Good morning.

Welcome to the committee on criminal justice.

Please place your phone on solid or vibrate mode at any time during the hearing.

Do not approach the dais.

Chair, we are ready to begin.

Good morning.

I am Councilmember Sylvina Brooks Powers, Chair of the Committee on Criminal Justice.

I want to welcome everyone to today's hearing on improving court operations to reduce the jail population.

At the outset, I would like to extend my gratitude to Judge Zayas on his superb staff and team and for participating in today's conversation.

Judge Zayas has demonstrated his commitment to changing the status quo and to creating a legal system that promotes community safety by reducing reliance on incarceration.

I am joined by committee members Brewer and Murano.

The pace at which cases move throughout courts is a critical factor in determining how New York City will achieve its legal mandate to close Rikers Island and transition to borough based jails.

At present, more than 80% of the people in city jails are pretrial detainees, individuals who have not been convicted, but are held while their cases are pending.

When those cases are delayed, people remain in custody longer than necessary.

The jail population is inflated, and questions are raised as to whether the plan capacity of the borough based jails will be sufficient.

As context for this hearing, it is important to recognize the real world consequences of prolonged pretrial detention in our city jails.

The experience of individuals like Khalif Rowder, who spent years at Rikers Island without a conviction, while his case was repeatedly delayed, underscores the human costs of a system where case processing breaks down.

His story is a reminder that delays in court proceedings are not abstract administrative problems, but have profound and lasting consequences.

Those consequences are felt not only by people unnecessarily detained, but also by crime victims and their loved ones.

When someone is victimized, especially by an act of violence, we should expect swift accountability.

When justice is delayed, especially in communities where immediate consequences for minor offenses are frequent and highly visible, people rightly lose confidence in the criminal justice system, the criminal legal system.

As a result, we are all left less safe.

Today's hearing will examine the operational factors that contribute to case delays, including discovery compliance, court scheduling practices, evidence production, and interagency coordination between the Office of Court Administration, the NYPD, and the Mayor's Office of Criminal Justice.

Also, the committee will hear testimony from legal service providers, community organizations, and other stakeholders about how these systems function in practice and where breakdowns continue to occur.

We will focus in particular on how discovery obligations are being implemented following the initial 2019 statutory reforms and subsequent amendments, and how those requirements are affecting trial readiness and case resolution timelines.

We will also examine how court operations, such as the timing of hearings, the resolution of discovery disputes, and the availability of court resources shape the length of pre pretrial detention.

I would like to thank my staff and committee staff for their hard work.

Jeremy Whiteman, Senior Counsel to the Committee, who is serving in his very final hearing with the city council, and I just want to thank you for the work that you've provided to the committee all of these years.

Also, we have Chad Benjamin, policy analyst, Casey Lajesky, Financial Analyst.

Julian Martin, my deputy chief of staff, who also is serving in his last hearing before departing, to go on to his next chapter.

And we like to thank Julian for all of his amazing work, both on the Committee on Criminal Justice and the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.

My communications director, Kiara Powell, and of course my chief of staff, Renee Taylor.

I look forward to a productive discussion about how we can strengthen court operations to enhance fairness and accountability across the board.

So now we'll quite call Judge Zayas up to the days, please.

And counsel will sway you in.

Do you affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing towards the truth before this committee and respond honestly to council member questions?

I do, noting for the record, it was answered affirmatively.

You may begin your testimony.

Now, my light is red here.

Should it be green?

Okay.

Great.

May I begin?

Yes.

Alright, good morning, uh Chair Brooks Powers.

Uh thank you and the other members of this committee for organizing uh today's hearing on a truly important subject, the processing of criminal cases in New York City.

Uh as you said in your opening remarks, which I I really appreciated, the efficient management of criminal cases is something that I care deeply deeply about, having served for many years as a trial judge and an administrative judge.

Now, as the chief administrative uh judge of uh overseeing the operations of all of New York State's trial courts, one of my highest priorities is the implementation of policies and procedures that help minimize the delays that often impede the swift resolution of criminal cases.

Let me start by explaining why this issue is so important.

For our criminal justice system to be effective and credible, serious criminal cases cannot routinely languish in the courts.

Allowing criminal cases to proceed at a pace that lacks an appropriate sense of urgency results in a loss of confidence in the court system's ability to do its job.

When, for example, there is a murder in one of our communities and someone is arrested, it should not take two or three years for the case to be resolved.

Witnesses, affected affected neighborhoods, and the families of victims deserve better.

So too do the individuals who are charged.

