Ex-DA Anderson left lasting mark on office
Respected by all, he brought positive changes to policies
Harris County District Attorney Mike Anderson died of cancer in the early morning hours of Aug. 31 at age 57. He left behind a family who loved him, friends who admired and respected him and an office that he had lifted up with his innovative spirit, cheerful energy and unqualified support of their efforts to obtain justice.
On Sept. 5, the Houston Chronicle published an editorial about Mike and his service as district attorney (“Mike Anderson,” Page B8).
In the editorial, the Chronicle commented on Mike’s relatively brief time in office, stating that “we will never know what his impact might have been as district attorney.”
Actually, that’s not the case. We do know what impact Mike Anderson had on this office as district attorney. Mike was an example to us all of courageous perseverance in the face of adversity. He announced that he had cancer and promised that he was going to fight it. And then he went back to work.
At that time, Mike made it clear to me that his illness was not going to be an impediment to his executive function. Over the next three months, he made every significant policy decision that had to be made in this office, remaining the same lucid, whip-smart and decisive man he had always been.
Until the last week of his life, he was available to decide the important issues facing this office, both prosecutorial and administrative. He listened attentively to arguments for and against seeking the death penalty in capital murder cases, he worked with other law enforcement agencies on local initiatives, he weighed in on difficult personnel matters and he provided wisdom and counsel to me in my role as first assistant. We could not have asked for more from him.
Mike accomplished many great things in his eight months in office:
1He made the criminal justice system more effective and efficient. He prioritized solutions to the backlogs of unfiled homicide cases, untested rape kits and long-pending capital murder cases.
He used his forfeiture funds to provide significant financial assistance to Crime Stoppers, the Children’s Assessment Center, the Harris County felony mental health court and the Houston Police Department, which used its funds to purchase game-changing technology for capturing crime scene data.
His budget included new smartmoney resources for the office’s domestic violence, human trafficking and mental health diversion programs. He knew that the county’s resources were better spent in sending nonviolent mentally ill offenders to treatment facilities than locking them up in the Harris County Jail.
He fought for paralegals to assist our overworked prosecutorial staff in the felony courts, allowing them to focus more on lawyering and less on clerical work.
He revamped the pretrial intervention programs for first-time driving-while-intoxicated defendants, aligning the programs with existing Texas law and his commitment to the rehabilitation of offenders with alcohol abuse issues.
He launched a pilot program of making offense reports and DWI videos available through the Internet to defense attorneys. This program will be extended to the entire defense bar by the end of the year.
Mike also did something that cannot be measured statistically but that will have a lasting influence on the operations of the office: He raised the morale of the district attorney’s staff. A longtime prosecutor himself, he knew how hard this profession can be and he made sure that everyone on the staff knew how much he appreciated them.
He also empowered our prosecutors to do the right thing in each case for the right reason, making it clear that he trusted their judgment. At a time when our profession has been under fire, Mike’s unwavering support of his staff was reassuring to everyone in the office.
Shortly after Mike’s death, I observed that he was a “good man doing great things.” The next day, the Chronicle highlighted that quote in its story reporting Mike’s death (“‘Terrible loss’ seen in DA’s passing,” Sept. 1, Page A1) because, I think, it was a fair summary of his well-lived life. Facing great adversity, Mike remained true to his character to the very end. He disclosed his cancer to the public. And then he went back to work.
Mike was an example to us all of courageous perseverance in the face of adversity. He announced that he had cancer and promised that he was going to fight it. And then he went back to work.