|
Richard Wood first worked in the criminal justice system in June 1970 at MacLaren School for Boy’s in Woodburn, Oregon. MacLaren was a CYA type institution that had a population of about 500 delinquent boys. Working as a group life supervisor, he learned about crime and its causes one on one from delinquents. He then went to work as a juvenile probation officer in Columbia County, Oregon where he remained for three and one-half years. Columbia County had a very small population and there were only three probation officers. The work included writing sentencing reports, supervising juvenile offenders, working on a child abuse team with a social worker and a district attorney’s investigator and community work. In 1972, Mr. Wood earned a master’s degree in counseling psychology from the University of Portland.
In 1974, Mr. Wood returned to his home in San Francisco and went to work for the San Francisco Juvenile Court as a deputy probation officer. He had a caseload of probationers in the Bayview, Hunter’s Point and Potrero Hill neighborhoods. Most of his charges were high risk teenagers from high crime areas including the housing projects.
In May 1975, Mr. Wood joined the United States Probation Office in the Northern District of California. He prepared presentence reports and supervised probationers and parolees. For four years he carried a special caseload which included individuals enrolled in the federal witness protection program. For three years he was a member of the California State Prison Gang Task Force.
In August 1985, Mr. Wood left federal service to join Dayle Carlson in his business. While working, Mr. Wood enrolled in the University of San Francisco’s doctoral program in counseling psychology. He completed all of his course work for his doctorate and passed his oral examinations in 1987.
Private sector work included writing alternative sentencing reports in both federal and state courts. In 1988, he started working on capital cases. Over the last fourteen years, he has worked on approximately seventy-five capital cases both in federal and state court. His cases have been in Sacramento, San Joaquin, Santa Clara, Placer, Stanislaus, Fresno, Yolo and Contra Costa Counties. These cases have been trial cases and cases that are in the habeas process in both federal and state court. Most of this work has been in penalty phase investigations, but he also has completed guilt phase investigations in many capital and other major cases. Mr. Wood is an acknowledged expert in the area of social history and the development of mitigation. He has lectured on the development of mitigation at the CACJ\CPDA death penalty seminar and lectured on the causes of violence at Sacramento City College.
Over the last seventeen years, Mr. Wood has written hundreds of reports and testified in juvenile and adult court in many jurisdictions. He has qualified as a social history expert in both California and Montana. He has prepared reports for lifer hearings, prepared pre-parole plans, set up alternative sentencing and drug programs for many defendants. Mr. Wood has worked on capital cases in California, Montana, Colorado and Nevada and conducted investigations in Canada, Mexico, The Phillippines, and Vietnam. He works with privately retained counsel, public defenders and CJA attorneys.
|
