- 70,049
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NYC to get a whole lot more interesting 2020 VOL. eliminating cash bail
- 74,614
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- Apr 4, 2008
Da bill is good intentioned but poorly written
- 5,586
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- Aug 27, 2013
you aware its fellow democrats in NYC that are critical of da bill?
and the republicans aren’t critical?
- 70,049
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- Aug 1, 2004
they're out of power in NY State, so their say is irelevant...which brings back to my point, its fellow democrats who are harping on da bill.
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- Aug 1, 2004
METRO
NYPD commissioner Dermot Shea blames bail reform for 2020 crime spike
By Gabrielle Fonrouge
January 24, 2020 | 9:14pm
NYPD Police Commissioner Dermot Shea
NYPD Police Commissioner Dermot Shea
William Farrington
A sharp rise in citywide crime since 2020 began was sparked by New York’s new bail reform laws, which took away a judge’s discretion to hold repeat and possibly violent offenders behind bars, NYPD Police Commissioner Dermot Shea said at a press conference Friday.
“In the first three weeks of this year, we’re seeing significant spikes in crime. So either we forgot how to police New York City, or there’s a correlation,” Shea told reporters in reference to the new laws.
“If you let out individuals that commit a lot of crime, that’s precision policing in reverse and we’re seeing the effects in a very quick time, and that is why we’re so concerned.”
The new law has stopped a slew of non-violent offenses from being bail eligible, allowing criminals to walk free after committing robberies, burglaries and other offenses.
Since 2020 began, as of Friday at midnight, robberies are up 32.5 percent, car theft is up 61 percent and burglaries are up 18 percent compared to the same time period last year.
And the numbers aren’t fractions either — a total of 233 more robberies have happened this year compared to last, 159 more car thefts and 125 more burglaries, just in the last three weeks.
SEE ALSO
Gerod Woodberry
Ridiculous reform forces NYPD to ask feds to catch serial NYC bank robber
“People say it just took effect you can’t have consequences already. Take a look at the comp stat,” Shea railed.
“We’re seeing it immediately at the same time that you have [state and local jail] populations dropping significantly,” the new commissioner went on.
“Now don’t tell me there’s not a correlation to that.”
Shea went to Albany this week to talk to lawmakers about his concerns, which he said were two pronged.
The first issue is repeat offenders being let out over and over again but the second issue is the state’s new discovery laws, which require prosecutors to turn over all of their evidence, plus the contact information of witnesses and victims, within 15 days of an arrest.
“The second piece is going to take longer and then it’s going to be a one two punch as discovery takes hold,” Shea said.
“Discovery is going to change how crimes are prosecuted in New York.”
While the new discovery law was created to ensure the accused aren’t seeing the evidence against them “until the eve of trial,” “swinging it back 180 degrees the other way and giving everything over immediately is equally wrong,” Shea said.
“When you have instances where witnesses and victims will be afraid to call the police, that is a real problem and that needs to be fixed… this is something that affects all New Yorkers.”
SEE ALSO
Andrew Cuomo
Cuomo again supports change to new bail law, but gives no specifics
Prosecutors are already grappling with how to protect the privacy of victims and witnesses and are trying to figure out how they can do that under the new laws, The Post learned at a recent conference for New York State prosecutors.
Shea cautioned his comments by saying the NYPD has long supported many aspects of the reforms and the amount of money in someone’s pocket shouldn’t determine if they’re allowed to go free or not.
Still, the interest of public safety will always prevail, Shea said.
“You have to have a situation where dangerous individuals, or individuals that repeatedly commit crimes and victimize people, are kept in,” the commissioner said.
“And if judges don’t have that ability, I think we’re all in trouble and I don’t think any New Yorker wants that to happen.”
nypost.com
NYPD commissioner Dermot Shea blames bail reform for 2020 crime spike
By Gabrielle Fonrouge
January 24, 2020 | 9:14pm
NYPD Police Commissioner Dermot Shea
NYPD Police Commissioner Dermot Shea
William Farrington
A sharp rise in citywide crime since 2020 began was sparked by New York’s new bail reform laws, which took away a judge’s discretion to hold repeat and possibly violent offenders behind bars, NYPD Police Commissioner Dermot Shea said at a press conference Friday.
