One of the most successful traits in a manager or owner taking over the operation of a business previously run by other hands is the ability to assimilate the very best of the staff, ensuring they become part of your mission and that your goals tap the myriad talents they display. Sadly, this rule — like so many in the business realm — doesn’t work out so easily in politics.

We don’t pretend to know all the dynamics involved in the forced resignation of veteran prosecutor Beth Toben from McLennan County District Attorney Abel Reyna’s staff this week, just five months after Reyna rode a Republican electoral tsunami into office, unseating Toben’s longtime boss, John Segrest. Almost from the start, courthouse observers saw Reyna’s first test as finding a way to make solid use of Toben, who during the course of 22 years distinguished herself prosecuting child molesters and rapists.

During her tenure, she played a role in getting law enforcement throughout our county to settle on a uniform system for investigating sexual assault cases, consequently allowing for successful prosecutions. This kept some individuals from getting away with the most despicable sorts of crime in our community.

Yet, in the end, Reyna obviously felt he couldn’t work with this dedicated, intelligent prosecutor. It probably didn’t help when, shortly after he took office, he demoted Toben, a former deputy first assistant under Segrest, cutting her pay by $18,000. Some sources tell veteran courthouse reporter Tommy Witherspoon that she was unhappy with Reyna’s decision to split her and longtime prosecutorial partner Mark Parker. Yet others say Reyna couldn’t get past Toben’s vocal support for her boss during the 2010 campaign season, including a column in the Trib.

The list of sexual deviants taken off our streets because of Toben and the personal interest she took in each of the child victims whose cases she handled suggest we have not seen or heard the last of Toben. The fact that she and Reyna could not reach a workable coexistence for the betterment of our county is extremely regrettable, something we should all lament, whatever our political sentiments in the election battle between Segrest and Reyna last year. Just where the blame falls in all of this we may never know.

That said, Reyna won the election. He is an accomplished attorney in his own right, comes from a family that knows law from the ground up, and displays a zeal and commitment to his duties that give us hope for the future, even if it must be without a great asset like Toben. He has every right to run the district attorney’s office as he sees fit. After all, he’ll be judged by how well he succeeds in four years.