Four years ago, George Gascón, fresh off his win as Los Angeles County’s new district attorney, made bold, dramatic policy changes his first day in office. Among them were instructions to prosecutors in the D.A.’s office to stop charging juveniles as adults, to get rid of a number of sentencing enhancements that could add years to a criminal’s jail sentence based on things like crimes committed on behalf of a gang or crimes involving a firearm, and barring prosecutors from accompanying victims or their families to parole hearings.
Fast forward to 2024. There’s a new district attorney in town – and he vowed to roll back a number of the new policies enacted by his predecessor.
On Tuesday, Dec. 3, former federal prosecutor Nathan Hochman took the oath of office as L.A. County’s 44th district attorney. He was sworn in by former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger outside the Hall of Justice in downtown L.A.
“I am deeply honored for the opportunity of a lifetime,” Hochman said in a roughly 20-minute speech during which he outlined his vision and goals for the nation’s largest local prosecutorial office.
“A D.A. must have as its North Star only two things: the facts and the law and not a personal political agenda,” Hochman said.
Gascón swept into office on a progressive criminal justice reform agenda in 2020, as the nation was reckoning with racial injustices after the death of George Floyd. But he became deeply unpopular among many of the prosecutors he oversaw because of sweeping policy changes he handed down, or the way he managed the D.A.’s office.
This election, the Association of Deputy District Attorneys, which represents deputy D.A.s in L.A. County, endorsed Hochman.
On Tuesday, Hochman thanked prosecutors for their work. And, as is fitting in Los Angeles, he turned to Dodgers references to describe the prosecutors he will now lead.
“They are effectively my Shohei Ohtanis, my Mookie Betts, my Freddie Freemans … and I will be the district attorney who will have their back,” he said to cheers and applause from the crowd of several hundred people.
Hochman was not the only one to cite pop culture or sports references.
Schwarzenegger, before administering the oath of office to Hochman, revived his famous line from The Terminator movies about how he would “be back.”
“The city of Los Angeles is now going to be back,” said Schwarzenegger, who said that in the last few years, the City of Angels had become “pitiful” with constant news about stabbings, robberies and store burglaries.
In the fall, Gascón said that statistics from the Los Angeles Police Department show that homicides are down in the city and that year-to-date figures make clear that crimes against people and property have decreased. Still, many of Gascón’s critics believe crime in L.A. ran amok under his tenure.
Hochman handily defeated Gascón in a landslide victory last month, winning by nearly 20 percentage points, or more than 655,000 votes.
“Now we have hope,” Schwarzenegger said, referring to Hochman’s approach to prosecuting cases.
“Hope” appeared to be the buzz word during Tuesday’s ceremony. It was also used by County Board of Supervisor Chair Kathryn Barger and L.A. City Councilmember Traci Park in their speeches.
Others in attendance included Jackie Lacey, the former L.A. district attorney who lost her bid for reelection to Gascon four years ago and who endorsed Hochman this year; L.A. County Sheriff Robert Luna; and Los Angeles Police Chief Jim McDonnell.
And while the mood was largely celebratory, a small group of protesters could be heard chanting and waving signs across the street, though what they were chanting was difficult to make out and it wasn’t entirely clear what they were protesting.
To be sure, though, Tuesday’s ceremony was a moment of celebration for Hochman.
But the 61-year-old Los Angeles native intimated during an interview over the weekend that he understands much work lies ahead.
Making good on a pledge that Hochman made on the campaign trail to undo some of his predecessor’s more controversial policies his first day in office, the D.A.’s office announced within minutes of the swearing-in ceremony ending that Hochman had indeed issued directives to rescind some of Gascon’s policies.
Specifically, prosecutors will again be allowed to seek sentencing enhancements for defendants who use a firearm while committing a crime or who commit a crime to benefit a street gang, and may charge juveniles with misdemeanors if they steal merchandise worth less than $950.
In addition, prosecutors may again attend parole hearings to advocate for victims or their families when an inmate is seeking early release.
Hochman also announced Tuesday that he plans to launch task forces to focus on issues of homelessness, fentanyl use, human trafficking, hate crimes, organized retail crimes and residential burglaries.
Throughout the campaign, many portrayed the race between Gascón – nicknamed the “godfather” of progressive prosecutors – and Hochman as a choice between a progressive reformer and a more conservative, tougher-on-crime leader. Gascón even warned that electing Hochman would mean a return to the days of mass incarceration for people of color.
As he’s done many times now, the new district attorney on Tuesday emphasized that he rejects “extreme policies on both ends of the pendulum.”
Hochman said he’s neither for decarceration policies that let criminals off the hook without adequate consequences – something he accused his political opponent of doing – or blanket policies that result in mass incarceration – something which Gascón accused him of supporting.
Instead, Hochman described a “hard middle” approach to prosecuting, pledging to consider each case individually based on a defendant’s past criminal record, the crime, and the impact of the crime on the victim or victims.
In an interview two days before being sworn in, Hochman described his decisive victory in the election as a mandate from voters for the county’s top prosecutor “to do his job – to prioritize public safety while instituting real and effective criminal justice reforms.”
“I don’t believe these are antithetical concepts,” Hochman said. “You can do both at the same time, which is exactly what we’re going to do.”
During the interview, Hochman expressed frustration that during the campaign people often brought up the fact that until recently he was registered as a Republican yet failed to recognize that he was registered as a Democrat for 20 years before being registered as a Republican for another 20 years.
In 2022, Hochman ran unsuccessfully for state attorney general as a Republican. He then switched to no party preference and ran for district attorney this year as an independent to reflect the fact, he said, that the D.A.’s office is nonpartisan.
“No one reports me as an ex-Democrat. I’ve been a centrist my whole life,” Hochman said. “I’ve been pro-choice, pro-LGBTQ my whole life. People like to put a label on you. I did run as a Republican for attorney general. But 99.9% of the people who say that about me didn’t bother to read one word about me and what I was running on in 2022.”
Hochman said he proposed middle-of-the road approaches when he ran for state attorney general – much like he did during his campaign for district attorney.
If people did not know Hochman before, they now have the next four years to learn more about this Los Angeles native.
Hochman, who turned 61 last month, attended Beverly Hills High School, where he played varsity tennis, was a member of the debate and was elected student body president his senior year.
He’s been married for 31 years to his wife Vivienne Vella Hochman, who has practiced law. The couple lives in Brentwood and has three children, all in their 20s and recently became first-time grandparents.
They say the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, and such was the case for Hochman, whose father was a prosecutor in L.A. for the U.S. Attorney’s Office and later opened his own tax law firm.
Hochman himself was an assistant U.S. attorney for the Central District of California. From 1990 to 1997, he prosecuted over 100 cases, including ones involving gang members, drug traffickers and corrupt public officials. He also ran the environmental crimes section of his office, going after air, water and land polluters.
Hochman later served as an assistant attorney general overseeing the U.S. Department of Justice’s tax division from 2007 to 2009.
In addition to his day job, Hochman served on the Los Angeles City Ethics Commission for five years and was president of the commission from 2015 to 2016. The commission is responsible for enforcing the city’s ethics laws and doles out punishments to city officials and others who violate these laws.
Most recently, Hochman worked for a private law firm, specializing in criminal defense, tax litigation and complex business litigation.