“In the first three weeks of this year, we’re seeing significant spikes in crime. So either we forgot how to police New York City, or there’s a correlation,” Shea told reporters in reference to the new laws.
“If you let out individuals that commit a lot of crime, that’s precision policing in reverse and we’re seeing the effects in a very quick time, and that is why we’re so concerned.”
The new law has stopped a slew of non-violent offenses from being bail eligible, allowing criminals to walk free after committing robberies, burglaries and other offenses.
Since 2020 began, as of Friday at midnight, robberies are up 32.5 percent, car theft is up 61 percent and burglaries are up 18 percent compared to the same time period last year.
And the numbers aren’t fractions either — a total of 233 more robberies have happened this year compared to last, 159 more car thefts and 125 more burglaries, just in the last three weeks.
SEE ALSO
Gerod Woodberry
Ridiculous reform forces NYPD to ask feds to catch serial NYC bank robber
“People say it just took effect you can’t have consequences already. Take a look at the comp stat,” Shea railed.
“We’re seeing it immediately at the same time that you have [state and local jail] populations dropping significantly,” the new commissioner went on.
“Now don’t tell me there’s not a correlation to that.”
Shea went to Albany this week to talk to lawmakers about his concerns, which he said were two pronged.
The first issue is repeat offenders being let out over and over again but the second issue is the state’s new discovery laws, which require prosecutors to turn over all of their evidence, plus the contact information of witnesses and victims, within 15 days of an arrest.
“The second piece is going to take longer and then it’s going to be a one two punch as discovery takes hold,” Shea said.
“Discovery is going to change how crimes are prosecuted in New York.”
While the new discovery law was created to ensure the accused aren’t seeing the evidence against them “until the eve of trial,” “swinging it back 180 degrees the other way and giving everything over immediately is equally wrong,” Shea said.
“When you have instances where witnesses and victims will be afraid to call the police, that is a real problem and that needs to be fixed… this is something that affects all New Yorkers.”
SEE ALSO
Andrew Cuomo
Cuomo again supports change to new bail law, but gives no specifics
Prosecutors are already grappling with how to protect the privacy of victims and witnesses and are trying to figure out how they can do that under the new laws, The Post learned at a recent conference for New York State prosecutors.
Shea cautioned his comments by saying the NYPD has long supported many aspects of the reforms and the amount of money in someone’s pocket shouldn’t determine if they’re allowed to go free or not.
Still, the interest of public safety will always prevail, Shea said.
“You have to have a situation where dangerous individuals, or individuals that repeatedly commit crimes and victimize people, are kept in,” the commissioner said.
“And if judges don’t have that ability, I think we’re all in trouble and I don’t think any New Yorker wants that to happen.”
NYPD commissioner Dermot Shea blames bail reform for 2020 crime spike
A sharp rise in citywide crime since 2020 began was sparked by New York’s new bail reform laws, which took away a judge’s discretion to hold repeat and possibly violent offenders behind bars, NYPD …
nypost.com
- 49,029
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- Joined
- Sep 21, 2008
Robbery is up almost 30% in New York City since the first of the year. Is this a statistical blip, a trend — or a New Year’s bail-reform gift from Albany, robbery now largely being a revolving-door offense in the Empire State?
Time will tell, but consider this as well: According to the latest NYPD stats, the number of shooting victims in the city is up 31% since New Year’s Day — so at the very least Gotham appears to be off to a rocky 2020 compared to last year.
Which should not surprise: Not only does government usually get more of what it encourages, when it comes to crime, it also gets more of what it fails to discourage.
Sad to say, New York falls down on both counts.
Albany’s bail-reform initiative got off to an ominously comical start. When the feds had to take custody of alleged serial bank-robber Gerod Woodberry because local judges had to keep turning him loose — well, what else was there to do but laugh?
But consider this: Robbery in the third degree became a revolving-door offense Jan. 1, and this was followed by a dramatic, 29% spike in reported robberies, according to the most recent — albeit very short-term — CompStat numbers.
This crime isn’t nearly as amusing as a haplessly compulsive bank heister — robbery-third involves the threat of physical force and was devastatingly common in the ’80s — but its current threat to the city’s streets is clear enough.
