us."

I cannot begin to imagine this woman's pain and grief.

I have been undecided about who to vote for, but this kind of ad doesn't sit well with me.

The CA position serves the entire community. The election shouldn’t be centered around this one family.

And pushing this tragedy so prominently into campaign marketing materials feels slimy.

The race is certainly NOT centered around one family though this thread seemingly is. The race is a referendum on the CA’s alleged poor management of the CA office $ that is why the police union endorsed Katcher.

https://patch.com/virginia/arlington-va/amp/31398376/arlington-police-union-endorses-katcher-for-commonwealths-attorney

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Her son’s wealthy killer essentially received a year of house arrest. She has every right to be upset at Parisa.

That said, it seems the judge was the bigger problem.

Why? Josh said he would've done the same thing and not have charged him as an adult, because that's the law in Virginia. And Parisa's office asked for the maximum punishment of 3 years detention, it was the judge who downgraded it.

Watch the video. She never talked about the sentence, she talked about how she was treated by the CA’s office.

So it's a personal grudge?

No it’s not a “grudge.” She wasn’t treated well by the CA and is sharing her experience. You can evaluate it however you like - it’s a free country. She can speak up and you can choose to ignore her. That’s how America works, remember?

Yes, and we can comment on her grievances that she makes publicly.

It’s slimy to make this the center of the election. Once again, the rich, white parents are taking up all of the oxygen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This race sets a record for the amount of political mailings I've received for one election. By far. Today's from Katcher is viscerally shocking, with a picture of the mother of the deceased boy on the front saying "When a drunk driver killed my son, Parisa didn't even listen to us."

I cannot begin to imagine this woman's pain and grief.

I have been undecided about who to vote for, but this kind of ad doesn't sit well with me.

The CA position serves the entire community. The election shouldn’t be centered around this one family.

And pushing this tragedy so prominently into campaign marketing materials feels slimy.

The race is certainly NOT centered around one family though this thread seemingly is. The race is a referendum on the CA’s alleged poor management of the CA office $ that is why the police union endorsed Katcher.

https://patch.com/virginia/arlington-va/amp/31398376/arlington-police-union-endorses-katcher-for-commonwealths-attorney

Parisa has been endorsed for re-election not only by the Washington Post, but by Barbara Favola, JD Spain, Don Beyer, Jennifer McClellan, Alphonso Lopez, Jennifer Carroll Foy, Patrick Hope, Jay Jones, Matt de Ferranti, and Mary Margaret Whipple, among others. These are good people. Katcher has seemed increasingly desperate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Her son’s wealthy killer essentially received a year of house arrest. She has every right to be upset at Parisa.

That said, it seems the judge was the bigger problem.

Why? Josh said he would've done the same thing and not have charged him as an adult, because that's the law in Virginia. And Parisa's office asked for the maximum punishment of 3 years detention, it was the judge who downgraded it.

Watch the video. She never talked about the sentence, she talked about how she was treated by the CA’s office.

So it's a personal grudge?

No it’s not a “grudge.” She wasn’t treated well by the CA and is sharing her experience. You can evaluate it however you like - it’s a free country. She can speak up and you can choose to ignore her. That’s how America works, remember?

Yes, and we can comment on her grievances that she makes publicly.

It’s slimy to make this the center of the election. Once again, the rich, white parents are taking up all of the oxygen.

Who shows up at the primaries, though?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Her son’s wealthy killer essentially received a year of house arrest. She has every right to be upset at Parisa.

That said, it seems the judge was the bigger problem.

Why? Josh said he would've done the same thing and not have charged him as an adult, because that's the law in Virginia. And Parisa's office asked for the maximum punishment of 3 years detention, it was the judge who downgraded it.

Watch the video. She never talked about the sentence, she talked about how she was treated by the CA’s office.

So it's a personal grudge?

No it’s not a “grudge.” She wasn’t treated well by the CA and is sharing her experience. You can evaluate it however you like - it’s a free country. She can speak up and you can choose to ignore her. That’s how America works, remember?

Yes, and we can comment on her grievances that she makes publicly.

It’s slimy to make this the center of the election. Once again, the rich, white parents are taking up all of the oxygen.

Who shows up at the primaries, though?

People who can look past this horrible tragedy and see the bigger picture.

[Anonymous]

https://bluevirginia.us/2023/05/two-prosecutors-in-arlington-falls-church-commonwealths-attorneys-office-make-the-case-for-reelecting-parisa-dehghani-tafti

Two current prosecutors have written why they support Parisa's re-election. It's worth reading.

And they don't say nice things about Josh

When Parisa took office, Josh paid lip service to reform. Parisa took him at his word and he was promoted to a leadership position in the office. Instead of working to make real reform succeed, Josh spent his time furthering his own agenda by stirring up discontent, encouraging attorneys to quit, and actively undermining the mission of reform.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:https://bluevirginia.us/2023/05/two-prosecutors-in-arlington-falls-church-commonwealths-attorneys-office-make-the-case-for-reelecting-parisa-dehghani-tafti

Two current prosecutors have written why they support Parisa's re-election. It's worth reading.

And they don't say nice things about Josh

When Parisa took office, Josh paid lip service to reform. Parisa took him at his word and he was promoted to a leadership position in the office. Instead of working to make real reform succeed, Josh spent his time furthering his own agenda by stirring up discontent, encouraging attorneys to quit, and actively undermining the mission of reform.

It needed to be said.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:https://bluevirginia.us/2023/05/two-prosecutors-in-arlington-falls-church-commonwealths-attorneys-office-make-the-case-for-reelecting-parisa-dehghani-tafti

Two current prosecutors have written why they support Parisa's re-election. It's worth reading.

And they don't say nice things about Josh

When Parisa took office, Josh paid lip service to reform. Parisa took him at his word and he was promoted to a leadership position in the office. Instead of working to make real reform succeed, Josh spent his time furthering his own agenda by stirring up discontent, encouraging attorneys to quit, and actively undermining the mission of reform.

I can’t say I find the opinions of 2 high ranking officials who currently work for Parisa to be persuasive. What were they going to say, she sucks?