Efficiency is not just essential for cases that are resolved in the traditional ways, either with a bail uh bargain, uh plea bargain, I'm sorry, or a trial.

It is also critically important to the efficacy of our problem-solving courts, which provide diversion opportunities for individuals with substance use disorders, mental health issues, victims of uh human trafficking, adolescents, and emerging adults, veterans, and others.

It should go without saying that the faster we engage these individuals with the services and treatments they need, the more likely these interventions are able to be effective.

This morning I'm excited to highlight all of the things the court system is doing to address these case delays.

But just as importantly, I'm going to suggest several ways in which other justice system stakeholders must step up if we're going to achieve the goal that I know is so important to this council.

Reducing the jail population to around 4,000 so that it can be accommodated by the borough-based jails.

The bottom line is this: improving case processing efficiency in high volume courts is not easy.

It truly requires an all hands-on-the-deck deck approach.

The simplest reason is that while we would like to believe that judges have the authority to make criminal cases proceed at whatever pace they choose, in actuality, there are many factors that affect uh case processing that are beyond the court's control.

To list just a few, uh, cases get delayed when it takes the prosecution months upon months to provide all of the discovery that the defense is entitled to under New York's robust discovery law, which sometimes results from the lack of effective coordination between prosecutors and the NYPD.

Cases get delayed because defense attorneys have a constitutional obligation to carefully review the discovery they receive, hundreds or even thousands of pages of police reports and medical records, along with the hours of body camera footage recorded by the officers who responded to the scene.

Cases get delayed when a defendant who has been found unfit to proceed must wait months before they can begin receiving competency restoration services at an OMH hospital.

And perhaps most frustrating of all, cases are delayed when private defense attorneys have dozens of paying clients from across the city, far more than a solo practitioner can reasonably manage, but choose not to hire associates to handle their caseload.

These are not excuses, they are facts.

And if we're going to improve the case processing in a long term sustainable way, we need to be realistic about the myriad changes, uh challenges.

So, what is the court system doing about case processing?

For starters, we are urging judges and court attorneys to take a more proactive approach to case management and giving them the tools and resources to do so effectively.

Throughout New York City's Supreme Courts, where indicted felonies are handled, judges are now issuing scheduling orders that set clear timelines for getting through the cases preliminary stages.

These orders establish deadlines for the production of discovery by the prosecution as well as for the defense to raise issues with the people's discovery compliance.

And they mandate court attorney led conferences with the parties which provide a forum for discovery disputes to be resolved efficiently, hopefully without the need for time-consuming motion practice.

Importantly, these conferences also encourage early discussions about case resolutions.

In Brooklyn, where we first began issuing these orders at the end of 2024, an executive assistant district attorney attends every conference and makes a plea offer, which helped contribute in 2025 to a nearly 100% increase in the number of dispositions in the two court parts that were part of the pilot.

Perhaps this scheduling order initiative doesn't sound that groundbreaking, but it is.

When I was a public defender for nine years, and also when I was a judge, uh I was based, I was it was basically unheard of for judges in New York City's criminal courts to issue scheduling orders.

But for reasons that almost go without saying, it's best best practices uh for judges at the beginning of every case to set clear scheduling expectations so that the parties understand that the case is going to proceed on the court's timeline, not theirs.

We've also set up infrastructure in each borough to help that to ensure that homicides, felony sex crimes, multiple defendant gang prosecutions, and other complex matters which tend to be difficult to resolve, move towards this position.

There are many reasons these cases uh get delayed.

The discovery can be voluminous, plea bargaining is more fraught, and scheduling is complicated because even in New York City, we have too few lawyers on both sides handling the most serious criminal cases.

This is why we've hired experienced court attorneys in each of our Supreme Courts to aggressively conference these cases, identify barriers to progress, and develop firm plans for moving forward.

In addition, over the past two years, we have significantly ramped up the number of nonjudicial personnel serving in our problem solving courts statewide.

Statewide, we've added nearly 100 project directors, case managers, and resource coordinators, amounting to a 30% increase in programmatic staff, which has allowed us to reduce caseloads in some of our busiest courts, particularly in New York City, and open new ones.

In fact, in fact, last year, problem solving courts in the city's Supreme Courts served over 3100 New Yorkers, nearly 1,000 more than we served in 2022.

And credit for that must be shared with our district attorneys and our defense bar who have demonstrated a laudable commitment to alternative forms of accountability in criminal cases.

We are indeed focused on improving case processing and fish efficiency from every conceivable angle.

We have established dedicated positions in each borough to coordinate with the New York City Department of Corrections on issues related to the production of defendants that can stall cases.

