Is Alameda County’s DA Finally Delivering Real Accountability?

A year after voters recalled a progressive prosecutor, Alameda County’s new district attorney says she’s cleared thousands of stalled cases. But is the office really fixed — or just quieter?

Two thousand cases sat frozen. That was the backlog Ursula Jones Dickson says she inherited.
It matters now because voters just settled the question of who cleans it up. On June 2, 2026, Jones Dickson won a full term outright, taking roughly 65 percent of the vote and beating back a comeback bid from the district attorney recall removed in 2024, Pamela Price [Alameda County Registrar of Voters]. The election closed one chapter of a saga that began with a 63 percent recall vote against Price. It opened another: can Jones Dickson actually deliver the accountability she promised, or is Alameda County trading one set of unmet expectations for another?

Who Is Actually Running Alameda County’s Justice System Now?

Jones Dickson is no outsider. A former Alameda County Superior Court judge appointed to the bench in 2013 and a deputy district attorney for 14 years before that, she was one of 15 applicants the Board of Supervisors considered after Price’s recall [county records]. Supervisors picked her unanimously in January 2025; she was sworn in that February. Her appointed term was always temporary — good only until voters weighed in. They just did, and they weighed in decisively.

What Happened to the Backlog Progressives Left Behind?

Jones Dickson’s first move was procedural but consequential: she scrapped Price-era charging directives that required multiple layers of supervisory sign-off before prosecutors could file a case. By her 100th day in office, she said the office no longer carried a reported charging backlog. Juvenile case backlogs fell from roughly 340 to 130 over the same stretch [Oaklandside reporting]. She also rehired roughly a dozen experienced prosecutors who had left the office during Price’s tenure, saying the previous administration had left staff “scared to do their jobs.”

2,000. That’s roughly how many stalled adult criminal cases Jones Dickson says her office inherited. The question voters are still asking: how many of those cases involved victims who simply gave up waiting?

Are Violent Offenders Finally Facing Real Consequences?

Where Price’s office restricted prosecutors from seeking sentence enhancements except in narrow circumstances, Jones Dickson reversed that policy outright. Her office has also gone back to court seeking “special circumstances” charges — the kind that can carry life without parole — in cases the prior administration declined to pursue, including a multiple-murder case from the 1980s and a 2025 case involving five family members killed in Alameda. She also halted Price’s controversial review of death penalty convictions, a review that had drawn scrutiny over how it was conducted.

“We continue to find cases that have sat for years and have not been touched during the last administration.”

That line, from Jones Dickson herself, is less a policy statement than an indictment of what came before it — and it’s the kind of admission that raises its own follow-up questions.

Why Are Some of Her Own Decisions Drawing Scrutiny?

Accountability cuts both ways, and this is where the record gets more complicated. Jones Dickson dismissed a criminal case Price’s office had brought against Radius Recycling over a 2023 industrial fire that sent toxic smoke across the Bay Area, saying prosecutors must only pursue cases they can prove beyond a reasonable doubt. She’s also reviewing a complaint against Farmers Insurance and fired an outside law firm Price had retained for consumer-protection cases, citing ethics concerns. If a district attorney’s office can’t prove a case, should it have filed it in the first place — or is dropping it just as troubling as bringing it was?

Where Does She Stand on Federal Immigration Enforcement?

In October 2025, as ICE activity increased across the county, Jones Dickson issued a statement declaring her office will not share immigration status information with federal authorities or coordinate with ICE operations. It’s a position shared by most California DAs and consistent with state law, but it’s also a flashpoint. Her general-election rival, Gopal Krishan, campaigned on a more aggressive posture toward prosecuting federal agents for misconduct; Price made similar promises. Jones Dickson’s answer has been narrower: prosecute federal agents only where evidence proves a crime beyond reasonable doubt, same as any other case.

What Do Supporters of Price’s Approach Actually Believe?

Progressive critics argue Jones Dickson has simply restored a status quo that produced its own injustices — including racial disparities in jury selection that Price’s death-penalty review was meant to address. Price herself has framed the 2026 race as a fight against “corporate corruption” and Trump-aligned money, arguing that reform prosecutors are being systematically outspent and removed nationwide. That’s a serious argument, and it deserves a serious answer: California’s crime data doesn’t support the claim that reform prosecution made Alameda County safer, and 65 percent of voters — in a county that leans heavily Democratic — just said so directly. Accountability isn’t partisan when the electorate delivers it twice.

Key Questions This Story Raises

• Will the charging-backlog fix hold, or was it a one-time catch-up that stalls again as caseloads grow?
• How will Jones Dickson balance victim-focused prosecution with the ethical duty to only bring provable cases?
• Does declining to coordinate with ICE undercut public safety, or is it simply following state law?

What Happens If the Backlog Comes Back?

Jones Dickson’s own team acknowledges the office is still rebuilding — institutional knowledge lost during the Price years, a training gap among younger attorneys who saw fewer trials, and a staffing base that isn’t fully restored. Structural fixes only hold if the office keeps the discipline that produced them. Voters extended her a mandate through 2028. Whether that mandate survives contact with the county’s actual caseload is the real test still ahead.

Is Alameda County actually safer today — or just better at managing the paperwork of the problem?

That’s the question this office has to answer over the next two years, not just in press conferences, but in courtrooms and closed cases. The real question isn’t whether the backlog got smaller — it’s whether the county will notice if it starts growing again.

Still have questions about who’s running your local justice system? Stay informed — subscribe for daily coverage. Think your neighbors need to see this record for themselves? Share the article. Want your voice counted? Alameda County Board of Supervisors meetings are open to public comment — check the agenda at alamedacountyca.gov and show up.