BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KERO) — Former Kern County District Attorney Ed Jagels was taken into custody Monday afternoon on suspicion of driving under the influence.
Bakersfield police arrested Jagels at 4:35 p.m. on the 6000 block of Stockdale Highway and escorted him to the county jail.
The 77-year-old faces 2 misdemeanor charges — one for driving under the influence of alcohol and another for DUI with a blood alcohol content of 0.08 or higher. His bail was set at $10,000.
Jagels served as Kern County's longest-serving district attorney, winning office in 1983 and stepping down in 2010. His office launched prosecutions against dozens of parents in Oildale and Bakersfield during the 1980s, accusing them of satanic and mass sexual abuse rings.
In the decades that followed, state appellate courts and local judges dismantled those convictions, ruling that investigators coerced testimony from alleged child victims through suggestive and manipulative interrogation tactics. The courts' reversals spanned from the 1990s into 2004.
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