Fresno City Councilman criticizes county officials following attack on city worker

FRESNO, Calif. (KSEE/KGPE) – A Fresno City councilman is criticizing the Fresno County District Attorney’s Office and the sheriff’s office for mishandling the arrests and prosecutions of homeless people.

Councilmember Miguel Arias believes that the gruesome attack on the beloved city worker, Tim Smith, could have been prevented.

“I knew something like this was going to happen eventually, because the message out in the unhoused community is that you can commit whatever you want in Fresno and you’ll never see the county jail for longer than an hour. And you definitely won’t get prosecuted by the county DA.”

County officials say that’s just not true. Fresno County District Attorney Lisa Smittcamp and Sheriff John Zanoni told YourCentralValley.com that there’s not enough room in the jail to hold individuals who do not pose a threat to the public. 

But Sheriff Zanoni says calling it overcrowding is not correct. 

“We may have open beds within the jail right now as we speak, we still may have to release people under the federal consent decree,” Zanoni said.

He states that if the jail houses inmates who are at risk of getting into fights with each other, but do so anyway, the jail could be sued for failing to protect the well-being of those inmates.

“Because we knew what the potential outcome would be,” Zanoni said.

Smittcamp says that Padavona’s criminal history doesn’t point to an attack as heinous as the one caught on surveillance video last week.

“That’s why he was one time released on his own, recognizance by a judge. And one time he was released on overcrowding,” DA Smittcamp said. 

Zanoni portrays the attack as an indictment of California’s penal system.

“The city’s not to blame. The county’s not, you know who is to blame for this attack on the city employee? It’s Dyllan Padavona. And I say that because this is what’s wrong with our system. We look to blame other people. Blame the individual who committed the crime. He needs to be held accountable. And I believe with the charges that he has, he’s currently in our jail. He will be held accountable this time,” he said.

Arias also claims that the Fresno County DA’s Office is not prosecuting people who are charged with the city’s no-camping ordinance.

“That’s why the city has had to fund its own prosecution team and has had to take folks to trial because the county system has been doing it,” Arias said. But Smittcamp said, “That’s really just not true.”

Smittcamp shared that her office has never been approached about prosecuting these types of cases, but is more than happy to review them if they do.