And we're now meeting regularly with representatives from City Hall on a range of issues of mutual concern with case processing at the very top of the list.

And of course, Chair, we're happy to meet more regularly with you and members of this committee as well.

We were also successful at getting the state legislature this year to pass one of our program bills, which we hope the governor will sign that will give judges the authority with the party's consent to dispense with recidivist sentencing provisions and plea bargaining restrictions that can make the resolution of certain cases very difficult.

Finally, over the last year we've begun to roll out electronic filing in the city's Supreme Courts.

I'm pleased to report that the early results of these efforts are quite promising.

Every borough in New York City had more dispositions last year than it did in 2024.

Brooklyn, where we first piloted this work in late 2024, saw a substantial 15% increase, and citywide dispositions increased by 10%.

That positive trend is continuing.

So far this year, dispositions in our Supreme Courts are up 11%, and we are resolving cases significantly faster than new filings are coming in, which is important.

This is our year-to-date clearance rate, which reflects the percentage of cases that have been disposed compared to how many were filed, which is now 125%.

Another positive data point at the end of 2021, as we began to emerge from the pandemic, we had 70 781 cases that were over two years old with incarcerated defendants.

Earlier this year, that number dipped below 500 for the first time since 2020.

We can do better though.

As I said, we need the help of other justice systems stakeholders to continue to move the needle.

Let me start with discovery.

New York's discovery statute says that in cases in which the defendant is incarcerated, discovery must be provided within 20 days of arraignment.

In New York City, this deadline largely remains an aspiration.

I'm not unsympathetic to the fact that our discovery laws are extremely onerous.

And I know that the city's district attorneys take their discovery obligations seriously.

But I hope that this morning we can have a serious conversation about when compliance with the discovery deadlines that were a key component of the 2020 criminal justice reforms will become the norm.

Because the fact of the matter is this, cases rarely resolve before discovery is complete.

If discovery were routinely produced in 20 or 25 days rather than 60 or 90 days, cases would be resolved much faster.

Put simply, if one of the central selling points of discovery reform, namely that earlier, broader discovery of case information will facilitate earlier case resolutions, is going to be realized.

We need to actually have earlier disclosure.

This brings me to the next point.

In New York, 98% of criminal case criminal convictions are the result of guilty pleas, not trials.

Whatever the downsides of this state of affairs, the fact is that a very small percentage of criminal cases are tried.

Nevertheless, in many cases in New York cities, including many relatively straightforward cases, prosecutors do not make plea plea offers in a timely manner.

While there may be strategic reasons for the defense to tolerate or even encourage delay, that is almost never true for prosecutors.

From the perspective of prosecutors, criminal cases typically do not get better with age.

But judges do not control plea bargaining, prosecutors do.

So another issue that I hope will be discussed today is whether our district attorneys will commit to engaging in plea bargaining earlier in most cases.

The defense bar too is essential to improving case processing efficiency.

Private attorneys assigned as counsel to represent criminal defendants pursuant to county law 18B.

Basically, we're talking about ATB attorneys consistently litigate around 50% of the cases that go to trial in New York City.

But as a recent report from the New York City Bar Association highlighted, the New York City assigned council plan administration is understaffed and under-resourced, and is thus unable to provide panel attorneys with the support that they need.

In fact, according to the Bar Association's report, since 2018, the mayor's Office of Criminal Justice has failed to access over 50 million dollars that indigent legal services has allocated to the New York City Assigned Council plan under two separate contracts.

I hope and I expect that the new mayoral administration will work quickly to address these issues.

I also want to encourage the public defender organizations to give fair consideration to case processing initiatives when we propose them.

Obviously, we need their cooperation as well to make progress in this area.

Finally, the city can help too by, among other things, adequately funding the programs and services to which our problem-solving courts refer defendants.

We are committed to continuing to expand these courts, but that expansion will only be impactful if there is a corresponding increase in service provider capacity.

Despite the challenges I've just laid out, I am uh overly optimistic that we can continue to make significant improvements to case processing efficiency in New York City.

The court system is deeply committed to this work.

We now have a mayoral administration that shares this commitment and a city council that desperately wants to see the jails on Rikers Island close.

We're also fortunate at this moment to have five forward-thinking district attorneys and a sophisticated passionate defense bar.

For all of these reasons, I believe the time is ripe for a renewed commitment by all stakeholders to efficient case processing that does not sacrifice fairness to either prosecutors or defendants.

Working together, I honestly believe that we can do this.

And I'm happy to answer any questions that the chair or other committee members have about this topic.

Thank you so much, Judge.

Um, we've been joined by Councilmember Salam.