Shootings, thank goodness, aren’t yet revolving-door offenses but nevertheless also were up sharply, according to CompStat — with a 22% hike in incidents and that 31% increase in victims. A Thursday shootout in Upper Manhattan — one dead, two wounded — suggests the spike is no fluke.
It’s also no surprise. As a matter of policy, City Hall has backed away from the quality-of-life enforcement that historically encouraged criminals to leave their weapons at home — stop-and-frisk, for example, has virtually ended and hardly anybody is busted for fare-beating any more.
So, more guns — more gunfire. Easy peasy.
Equally intuitive is why New York is evolving into a soft-on-crime world — even if nobody wants to talk about it.
It really is simple: Politicians pander, and you can learn a lot by watching to whom they pander. Right about now that would be people who — wittingly or otherwise — are intent on making New York less safe.
These are basically the folks who embrace a common, albeit perverse, interpretation of affirmative action — arguing that energetic law enforcement is illegitimate because it tends to have disproportionate racial, ethnic or class consequences.
This is not all that’s going on, of course, but it is the principal motivator of Albany’s revolving door “reforms”; it underlies the virtual abandonment of quality-of-life law enforcement in New York City; it’s the reason Schools Chancellor Richard Carranza refuses to address school violence — angering both parents and the United Federation of Teachers — and it has prompted the federal government to threaten a crackdown on so-called “sanctuary city” policies now so warmly embraced by City Hall and Albany.
Specifically, Gerod Woodberry’s alleged bank robberies; Thursday’s shootings at 135th Street and Riverside Drive; Carranza’s contemptuous walkout from a school-violence town hall meeting and the rape-murder of a 92-year-old Queens woman allegedly by an illegal immigrant set free by city officials in defiance of federal authorities are of a piece — and they did not happen in a vacuum.
They occurred in the context of a strengthening, extremely disturbing official acceptance of behavior that would not remotely have been tolerated before Bill de Blasio became mayor. And it’s not just de Blasio; the City Council, Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the state Legislature are actively promoting the decline.
What’s missing in all this, of course, is that far more often than not the victims of New York’s growing soft-on-crime sensibilities belong to the same racial, ethnic and class categories as their victimizers. On this irony does the disparate-impact argument fail.
Amazingly, only the feds are looking out for the innocent.
“It is unbelievable that I have to come here and plead with the city of New York to cooperate with us to help keep this city safe,” said acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Matthew Albence last week, following the Queens rape-murder.
Indeed it is.
nypost.com
ninjahood
Time will tell, but consider this as well: According to the latest NYPD stats, the number of shooting victims in the city is up 31% since New Year’s Day — so at the very least Gotham appears to be off to a rocky 2020 compared to last year.
Which should not surprise: Not only does government usually get more of what it encourages, when it comes to crime, it also gets more of what it fails to discourage.
Sad to say, New York falls down on both counts.
Albany’s bail-reform initiative got off to an ominously comical start. When the feds had to take custody of alleged serial bank-robber Gerod Woodberry because local judges had to keep turning him loose — well, what else was there to do but laugh?
But consider this: Robbery in the third degree became a revolving-door offense Jan. 1, and this was followed by a dramatic, 29% spike in reported robberies, according to the most recent — albeit very short-term — CompStat numbers.
This crime isn’t nearly as amusing as a haplessly compulsive bank heister — robbery-third involves the threat of physical force and was devastatingly common in the ’80s — but its current threat to the city’s streets is clear enough.
Shootings, thank goodness, aren’t yet revolving-door offenses but nevertheless also were up sharply, according to CompStat — with a 22% hike in incidents and that 31% increase in victims. A Thursday shootout in Upper Manhattan — one dead, two wounded — suggests the spike is no fluke.
It’s also no surprise. As a matter of policy, City Hall has backed away from the quality-of-life enforcement that historically encouraged criminals to leave their weapons at home — stop-and-frisk, for example, has virtually ended and hardly anybody is busted for fare-beating any more.
So, more guns — more gunfire. Easy peasy.
Equally intuitive is why New York is evolving into a soft-on-crime world — even if nobody wants to talk about it.
