Monterey County Crime & Justice Articles

A yearlong investigation shows that a $100 million-a-year rehabilitation program for former California prisoners grew with little oversight from the state corrections agency. It's unclear how many parolees wind up back in prison.

A Bay Area woman sued her husband's employer after she became infected with COVID-19. The California Supreme Court found that giving her workers' comp could set a precedent that would imperil the system.

The first-in-the-nation state-appointed task force report contains hundreds of recommendations for reparation, including a proposal that the state apologize and make financial amends for slavery and decades of racist policies.

In a landmark case, California's Supreme Court will decide if cities must switch their at-large elections to a voting-by-district system after hearing oral arguments the Pico Neighborhood Association v. Santa Monica voting rights case June 27.

The population of transgender inmates in California prisoners surged by 234 percent in the years since the state adopted a first-in-the-nation policy allowing gender-affirming health care.

Learn about the charismatic leaders who founded Daughters of Bilitis, Mattachine Society, ONE Inc. and other “homophile movement” groups in the Golden State.

You have to be 18 to get divorced in California, but there’s no minimum age to get married. Child marriage survivors protested at the state Capitol, but the Legislature likely won’t act until next year.

Gov. Gavin Newsom took to his Twitter account to propose an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would regulate gun sales and use nationwide, in a way that courts cannot change.

‘You small, pathetic man,’ Gavin Newsom wrote in a Twitter post suggesting he’d pursue criminal charges against Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis over recent migrant flights to Sacramento.

California is unwinding the prison-building boom of the 1980s and 1990s. The cuts are falling on small towns that banked on government jobs to anchor their communities.

More than 4 percent of death penalty convicts have been wrongfully convicted, data shows. But courts including the U.S. Supreme Court have failed to provide protections for the innocent facing death at the hands of the state.

GREENFIELD — Five new police officers and one community service officer, all bilingual speakers, have joined the Greenfield Police Department. Officers Damian Ayala, Daniel Lopez and Michael Ramirez are recent graduates from the police academy, and Officers Antonio Jardines and …

The Monterey County Civil Grand Jury has released a new report on the county Coroner’s Office, finding issues with insufficient staffing and inefficient workflows resulting in autopsy reports often taking more than six months to complete.

The death penalty remains legal in California, but Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered a moratorium on executions in 2019. Will capital punishment end in the state? Here’s what’s happening.

KING CITY — California Board of Parole Hearings has granted parole and a future release date to Angela Zuniga, who was convicted of second-degree murder of a Salinas teenager in 2013. Zuniga, of King City, was 21 years old at …

There are serious efforts being made to cut back on the number of non-public safety tickets police give out. In Seaside alone, about 50 tickets are written for broken tail lights or headlights each year.

KING CITY — Police chiefs of King City’s past, Keith Boyd and Robert Masterson, gathered with the town’s newest Chief of Police James Hunt during his swearing-in ceremony May 9 inside the Council Chambers. Hunt took over the position from …

With applause and cheers, dozens of people celebrated a unanimous vote on Tuesday, May 16 by Salinas City Council to repeal a ban on cruising on city streets.

The California Supreme Court has kept the state at the forefront of legal issues surrounding abortion, the death penalty and same-sex marriage, starting in its earliest days in the Gold Rush era.

KING CITY — Monterey law firm Fenton & Keller has opened a new law office in King City, led by attorney John E. Kesecker, following a soft opening on May 1, with plans for an official opening and ribbon-cutting ceremony …