And before I start questioning, I will read brief remarks from councilmember Althea Stevens, who serves as the chair for the Committee on Children and Youth.

Good morning.

As chair of the Committee on Children and Youth, I want to emphasize that any conversation about reducing incarceration must include young people.

Following the recent incident at Horizon Juvenile Center, it is clear that we cannot examine challenges within our justice system in pieces.

We must look at the entire continuum from youth facilities to adult detention and understand how each part impacts the other.

If we focus on adult facilities such as Rikers Island without addressing what is happening within our youth justice system, we will not solve the problem to its entirety.

The young people in our care today are the adults who will enter our criminal legal system tomorrow if we fail to intervene with meaningful support effective programming timely court processing and opportunities for rehabilitation.

Reducing the jail population is not just about moving cases faster.

It's about ensuring that every person especially every young person has access to justice services and the resources needed to prevent deeper involvement in the criminal justice system.

If we do not invest in youth now we are we risk seeing the numbers at Rikers grow again in the years ahead.

Today's hearing is an opportunity to examine how our courts can operate more efficiently while ensuring fairness accountability and better outcomes for New Yorkers of all ages.

I look forward to having meaningful conversations to develop a plan to reduce the census population in the juvenile detention center in the near future thank you.

And now I'll pivot to um questions.

Sorry about that a little bit of technical deep difficulties over here but you mentioned that judges are now issuing schedule and orders to set deadlines and prioritize the discovery process in general would you say discovery materials are being served to the defense council in accordance with the timeframes established in state law.

I I think it's uh very clear that that they are not um the uh as I indicated the uh discovery statute calls for really accelerated um uh this disclosure I think it's 20 days uh for defendants who are uh being detained 35 days for defendants who are not and the we'll get you the numbers on each of those we we do we do keep track of the times uh uh in which they file a certificate of compliance with discovery and um um I don't want to be critical of like my uh partners uh in uh government uh the district attorney's office but I think it's it's clear and I think they would admit that they they are not complying with the letter of the law uh in the um discovery statute so it's it's maybe twice twice the time is probably more like it understood and can you provide a county by county breakdown on adherence to the discovery deadlines if there are variations between counties what do you think the root cause could be like is it a resource thing or is it that they just have a higher concentration?

Yeah I mean I I want to try to stay in my lane here in terms of my neutral uh role uh but I think that's a very good question to ask them.

Uh but I but I will say look the discovery statute is required uh it's been six years now, so you you think about this the discovery reform statute was uh took effect six years ago, but it does impose uh extremely onerous burdens on the district attorney's office.

And I as I said in my opening statement, I do think that they are working hard to take it seriously, uh, but the sheer uh voluminous nature of the discovery and maybe the need for some technological solution to uh uh make it happen, which I know that there were efforts at that, um, I'm sure would help uh maybe some coordination with the NYPD in terms of uh uh collaboration with them to get that discovery directly to the DA's office so that they can categorize it uh because what the DA's office wants to do needs to do is present it to the defense in a way that it makes it easy, uh uh easy to use by the defense so that they're not just dumped on with a thousand pages, but that it's categorized by witness, by body cam uh uh um you know the the person whose body cam it was.

So, but I I don't think there's any question that they have been they've been having a really hard time complying with the strict um uh deadlines that have been imposed by the statute.

No, thank you for that.

And just kind of going back to the beginning of the question, which doesn't necessarily have to opine on why they are um because to your point, we are going to follow up with them the district attorneys all have submitted um testimony because they have a conference today and as a result they were unable to be here.

But I would like to know if you would be able to bring provide a breakdown by county in terms of the adherence to the guidelines.

In terms of the adherence to the discovery like deadlines?

Yes.

County by county we we do keep track of that.

So we I believe I'm pretty sure we will be able to give you that information.

Okay.

So do you have it now or I have it somewhere if you uh it might take me a minute to find it in my paperwork, but um, we'll move on, but if you could get it to us, that'd be great.

Oh, I I think I do have it here.

So um this these are days that it takes them to file um the uh certificate of compliance, and so uh in in the Bronx it's the uh average days is a hundred and thirty days, a hundred and twelve median days.

In Kings County, it's seventy-four days uh average days, fifty-six fifty-six um median days.

New York County, it's a hundred and forty-five days uh and a hundred and uh uh five median days in Queens, which is where I was the administrative judge and uh chair, I know you're from Queens too.

Um in terms of their they are probably doing the best.

It's uh average sixty days and forty-four day median days.

What's that?

I expect nothing different at the best from Queen.

And then in Richmond it's forty-six uh average days and twenty-eight median days.

