California Racial Justice Act – District Attorney Transparency Cases 

The California Racial Justice Act (“RJA”) prohibits the State from pursuing convictions or sentences based upon race, ethnicity, or national origin. The law also permits challenges when such outcomes show racial bias or disparities.  

Since the RJA went into effect in 2021 the ACLU of Northern California has been working to force prosecutorial transparency by engaging in a statewide effort to access information to develop and pursue potential RJA claims. Using the California Public Records Act (“PRA”) and in partnership with the law firms of BraunHagey & Borden LLP and Morgan Lewis LLP, we have sought access to prosecutorial data, policies, training materials, and other information from every district attorney across the state. We have published the information we have collected, as well as other key resources, here. 

We have filed legal challenges in numerous cases where district attorneys have refused to produce information despite their legal obligation to do so. Numerous district attorneys have asserted inapplicable or overbroad exemptions to disclosure, unnecessarily delayed access to the information, or did not respond at all. We have successfully litigated the failure of these district attorneys to comply with the PRA in Orange County, Santa Cruz, Siskiyou, Mendocino, and Solano. We are also seeking and disclosing updated prosecutorial data and advancing other lawsuits to continue to force disclosure of prosecutorial records where district attorneys are not complying with their legal obligations. 

Further information about our work towards robust implementation of the RJA and the records that we have received from District Attorneys can be found here.