Eric Gonzalez last night went from acting Kings County District Attorney to becoming Brooklyn’s first elected Latino DA in a landslide victory over five opponents in the Democratic primary.
According to unofficial results, Gonzalez garnered 76,947 votes or 53.1% of the electorate to second place finisher Anne Swern who had 16,653 votes or 11.5% of the electorate. Following Swern, Mark Fliedner received 10.2 percent of the vote, Pat Gatling had 9.3% of the vote, Vincent Gentile garnered 8.7% of the vote and Ama Dwimoh had 7.2% of the vote.
“I am so happy,” Gonzalez said at his Williamsburg Hotel victory party. “Tonight we make history. I look around this room and see what’s beautiful about Brooklyn. I see the diversity.”
Gonzalez, 48, unlikely rise from the hard-scrabble streets of East New York to becoming the borough’s top prosecutor started last October following the unexpected cancer death of former DA Ken Thompson in his third year of his four-year term, and who appointed Gonzalez acting DA just days before his death.
His victory capped off a grueling contest in which five former assistant district attorneys challenged Gonzalez, who showed a campaigning grit that belied his mild-mannered persona.
He proved to be both an able fundraiser, far outraising his primary opponents with more than $1 million in his campaign war chest, and easily garnered the most endorsements, including from all of Brooklyn’s Congressional delegation and the city’s rank-and-file police union.
With crime at an all-time low, the primary contest was characterized as a race to the left with all the candidates arguing who would best lead the borough in criminal justice reforms including the lessening of bail, instituting alternatives to incarceration and stepping up social service programs to help keep at-risk impovershed residents away from a life of crime.
“I’m here to make sure our criminal justice system in Brooklyn is the finest we can have while keeping us safe. We’re going to make sure we lead the most progressive D.A.’s office in the country,” Gonzalez said.
In his victory speech, Gonzalez emotionally credited his mother who kept him on the straight and narrow, and noted in an earlier KCP profile how he was fortunate in being a very strong test taker, and someone who always enjoyed school.
Although Gonzalez got into Brooklyn Tech for high school, he decided to go to John Dewy High School in Coney Island as it was a more integrated school and in a different part of the borough. It was here where he also became involved with Aspira, an organization involved in creating educational opportunities for young Puerto Rican and Latino youths.
Gonzalez said he originally planned on entering the military after high school like many on both his mom and dads side of the family, but with Aspira’s help and guidance, along with his own perseverance and tenacity, he got into Cornell University, and after law school, began his legal career in 1995, as an assistant district attorney in the Kings County District Attorney’s Office, thereby fulfilling his ambition to give back to his community.
Gonzalez spent several years, first as a junior and then senior assistant in different bureaus within the office, including the Sex Crimes and Special Victims Bureau and Domestic Violence Bureau. He also regularly liaised with community members and precinct commanders as part of a “community prosecution” approach to law enforcement.
Shortly after Thompson took office in 2014, Gonzalez was promoted to Counsel to the District Attorney, the first Latino to hold that position in Brooklyn.
The two prosecutors then successfully launched several of Thompson’s key initiatives, including the creation of the Conviction Review Unit and the office changing policy regarding the possession of marijuana, which Gonzalez framed and implemented.