Um so and yeah, you know, that that doesn't include uh that doesn't include the uh really uh more complex cases uh such as homicides uh uh of that nature.

So th these are just your your uh other other uh serious felonies, but not homicides.

Thank you for that, Judge.

Um one issue raised by defense providers is that after the 2025 amendments to the discovery laws, they've seen an increase in circumstances where the prosecution files a certificate of compliance with discovery obligations months into the life of a case, but without actually turning over all of the relevant material and then relying on their ability to serve supplemental discovery at a later date.

Is this something you've also identified as problematic and a cause of case delays?

Yes.

I mean, uh, I'm not trying to come to the defense of the prosecutors in this case, but uh given sometimes prosecutors don't come across this information until later on.

So um yeah, I I think the defense is right about that.

There are it's sort of a continuing process, and we've been encouraging the district attorney's offices to actually um start giving over discovery that they have right away.

Like forget about the deadlines.

If you have discovery that you think that that is clearly uh discoverable, why not just start providing it to them without certifying that you've complete completed the um because that gives the defense sort of a head start and and they're not dumped on at the uh I don't use that word d derogatory uh it's not it's not a criticism, but the statute set gives a date and then you know it could be hundreds, hundreds of of uh documents, maybe thousands of documents that they're given at the last minute.

So if there could be a piecemeal approach by its it being uh given over early, I I don't really I we've been encouraging that sometimes documents take a little longer and then a supplemental uh disclosure has to happen.

And um, of course that causes delays.

Uh the question is whether the supplemental documents that were later turned over uh whether there was good cause or a good reason why they didn't have it at the time that it was required.

Understood.

And how often are judges imposing sanctions for late produced discovery?

I'm not sure we're we're keeping track of of that.

Um if we are, we will send that to you.

Thank you.

I just want to acknowledge we've been joined by Councilmember Caban.

So according to standards set by National Center for State Court, 75% of felony cases should reach disposition within 90 days, 90% should reach disposition within 180 days, and 98% within 365 days.

How does New York City compare to these national standards?

So we could get to those numbers as well.

We we clearly do not uh uh um maybe in the the the first part of that there's more compliance, but when you're talking about the more serious cases, you know, New York is different in all sorts of ways from other small states.

Uh I mean, our our um uh uh caseloads uh are uh uh you know uh twenty, thirty, forty, fifty times more than the caseloads that they might have in these small jurisdictions in Utah and so that's what they're comparing it to.

Um and um New York also has uh you know a a very robust um defense bar uh and um so uh uh I'm not I don't think that we are aspiring to um meet those um uh center for court uh uh th the the cent uh the state center for for a courts um um timeline because New York is so different.

Um given that judges are independent actors, how is OCA working to change behavior on c in case processing?

So yeah, so we we are um uh strongly encouraging our judges to be more proactive in resolving discovery disputes.

Um so what what was happening uh early on was it you know we had these old cases and then we had this whole sort of middle area of cases, bucket of cases that were getting bottled up with uh discovery disputes, and motions were being filed, and it took uh, you know, many, many, many months.

It was causing all sorts of delay.

So that was the reason that we um began the uh the the scheduling order initiative was to deal with that big bucket of cases, which we were trying to prevent from those cases becoming the really old cases.

And so um we hired uh uh additional law clerks in each of the counties to meet off calendar with the lawyers on resolving these discovery disputes.

And there's there's uh there's a discovery dispute in in you know almost every case.

So the the lawyers have an independent obligation to meet together uh and try to resolve the d dispute among themselves.

Uh and sometimes that happens, uh, but sometimes we need to so we've we've devoted a lot of resources to get um to get those issues resolved.

Thank you for that, Judge.

In terms of the system actors necessary to make your new protocols effective, are there specific steps that the district attorneys and the defense bar can take right now to improve the speed at which cases reach a disposition?

Sure.

Uh uh I mean, being being active participants in that those discovery conferences uh with respect to the old cases, um we have an old case uh uh conferencing so that any of the old cases um be uh having the district attorney's offices having a high level executive uh uh available for those conferences a high level executive who has the authority to resolve cases to uh if uh uh uh an offer is made, you know, instead of having to adjourn it to see whether the dist uh the higher level district attorneys will approve it.

So um those are some of some of the things that that will be helpful.

Uh and the district attorney's offices are doing that.

Thank you.

Um the piece you published in the New York Law Journal, you emphasize the importance of conducting pretrial suppression hearings early in the proceedings because they bring information to light that spurs settlement talks.

What specific steps have you taken to ensure that pretrial hearings happen earlier in the life of a case?

