Meet John McKinney, Candidate For Los Angeles City Attorney

LOS ANGELES, CA — John McKinney, 58, is vying to be elected as Los Angeles city attorney.

McKinney is facing off against Marissa Roy in the Nov. 3 general election.

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Learn more about McKinney's goals for Los Angeles:

What is your educational background?

I grew up in a low-income, high-crime neighborhood. After high school, I enrolled in college but dropped out after my first year to work as a fast-food worker, blacksmith, carpenter's apprentice, warehouse worker and delivery driver. After a few years, I returned to school, attended community college while working full-time, and later transferred to Rutgers University and finished my degree. I moved to Los Angeles in 1994 with $250 in my pocket and earned my JD from UCLA Law School.

What is your professional background?

Immediately after graduating from law school, I joined the LA County District Attorney's Office where I have worked for nearly 30 years. Throughout my career, I have prosecuted crimes ranging from misdemeanor offenses to over 40 murder cases — securing convictions in each one. I currently hold a senior role in the office as director of specialized prosecutions, overseeing cases related to juveniles, family violence, sex crimes, narcotics, major crimes and gang homicide.

Have you ever held public office, whether appointive or elective?

No, I have spent my entire career as a prosecutor working to improve public safety and our system of justice here in Los Angeles.

The city attorney has significant discretion over misdemeanor cases. Name one category of misdemeanor cases you believe the office should prosecute more aggressively and one category in which you would make use of diversion or decline prosecution. Why?

The focus of the Los Angeles City Attorney's Office must be on the crimes that are most directly impacting the public safety of our communities and the quality of life or our neighborhoods.

That means prioritizing cases involving repeat offenders who drive quality-of-life crime through theft, vandalism, and destruction of property. It also means focusing on retail theft and organized shoplifting, which have become a major challenge for small businesses across Los Angeles. When businesses are repeatedly targeted, it threatens their ability to stay open and serve their communities.

The City Attorney must prioritize dangerous activity like street racing and open-air drug markets, as well as cases involving illegal firearms possession, because these offenses pose immediate risks to public safety and often contribute to more serious criminal activity.

Finally, the City Attorney needs to play an active role in addressing the homelessness crisis — keeping sidewalks passable, protecting parks and schools, and addressing dangerous encampments that threaten community safety.

At the same time, the City Attorney's approach must include compassionate accountability. This is not about punishment for its own sake — it is about restoring order while working closely with diversion programs and service providers to help people access housing, treatment, and support. A balanced approach ensures laws are applied in ways that protect public safety while respecting the dignity of individuals.

How aggressively should the city attorney use affirmative civil litigation against landlords, employers, corporations or other private entities? What criteria would you use to decide which cases justify city resources?

The City Attorney should use affirmative civil litigation aggressively when private entities violate the law and cause real harm to Los Angeles residents, but litigation should be strategic and focused on cases where the city can make a meaningful difference.

For landlords, that means pursuing serious and repeat violations involving unsafe living conditions, tenant harassment, illegal evictions, unlawful rent increases, price gouging and deceptive fees. The goal should not simply be punishment, but securing compliance, correcting dangerous conditions and protecting housing stability. For employers, I would prioritize wage theft, payroll violations, unsafe working conditions, retaliation, discrimination and other serious violations of workers' rights.

The same principle applies to corporations and other private entities. The city attorney should act when there is evidence of unlawful conduct affecting Los Angeles residents, workers, consumers, or taxpayers and when civil enforcement can prevent continuing or widespread harm.

With limited resources, we cannot pursue every violation. The priority should be cases where enforcement can protect the greatest number of residents, deter future misconduct, and produce measurable results — not litigation for the sake of generating headlines.

Both you and your opponent have said the city should reduce its reliance on outside attorneys. What specific change would you make to outside-counsel spending during your first year, and under what circumstances would you still hire an outside law firm?

The City Attorney's Office has hundreds of attorneys, and taxpayers should not be paying private-firm rates for work our own attorneys are capable of performing.

Outside counsel should be the exception, not the rule. I would still retain an outside firm when a case requires highly specialized or niche legal expertise that the city does not reasonably have in-house, when an unavoidable conflict prevents city attorneys from handling a matter, or when extraordinary circumstances temporarily exceed the office's capacity. Those decisions should be based on the complexity of the case, the expertise required and whether hiring outside counsel actually provides better value for taxpayers.

I would also require greater accountability for those contracts by tracking what we spend, why matters are being outsourced, and whether outside counsel is delivering results that justify the cost. My goal is not simply to move cases around — it is to build a modern, well-trained City Attorney's Office capable of handling complex civil and criminal matters itself.

Every unnecessary dollar spent on outside lawyers is a dollar that cannot be invested in public safety, infrastructure, parks, libraries and other essential city services.

The city attorney oversees an office of roughly 1,000 legal professionals. What specific changes would you make to the office's management, staffing or internal operations during your first year, and how would you measure whether those changes are working?

The City Attorney's Office must be an efficient steward of public funds, delivering strong legal representation while minimizing unnecessary costs. The City is paying out hundreds of millions of dollars in liability — money that could otherwise support infrastructure, public safety, and essential services. While some victims deserved compensation, many incidents could have been prevented.

As city attorney, I would implement an aggressive risk-management strategy that identifies recurring sources of liability across city departments before they become lawsuits. That means improving training, tracking patterns in claims and settlements, and ensuring our attorneys are working proactively with departments rather than simply responding after something goes wrong. I would vigorously defend against frivolous claims while resolving legitimate cases early when doing so protects taxpayers from larger verdicts.

Internally, I would review how attorneys are assigned and deployed, modernize case-management systems, and reduce unnecessary reliance on outside counsel. We would measure whether these reforms are working with concrete results: fewer claims filed against the city, lower total liability payouts, reduced outside-counsel spending, and improved efficiency in resolving cases.

Candidates' responses were lightly edited for style and clarity.