Angela Alsobrooks says when she takes over as Prince George’s County’s top prosecutor Monday, she hopes to send a signal to public officials that her office will not put up with any sort of corruption. “We will be firm, we will be fair and we will be consistent in our prosecutions without respect for people’s title,” she said. “We don’t care who you are. If you are not law-abiding, people in this county have made it 100 percent clear to me that they do not wish to tolerate it in their community.”
Alsobrooks, 39, wouldn’t comment on the arrests stemming from an FBI probe into several high-profile county officials, including then-County Executive Jack Johnson and his wife, Leslie, now a county councilwoman.
“That’s an ongoing federal investigation, and you know, I haven’t even taken office yet. I don’t even have enough information to speak to it,” she said.
Alsobrooks said, though, that an ethicist will speak to her staff about such issues at the beginning of the year.
She has been working out of a conference room in the courthouse, meeting with potential hires and going over big cases with county attorneys. The Duke-educated single mother and Prince George’s native says securing additional funding to supplement the roughly $13 million budget for her office is a top priority.
“So the priorities are … first to concentrate internally to support the office and the attorneys as best we can, to seek resources to make sure they are able to do a first-class job,” she said.
Departing State’s Attorney Glenn Ivey, who did not run for re-election but endorsed Alsobrooks in her bid to replace him, said “the budgetary constraints are a huge challenge” as she tries to expand the office. The county is facing a $77 million shortfall next fiscal year.
“We’re getting to the point where we’ll have a million people here soon. It needs to be an office the size of the prosecutor’s office in other major jurisdictions,” he said.
The county handles more cases than Baltimore in some crime categories, Alsobrooks pointed out, though that city has more than 200 lawyers compared with the county’s 70.
Other plans include hiring a full-time training director and a grant writer to find more money.
Alsobrooks said she wants to focus more on auto theft, vandalism and home break-ins, which she calls “quality of life” crimes.
“Those were the crimes people talked to me the most about,” she said. “So we’re going to have an increased focus on those crimes.”