And do you have data on whether these hearings are actually occurring earlier?

So the the um uh example that um showed that this was uh the a very helpful way of resolving cases early was what they did in Queens.

So Queens was the only county uh when when I was the administrative judge there, which uh didn't wait until the trial date to do suppression hearings, and so we use that example because what happens in those hearings is the judge gets an opportunity to hear the pro the um the police testify to to get a real sense of what the case is about, and so it's a really important um and fertile opportunity for the judge to see the case, for the district attorneys to see the case, for the defense attorney to see the case, and oftentimes after a hearing uh a case might get resolved.

So we always thought why wait till uh the end of right before trial and let's start this litigation right then.

And so um as part of the initiative, we've admonished directed, cajoled, uh um uh pushed the uh administrative judges to get their judges to uh hold hearings well before trial.

And uh that we the stats that we received I can we have them, I have them here.

I don't want to waste two minutes looking for them.

But I will say that I I think probably the number of hearings in most of the counties has doubled uh from the time that we uh uh issued that uh the initiative started.

Thank you.

We think that's important because um those also I think are probably also responsible for the increase in the dispositions that we're receiving, and when you receive a disposition, that's you know, one less defendant uh uh uh on Rikers Island, one less accused on Rikers Island.

Thank you, Judge.

I'm gonna yield myself to allow my colleagues to ask some questions.

I'm gonna first hear from Councilmember Morano, followed by Councilmember Brewer.

Thank you, Chair, thank you for uh convening this hearing on such an important topic.

And uh judge, as uh the council member that represents the only borough that routinely elects both Democrat and Republican judges.

I can attest to how widely respected you are by jurists on both sides of the aisle and hearing your testimony, it's easy to understand why.

Um I had a couple quick questions based on your testimony.

You stated that one of the goals is reducing the jail population to around four thousand so that it can be accommodated by the borough-based jails.

And when we questioned the correction commissioner, he indicated the same thing.

Shouldn't the criminal justice system be focused on administering justice in a way that's fair and in a way that protects public safety rather than achieving a predetermined jail population?

Are we at risk of allowing the capacity of our jail system to dictate criminal justice policy instead of the other way around?

Yeah, I mean, I I don't think we're at risk for that because it is it is a aspirational goal, uh, and having a if you know what's that phrase?

If you if you don't have a goal, you're never gonna meet it.

Um I don't think that's the this you could probably say it better than me.

Uh but um the 4,000 number I will concede does not adequately take into account spikes in uh uh or increases in uh um uh in criminal activity violent crimes.

Um but all things being considered uh I think it's a reasonable thing for uh folks to do is to have a goal of 4,000 and let's see how how we're able to to get there.

I don't think justice is um uh being short circuited or jeopardized by it.

I think I think we can we can have a goal and also make sure that justice is done without um uh uh you know uh if you're suggesting that we would just start reason releasing people from jail just to reach the 4,000 uh number, then I completely get your point.

Uh but otherwise I I think we could do both things at the same time.

One thing that I think Staten Islanders who uh and Manhattanites, for instance, may share the same objection is that someone who's elected as a civil court judge on Staten Island because of their expertise in criminal court uh in civil court issues and things like that ends up hearing criminal cases in Manhattan, the Manhattanite who ends up appearing before this judge may not be voting for that person and may not want them deciding cases, and the Staten Islander that elected a civil court judge may not want that person hearing criminal concerns.

And one concern I hear from practitioners is that not every judge assigned to criminal court has substantial criminal law experience or even sought that assignment.

How does OCA determine who serves in criminal court, particularly in arraignment parts where judges make critical release decisions?

Should criminal law experience receive greater weight in those assignments?

Yes, absolutely.

So yeah, and they do.

But the question is what do we do when we don't have enough criminal law um experienced uh lower court judges to sit in those parts.

So I think most recently a civil court judge in Staten Island was elected, uh, but that civil court judge had uh uh uh criminal law experience, was a form of prosecutor or defense attorney, and naturally that's where we put him, not in civil court, but in criminal.

I will say this.

I was a practitioner for nine years doing exclusively criminal cases, and I then got hired as a law clerk and then did exclusively civil cases.

So um smart lawyers um can make that adjustment, and so and and I'm not saying this, you know, criminal law is you know rocket science, but I I think that uh people who practice law can make that adjust adjustment um, you know, that we typically would assign a mentor to those, and it's only done, so we would only put a civil court judge who has no criminal law experience in a criminal part when there is no other option.

