Casey Gwinn

Casey Gwinn took office December 2, 1996, as the City Attorney of the City of San Diego. Prior to his election, Casey headed the Domestic Violence Unit for nine years. He has handled over 10,000 domestic violence cases. The Unit has been recognized by the Governor's Office of Criminal Justice Planning for it's aggressive prosecution of batteries even when the victims are unwilling or unable to participate. In 1993, the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges chose Casey's unit as the model prosecution unit for the nation in the handling of domestic violence cases. The Unit handles an active caseload of 1,500 domestic violence cases and receives 300 new cases month involving misdemeanor spousal abuse.

Casey was a founding member of the San Diego Task force on domestic Violence in 1989. The task force started with 80 agencies countywide including law enforcement agencies, shelters, hospitals, churches, and other victim service providers. The task force concluded its work in 1991 after implementing model protocols for law enforcement, medical facilities, military agencies, prosecutors, and treatment providers. He then led the San Diego Domestic Violence Council for seven years. The Council serves as the coordinating body for all the domestic violence intervention agencies in San Diego County.

Most recently, Casey has devoted his energies to initiatives to address the spiraling rates of juvenile crime through early intervention and parental responsibility strategies. These initiatives include defending the City's aggressive curfew enforcement policy, creating the San Diego Parenting Project, and drafting a daytime loitering ordinance for the City of San Diego.

Casey's primary focus has always been on early intervention at the misdemeanor level in order to prevent an escalation of the offenders behavior to felony level conduct. He personally pioneered the current state of the art methods for winning domestic violence cases in trial without victim testimony. His work as a prosecutor is credited with playing a major role in the 60% drop in domestic violence homicides over the last 10 years in San Diego. Today, less than 6% of San Diego's homicides are domestic violence-related compared to the national average of 30%.

Casey, his wife Beth, and their three children live in San Diego suburb San Carlos. Casey is a frequent speaker for the state and national domestic violence organizations and coalitions, law enforcement agencies, victim service agencies, churches, service clubs, hospitals, and other groups throughout the country as he calls for effective early intervention to protect domestic violence victims and successfully break the generation cycle of violence.

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