It really is simple: Politicians pander, and you can learn a lot by watching to whom they pander. Right about now that would be people who — wittingly or otherwise — are intent on making New York less safe.
These are basically the folks who embrace a common, albeit perverse, interpretation of affirmative action — arguing that energetic law enforcement is illegitimate because it tends to have disproportionate racial, ethnic or class consequences.
This is not all that’s going on, of course, but it is the principal motivator of Albany’s revolving door “reforms”; it underlies the virtual abandonment of quality-of-life law enforcement in New York City; it’s the reason Schools Chancellor Richard Carranza refuses to address school violence — angering both parents and the United Federation of Teachers — and it has prompted the federal government to threaten a crackdown on so-called “sanctuary city” policies now so warmly embraced by City Hall and Albany.
Specifically, Gerod Woodberry’s alleged bank robberies; Thursday’s shootings at 135th Street and Riverside Drive; Carranza’s contemptuous walkout from a school-violence town hall meeting and the rape-murder of a 92-year-old Queens woman allegedly by an illegal immigrant set free by city officials in defiance of federal authorities are of a piece — and they did not happen in a vacuum.
They occurred in the context of a strengthening, extremely disturbing official acceptance of behavior that would not remotely have been tolerated before Bill de Blasio became mayor. And it’s not just de Blasio; the City Council, Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the state Legislature are actively promoting the decline.
What’s missing in all this, of course, is that far more often than not the victims of New York’s growing soft-on-crime sensibilities belong to the same racial, ethnic and class categories as their victimizers. On this irony does the disparate-impact argument fail.
Amazingly, only the feds are looking out for the innocent.
“It is unbelievable that I have to come here and plead with the city of New York to cooperate with us to help keep this city safe,” said acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Matthew Albence last week, following the Queens rape-murder.
Indeed it is.
It looks like New York’s getting the crime uptick politicians have been asking for
Robbery is up almost 30% in New York City since the first of the year. Is this a statistical blip, a trend — or a New Year’s bail-reform gift from Albany, robbery now largely being a revolving-door…
nypost.com
ninjahood
- 74,614
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- Apr 4, 2008
Da institution failed da people
llerraj
Banned
- 5,441
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- Oct 19, 2016
- 74,614
- 24,037
- Joined
- Apr 4, 2008
Man cmon. It’s supposed to be low level weed dealers that kind of thing
- 4,669
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- Jul 20, 2017
- 5,035
- 6,175
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- Jun 22, 2018
So if judges CAN NOT use discretion in requesting bail, why is there even bail anymore. I believe this is just a narrative tho or pushback from judges to try and sensationalize the bill. In a situation now where someone is requesting a bail loan. I told him NY judges can't hold people on bail now but he doesn't believe me since he is still locked up 
llerraj
Banned
- 5,441
- 6,974
- Joined
- Oct 19, 2016
- 70,049
- 24,223
- Joined
- Aug 1, 2004
Robbery is up almost 30% in New York City since the first of the year. Is this a statistical blip, a trend — or a New Year’s bail-reform gift from Albany, robbery now largely being a revolving-door offense in the Empire State?
Time will tell, but consider this as well: According to the latest NYPD stats, the number of shooting victims in the city is up 31% since New Year’s Day — so at the very least Gotham appears to be off to a rocky 2020 compared to last year.
Which should not surprise: Not only does government usually get more of what it encourages, when it comes to crime, it also gets more of what it fails to discourage.
Sad to say, New York falls down on both counts.
Albany’s bail-reform initiative got off to an ominously comical start. When the feds had to take custody of alleged serial bank-robber Gerod Woodberry because local judges had to keep turning him loose — well, what else was there to do but laugh?
But consider this: Robbery in the third degree became a revolving-door offense Jan. 1, and this was followed by a dramatic, 29% spike in reported robberies, according to the most recent — albeit very short-term — CompStat numbers.
This crime isn’t nearly as amusing as a haplessly compulsive bank heister — robbery-third involves the threat of physical force and was devastatingly common in the ’80s — but its current threat to the city’s streets is clear enough.
