Judge Judy blames liberal prosecutors for skyrocketing crime rate

The following is an edited version of an article published by the (UK) Daily Mail. 

In a recent interview with Fox News Digital, Judge Judy (Sheindlin) blamed liberal district attorneys for leaving America's cities "ruined", and said they would be better employed "filling ice-cream cones."

The veteran reality TV star, known for making rough the path of the wicked, said the country is in worse shape than it was when her popular programme started 30 years ago because "a small group of people who have very loud voices created a scenario where bad people got rewarded."

And she lashed out at a culture that increasingly excuses people's behaviour on the basis of their background. "I know how we got here," she said. "When society started to make excuses for bad behaviour, and react to criminality based upon the excuses, it fell apart."

Judge Judy spoke out after Multnomah County (OR) DA Mike Schmidt became the latest liberal prosecutor elected in the wake of the Black Lives Matter scam to lose his bid for re-election. "When you have district attorneys who are charged, whose job it is to do justice, but to keep the community safe, when you have elected district attorneys who don't know what their job is, they should go find another job," said the judge. "'Fill ice cream cones someplace, but don't ruin cities."

She added, "And what's happened around New York City, Portland, San Francisco, you had district attorneys who didn't know what their job was. And the cities are ruined, people are leaving."

So far this year, robberies are up 5.2% in the Big Apple, while recorded hate crimes have jumped 11% per cent. In Portland, larceny offenses jumped to more than 26,000 in the year to April, while arrests for prostitution more than doubled amid an ongoing drugs and homelessness crisis. 

Meanwhile, in the District of Columia, homicides jumped by 35% while robberies were up 67%. In San Francisco, DA Chesa Boudin lost his job in a 2022 recall election after securing just three -- count `em, 3 -- drug convictions the previous year.

Judge Sheindlin lashed out at the state of New York's 2019 decision to raise the minimum age at which a suspect can be tried as an adult to 18, branding it "ridiculous... If you have family, if you have a mother who's 65 years old who's walking to the grocery store and some crazy for no reason hits her over the head with a steel pipe and kills her, and they're 17, that person should never be allowed to walk the street again, because society can't take a chance.

"If I wouldn't take a chance on him living next to me why would I take a chance on him living next to you? You're just as dead as somebody 18 kills you, or 17. And if you're 17 years old and kill somebody, you don't belong with kids who are 12, in a juvenile facility. But a very small group of people pushed through in New York State, for instance, raising the level of criminal responsibility."

The explanations for why a person becomes a criminal should never be confused with excuses, she said. "You know there is always a reason for criminal behaviour. 

"Didn't have a good upbringing, didn't have two parents in the house, didn't have one parent in the house, there's always a reason. You're mentally ill. That's a reason. You took drugs, that's a reason. You took alcohol, your brain is fried, whatever it is. There is never an excuse for bad behaviour."

Judge Judy also reflected on how the situation has deteriorated since she began her TV career. "Here we are, 30 years later, and are we in a worse shape as a country, as a world, than we were in 1993? You bet your bottom we are. I think we better get smarter before we get lost," she added. "Permanently lost."