Orange County DA scolds sheriff over evidence mishandling controversy

Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer blasted Sheriff Don Barnes on Wednesday for allegedly sitting on the results of a department-wide audit that showed deputies routinely booked property evidence late, if at all.
In a letter to Barnes, Spitzer said the Sheriff’s Department never notified his staff of the wide-scale mishandling of evidence from February 2016 through February 2018. Instead, prosecutors were asked to review “seemingly unrelated” individual cases against 1