Shootings, thank goodness, aren’t yet revolving-door offenses but nevertheless also were up sharply, according to CompStat — with a 22% hike in incidents and that 31% increase in victims. A Thursday shootout in Upper Manhattan — one dead, two wounded — suggests the spike is no fluke.
It’s also no surprise. As a matter of policy, City Hall has backed away from the quality-of-life enforcement that historically encouraged criminals to leave their weapons at home — stop-and-frisk, for example, has virtually ended and hardly anybody is busted for fare-beating any more.
So, more guns — more gunfire. Easy peasy.
Equally intuitive is why New York is evolving into a soft-on-crime world — even if nobody wants to talk about it.
It really is simple: Politicians pander, and you can learn a lot by watching to whom they pander. Right about now that would be people who — wittingly or otherwise — are intent on making New York less safe.
These are basically the folks who embrace a common, albeit perverse, interpretation of affirmative action — arguing that energetic law enforcement is illegitimate because it tends to have disproportionate racial, ethnic or class consequences.
This is not all that’s going on, of course, but it is the principal motivator of Albany’s revolving door “reforms”; it underlies the virtual abandonment of quality-of-life law enforcement in New York City; it’s the reason Schools Chancellor Richard Carranza refuses to address school violence — angering both parents and the United Federation of Teachers — and it has prompted the federal government to threaten a crackdown on so-called “sanctuary city” policies now so warmly embraced by City Hall and Albany.
Specifically, Gerod Woodberry’s alleged bank robberies; Thursday’s shootings at 135th Street and Riverside Drive; Carranza’s contemptuous walkout from a school-violence town hall meeting and the rape-murder of a 92-year-old Queens woman allegedly by an illegal immigrant set free by city officials in defiance of federal authorities are of a piece — and they did not happen in a vacuum.
They occurred in the context of a strengthening, extremely disturbing official acceptance of behavior that would not remotely have been tolerated before Bill de Blasio became mayor. And it’s not just de Blasio; the City Council, Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the state Legislature are actively promoting the decline.
What’s missing in all this, of course, is that far more often than not the victims of New York’s growing soft-on-crime sensibilities belong to the same racial, ethnic and class categories as their victimizers. On this irony does the disparate-impact argument fail.
Amazingly, only the feds are looking out for the innocent.
“It is unbelievable that I have to come here and plead with the city of New York to cooperate with us to help keep this city safe,” said acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Matthew Albence last week, following the Queens rape-murder.
Indeed it is.
It looks like New York’s getting the crime uptick politicians have been asking for
Robbery is up almost 30% in New York City since the first of the year. Is this a statistical blip, a trend — or a New Year’s bail-reform gift from Albany, robbery now largely being a revolving-door…
I saw those numbers earlier in the week and basically my consensus was "protect your neck".
on da brightside this should stall gentrification in its tracks..
everyone knows when stickups are up first on da food menu are tourists.
- 70,049
- 24,223
- Joined
- Aug 1, 2004
they basically got in Hall of Fame curtain call send off ala chants from da dugout after hitting a grand slam
- 70,049
- 24,223
- Joined
- Aug 1, 2004
this dude needs to be hurt bad.
- 70,049
- 24,223
- Joined
- Aug 1, 2004
Police chief, DA, incensed over no-bail release in violent domestic assault
January 15, 2020
Facebook
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https://midhudsonnews.com/2020/01/1...no-bail-release-in-violent-domestic-assault/#
Vasquez-Paulino is seen in the upper left corner of this image attacking his girlfriend (MHNN image)
HARRIMAN – A Bronx man has been released on an appearance ticket following his violent assault on his girlfriend at his Harriman workplace. The pair of incidents, 10 minutes apart on Tuesday afternoon were captured on surveillance video obtained by Mid-Hudson News.
midhudsonnews.com
January 15, 2020
https://midhudsonnews.com/2020/01/1...no-bail-release-in-violent-domestic-assault/#
HARRIMAN – A Bronx man has been released on an appearance ticket following his violent assault on his girlfriend at his Harriman workplace. The pair of incidents, 10 minutes apart on Tuesday afternoon were captured on surveillance video obtained by Mid-Hudson News.
