“Follow the science” is a common chorus among progressives. But often they, not those they moralize against, are the real science deniers.

Take progressive prosecutors. Many, like George Gascon in Los Angeles, tout their soft-on-crime policies as “data driven” or “scientifically backed.”

Yet this is a complete hoax. These prosecutors cite studies that are misleading, non-replicable, non-peer-reviewed, or entirely disproven.

But the most damning proof that they are science deniers, not science followers, is the simple fact that crime, especially violent crime, has risen dramatically in their jurisdictions.

Of course, none of this has stopped them — and their media cheerleaders — from repeating the “data and science” incantation ad nauseum.

The problem isn’t the use of data or science to support prosecutorial policies. District attorneys have collected data for decades. That’s unsurprising given that the raison d’être of every elected prosecutor is public safety — a goal that data collection significantly furthers.

But instead of using data to protect the public, progressive prosecutors (or, more accurately, rogue prosecutors) collect data as a weapon against opposing viewpoints. They use it to justify recommending shorter sentences, to prevent the prosecutors under them from seeking more than one charge in many cases, and to seek low or no bail in others.

In other cases, rogue prosecutors use data to make prosecutorial decisions based on race and class rather than on public safety. They then reward assistant DAs who implement these progressive agendas — and punish those who dissent.

Fair and Just Prosecution (FJP), the front group for the progressive prosecutor movement, recommends that prosecutors should “adopt performance standards that reflect your values… encourage desired outcomes by adopting metrics like reducing incarceration, pretrial detention, and recidivism…. Include these measures in promotion decisions.”

FJP cautions rogue prosecutors not to consider a defendant’s arrest history when deciding whether to offer them bail, because it “reinforce(s) patterns of racial disparity.”

To support these soft-on-crime actions, rogue prosecutors rely on two main studies – neither of which is either factual or replicable.

In the first study, the chief judge of Cook County, Illinois (home of Chicago), reduced the cash bail amounts in his circuit, which led to more defendants being released before trial. In 2019, the chief judge issued a report stating that “the increased release of defendants from jail did not increase the threat to public safety in Cook County.”

Unfortunately, the exact opposite was true.

In a lengthy expose, the Chicago Tribune detailed the study’s flawed methodology and faulty conclusions. Among other things, the Tribune reported, the judge undercounted murders, limited his definition of “violent crime” to six offenses, and only counted the first new charge against released defendants, even when those defendants were charged with multiple new crimes.

A Wake Forest University law review article (written by a retired federal judge and former federal prosecutor) also noted that the study failed to control for many other factors and ignored confounding variables.

These authors found that “the number of crimes committed by pretrial releasees appear(ed)… to have significantly increased.” In fact, “the number of released defendants charged with committing new crimes increased by about 45 percent…(and) the number of pretrial releasees charged with new violent crimes increased by about 33%.”

The second study cited by rogue prosecutors has been similarly discredited.

The study contended that “marginal non-prosecuted misdemeanor defendant(s)” were 53% less likely to face criminal complaints in the next two years than similar defendants who were prosecuted. After this study’s release, then-DA of Suffolk County (home of Boston) used it to support her decision not to prosecute non-violent misdemeanors.

But this study, like the Chicago bail study, made crucial errors.

Instead of examining all criminal defendants in Suffolk County or even all misdemeanor offenders, the study only considered first-time misdemeanor offenders. But the pertinent question is not whether the first-time misdemeanor offenders will re-offend; many will not, regardless of whether they’re prosecuted. The real issue is whether the whole group of people that the DA decided to let off the hook — a group that includes repeat offenders — would likely re-offend.

In other words, the study examined only the most favorable subset of the data and ignored the data most likely to refute its hypothesis. It also failed to distinguish between cases that were charged, cases that were diverted to a non-punitive forum for resolution, and cases that were dropped.

Worse, the study used data that’s inaccessible and irreplicable.

Data and science aren’t the problem. The problem is the way rogue prosecutors use both words. Saying the words “data” and “science” repeatedly may sound credible, but after pulling back the curtain, one discovers that rogue prosecutors’ appeals to “data and science” are nothing more than a smokescreen — a “data and science” hoax.

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Charles "Cully" Stimson is the Deputy Director of The Heritage Foundation’s Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies and co-author of “Rogue Prosecutors: How Radical Soros Lawyers Are Destroying America’s Communities.”

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