So for example, in typically in these transition years when a new mayor comes into office, there is a shortage of of um of of judges because that new mayor now has to create a new committee and has to um vet uh the uh the applicants, and so there's always this sort of one year delay where we're short on judges, and so that might happen mostly in those those off those transition years after a new mayor is elected.

You identify discovery compliance, competency restoration, plea negotiations, defense counsel resources and prosecutorial practices as major causes of delay and I agree with you on on everything.

Many of which as you pointed out are outside the judiciary's control.

If you could change just one thing outside the courts tomorrow w what single reform would have the greatest impact on reducing delays.

That's a good question.

I mean I I um judges need to be empowered to move a case to trial um and um the case law uh uh does not allow a a judge to move a case to trial um even though the parties have may I continue uh if that's yeah that's for me not you uh the so uh uh uh uh uh so give judges more power to move a case to trial over the objection of a prosecutor or of a a defense attorney um uh and judges are reticent to do that uh sometimes because of the reasons that that that happened uh but the reasons that people give for requesting an adjournment but uh especially with respect to prosecutors um once a prosecutor answers not ready unless the prosecutor has been warned numerous numerous numerous times you gotta start on this date so given judges some more power to do that.

I may have other questions in the second round if possible.

Thank you Chair.

Thank you for that and I just want to on the record just clarify just a statement that was made because the purpose of this conversation also helps victims as well.

And I think we can all agree that Rikers Island is not designed to be a prison.

And so by moving along the court process it allows for um those who are in custody to either if they're to be released or if they are to um go on to a state facility and so I just wanted to clarify that these shouldn't be competing issues and I'll make sure my colleague understands um the purpose of this conversation and um with that we'll hear from council member brewer followed by council member caban thank you very much you obviously are the star of this discussion so thank you very much judge my goodness we've been talking about this for a long time so I was previously chair of oversight and investigations and we did actually had staff that got on the buses at Rikers and went to the courts.

And this was pre um my friend Stanley Richards but it was always ninety-nine percent of folks get there.

They don't get there 99% of the time from Rikers to the court.

And so I guess my question is that may not be something that the courts track but I don't know if you do because you have to get up at five o'clock in the morning don't necessarily get breakfast you don't necessarily get food when you get there that you want to eat etc.

So there's lots of reasons why one doesn't the uh before Stanley Richards I don't know what now is um individuals who are supposed to get on detainees were blamed for not getting on that's why the court numbers weren't great etc.

But the buses seem to be a problem.

I don't know if that's something that you track if you have any anecdotal but it seems to me that that's a slowing up of the process also but I didn't know what you have to say about that.

Sure.

First of all very happy to I've known Stanley uh Richards for a long time very happy with his about 40 years like me that's right.

Um and um so uh I'm not I didn't hear the statistics you you um well it you know they they they're not clear in other words the de in the past DOC would say oh they all get on it's you know 99% of folks get to court but it doesn't always work out like that so I'm just wondering what you have experienced yeah I think that number is probably inflated yes um a bit I mean a lot of defendants are uh alleged to have refused to go to court so that's one of the reasons we don't know um and uh but we do keep track uh we definitely keep track of the number of defendants who are being delivered to court every day.

Um we also have uh uh increased the collaboration.

So in every every county we have a liaison with the folks at uh docks and and and there are all discussions all day long about what's happening with this defendant.

What it why is that defendant not coming?

Uh and there's a lot of communication going on.

If a defendant is, for example, on trial or is there is supposed to be doing something significant in terms of litigation, doing a hearing, et cetera, there is uh uh uh the f the uh the liaison is all over that.

Uh and there are now ways of determining not only whether they were produced, but the time they were produced, the time the uh bus pulled into the sally port, the time the um the uh accused uh has uh been checked in, uh the area of the um the the um department of the the the um holding area that the defendants are in, and and I do think we have stats that we could share with the committee.

Okay, and do you think that this is how hopefully on what you know I'm like you everything will be improved under Stanley Richards.

But do you think that this um needs improvement?

I guess that's my question.

Do you think you or do you think the liaisons are doing enough to be able to um have the kind of uh structure you want for the buses and the transportation?

Right.

I mean I al uh th this uh n no system is perfect, so I I will I think we are always going to be striving to improve all of the systems that we put in place, including uh the court system.

There are things we uh can improve as well.

Um on that front, uh when I uh would go mostly to family court, not criminal, but it always a technology was an issue.

You mentioned it in your statement about the increasing hopefully electronic filing.

But generally, is the technology something that is up to par?

Do you find that that's an issue or is that something that you find is satisfactory?

Yeah, yeah.

Well it took us too long to get um e-filing into the criminal side of uh of things.