Police chief, DA, incensed over no-bail release in violent domestic assault - Mid Hudson News
HARRIMAN – A Bronx man has been released on an appearance ticket following his violent assault on his girlfriend at his Harriman workplace. The pair of incidents, 10 minutes apart on Tuesday afternoon were captured on surveillance video obtained by Mid-Hudson News. Harriman Village Police Chief...
midhudsonnews.com
- 2,828
- 586
- Joined
- Apr 18, 2004
This happened down the block from my house i'd say this ish is working real good 
Man accused of driving high, crashing into Suffolk police car released without bail
The officer inside the cruiser was taken to the hospital with non-life threatening injuries.
longisland.news12.com
- 63,609
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- May 23, 2005
- 2,828
- 586
- Joined
- Apr 18, 2004
YOOOO thats some wild ish and this dude got right back out on the street
PS those clowns that call themselves men watching a chick get beat up and didn't even care
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- Feb 24, 2009
- 70,049
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- Aug 1, 2004
backlash alert.
nypost.com
METRO
State Senate Democrats secretly meet to fix controversial bail reform law
By Bernadette Hogan
February 12, 2020 | 11:20am | Updated
Andrew CuomoStephen Yang
ALBANY — State Senate Democrats have been meeting behind closed doors seeking to amend the state’s controversial new bail law, following intense backlash over the changes that went into effect on Jan. 1, it was revealed Wednesday.
A group of eight senators backed by Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins (D-Westchester) have come up with a plan to return judges’ leeway to hold suspects before trial, as first reported by Newsday.
The proposal would entirely eliminate cash bail and give judges the power to exercise discretion in serious cases such as domestic violence or hate crimes, as well as cases in which someone is killed.
–– ADVERTISEMENT ––
Gov. Andrew Cuomo championed the idea, adding that the measure mirrors his 2019 state budget proposal.
“Let’s take money out of the cash bail system,” Cuomo said early Wednesday on Long Island News Radio.
“Just eliminate cash bail totally, but have a check in the system where the judge can use discretion where they make sure public safety … is protected.”
“That’s my original plan I put forth last year.”
“I’m saying the discretion should not be based on how much money [defendants] have in their pocket,” he added.
State Sen. Todd Kaminsky (D-Long Beach) told The Post on Wednesday he’s been part of these closed-door discussions along with Deputy Majority Leader Michael Gianaris (D-Queens) and Sens. Zellnor Myrie (D-Brooklyn), Luis Sepulveda (D-Bronx), Jamaal Bailey (D-Bronx), Brian Benjamin (D-Manhattan), Jim Gaughran (D-Suffolk) and Jen Metzger (D-Ulster).
MORE ON:
BAIL
Ex-Gov. Paterson urges state legislators to fix bail reform law
Look to the Garden State, New York, if you want to do bail reform right
A top state Assembly Democrat urges changes to new bail law
Brooklyn judge uses loophole in bail reform to send burglar to jail
Advertisement
“This system builds in more discretion for judges while making sure if they want to remand someone, that there will be a really compelling reason to do so,” he said in a phone interview.
SEE ALSO
NYPD peddling 'false narratives' about bail reform dangers, City Council warns
“We have really been trying to listen to all sides. We’ve listened to the prosecutors and the officers on the front lines who have been telling us what they’ve been seeing.”
Lawmakers started feeling pressure from law enforcement and constituents following a series of high-profile cases in which judges could not set bail due to changes to the penal code made last session.
The criminal justice changes included eliminating cash bail for most misdemeanors and nonviolent felonies. The changes also reduced the timeline for prosecutors to produce and share pretrial “discovery” evidence with the defense. District attorneys and law enforcement officers have decried the changes, arguing there’s not enough time to comply and no additional funding for system upgrades or to hire additional personnel.
Advertisement
New York voters have also slammed the policy changes, with 49 percent calling the bail reform a bad idea compared to 37 percent in support, according to results from a Siena poll last month.
Meanwhile, a growing hurdle to adjusting the reforms has come from the state Assembly, with Speaker Carl Heastie (D-Bronx) saying he is not interested in making any changes to the new law.
“Right now, it seems when the sun doesn’t come up, everyone wants to blame the bail law,” Heastie said last week.
His top aides began holding “informational” briefings for Assembly Democrats seeking more clarity on the law, as well as those who have introduced their own legislation seeking tweaks.
Heastie’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment
State Senate Democrats secretly meet to fix controversial bail reform law
ALBANY — State Senate Democrats have been meeting behind closed doors seeking to amend the state’s controversial new bail law, following intense backlash over the changes that went into effec…
nypost.com
METRO
State Senate Democrats secretly meet to fix controversial bail reform law
By Bernadette Hogan
February 12, 2020 | 11:20am | Updated
Andrew CuomoStephen Yang
ALBANY — State Senate Democrats have been meeting behind closed doors seeking to amend the state’s controversial new bail law, following intense backlash over the changes that went into effect on Jan. 1, it was revealed Wednesday.
A group of eight senators backed by Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins (D-Westchester) have come up with a plan to return judges’ leeway to hold suspects before trial, as first reported by Newsday.
The proposal would entirely eliminate cash bail and give judges the power to exercise discretion in serious cases such as domestic violence or hate crimes, as well as cases in which someone is killed.
–– ADVERTISEMENT ––
Gov. Andrew Cuomo championed the idea, adding that the measure mirrors his 2019 state budget proposal.
“Let’s take money out of the cash bail system,” Cuomo said early Wednesday on Long Island News Radio.
“Just eliminate cash bail totally, but have a check in the system where the judge can use discretion where they make sure public safety … is protected.”
“That’s my original plan I put forth last year.”
“I’m saying the discretion should not be based on how much money [defendants] have in their pocket,” he added.
State Sen. Todd Kaminsky (D-Long Beach) told The Post on Wednesday he’s been part of these closed-door discussions along with Deputy Majority Leader Michael Gianaris (D-Queens) and Sens. Zellnor Myrie (D-Brooklyn), Luis Sepulveda (D-Bronx), Jamaal Bailey (D-Bronx), Brian Benjamin (D-Manhattan), Jim Gaughran (D-Suffolk) and Jen Metzger (D-Ulster).
MORE ON:
BAIL
Ex-Gov. Paterson urges state legislators to fix bail reform law
Look to the Garden State, New York, if you want to do bail reform right
A top state Assembly Democrat urges changes to new bail law
Brooklyn judge uses loophole in bail reform to send burglar to jail
Advertisement
“This system builds in more discretion for judges while making sure if they want to remand someone, that there will be a really compelling reason to do so,” he said in a phone interview.
SEE ALSO
NYPD peddling 'false narratives' about bail reform dangers, City Council warns
“We have really been trying to listen to all sides. We’ve listened to the prosecutors and the officers on the front lines who have been telling us what they’ve been seeing.”
Lawmakers started feeling pressure from law enforcement and constituents following a series of high-profile cases in which judges could not set bail due to changes to the penal code made last session.
The criminal justice changes included eliminating cash bail for most misdemeanors and nonviolent felonies. The changes also reduced the timeline for prosecutors to produce and share pretrial “discovery” evidence with the defense. District attorneys and law enforcement officers have decried the changes, arguing there’s not enough time to comply and no additional funding for system upgrades or to hire additional personnel.
Advertisement
New York voters have also slammed the policy changes, with 49 percent calling the bail reform a bad idea compared to 37 percent in support, according to results from a Siena poll last month.
Meanwhile, a growing hurdle to adjusting the reforms has come from the state Assembly, with Speaker Carl Heastie (D-Bronx) saying he is not interested in making any changes to the new law.
“Right now, it seems when the sun doesn’t come up, everyone wants to blame the bail law,” Heastie said last week.
His top aides began holding “informational” briefings for Assembly Democrats seeking more clarity on the law, as well as those who have introduced their own legislation seeking tweaks.
Heastie’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment
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This is turning into a fiasco
- 49,029
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- Sep 21, 2008
City is nasty rn fr
Some dude just came up to us and let us know he got cut on the train for his phone
Some dude just came up to us and let us know he got cut on the train for his phone
- 2,602
- 6,986
- Joined
- Jul 15, 2018
They are gonna have to amend this before the summer or tourist are going to get hurt because we all know they freak out when tourist get hurt.
- 197
- 184
- Joined
- Apr 21, 2014
Cuomo for president!!!