That's now completely done.

It's not completely done.

Uh but it's Manhattan is next or something.

Yeah.

I mean, uh look, what w what the original e-filing statute required us to get permission uh from the legislature every time we wanted to s do it in another court.

So we we got a bill passed that essentially allowed the chief administrative judge to decide uh um, you know, wholesale what courts should be done next.

And so we're doing that in Supreme Court.

We're gonna do it in lower criminal court as well.

And I think three of the counties now in Supreme Court in the city are uh either in the process or have been done already.

Okay, are there other technology issues that are helpful or that's r the main one?

No, there there are all sorts of uh uh technological issues that we're with that we're considering that will um uh speed along the um the calendar call.

Um so there are there are things that we're exploring um um the the um you know w there there are things that we're doing with even with docs that will tell us that's what I'm wondering.

Go ahead.

W docks that are tell us um, you know, of the fa the f if a defendant says, I'm not coming to court, they immediately begin a and especially if it's the their appearance is really um important because they are in the middle of a trial and a jury is waiting for them.

Um there's a video tape that's taken and sent immediately to the judge and that person um you know whether or not that person voluntarily uh or refused to come to court gets disclosed to the judge.

Are there other video possibilities between Rikers and the courts that are used or is that something that because I have to say not you, but in family court, I was there and every time just about the something would happen with the video, we'd have to stop, fix it, etc.

So I don't know if that's the situation with you, but it was constant.

Yeah, I mean typically docs docs has been working on uh it was always on this is gonna sound like I'm I'm um I'm blaming them for everything, but our computer systems are all up to par.

Okay.

Uh there were there was some um uh work that needed to be done with the uh w with the computer systems at Rikers because we would often be in the middle of a these are virtual proceedings, right I know um and and sometimes they uh it would just shut off or they would bring the wrong defendant to the wrong computer and things like that would happen.

But that all slows down the system.

That's what I'm asking.

Yeah.

Thank you, madam chair.

Thank you.

Next we'll hear from Councilmember Kaban.

Thank you.

Uh uh before asking questions I just want to state that it is shameful but also really clarifying to see that the DAs aren't here because the subject of this oversight hearing is improving court operations and you would think that the prosecutors would have a vested interest in improving court operations uh and is especially to reduce jail populations.

You would think that they have experiences to bring to the table to talk about um to to be a partner in doing this work.

So it's unacceptable that they're not here.

And judge thank you for being here the last sort of preamble thing I'll say is we're both lawyers.

Lawyers like to be verbose.

I'm gonna try to be succinct because I got a lot of questions, but I'm gonna ask you to try to be succinct too.

Sure.

Thank you, Judge.

So I you know this is something I saw when I was practicing and it's still continuing today um we are are seeing that at Supreme Court arraignment a client who was either released or made bail shows up to their Supreme Court arraignment to to get charged post indictment uh and either at the request of the DA or or based on the arraignment charges the judge there increases or sets additional bail conditions.

Now bail is is simply to ensure that somebody shows up to court the best proof of that is that they showed up to the Supreme Court arraignment.

What are you guys doing to stop judges from abusing their power in in that scenario they shouldn't be they shouldn't be put increasing bail.

They showed up to court I I mean I think it's a good question.

Thank you.

Answer two parts of it.

The first is you know we don't I don't tell the the system we have is I do not tell judges what to do in their particular cases.

So they are given discretion uh judicial independence is is important.

But you give guidance on the law and the and the bail the bail statute is clear.

Like that is that I mean that's an area that's actually not really gray in that sense.

You don't tell them how to make these hard you know decisions but the the per the legal the the codified purpose of bail is to ensure somebody shows up to court and they're standing there.

So so there are some judges who believe that once if there are just criminal charges in a felony complaint uh that I mean I don't know the cases you're talking about we don't know the details but sometimes when a defendant gets indicted that defendant is now getting indicted for more serious charges correct than the person uh the original bail that was set.

And maybe things happened in between those two dates.

And so there might have been listen I'm saying I'm saying they didn't pick up any new cases.

They're not c showing up with the with the it's an indictment based on the original facts that they were arraigned on in criminal court.

I'm gonna I I think what I'm taking away from here is that OCA is not um holding their responsibility to not just advise but lead the judges to follow the bail statute.

I'm gonna move on to a another question but I do think that that's pretty unacceptable.

They're showing up to court.

Another common problem that we're seeing is that uh uh families are unable to pay partially secured bonds on nights and weekends which means people who could be released after bail is set or really soon after that have to wait for a clerk to to swear out the the PSB during the day um or during the week will you commit to remedying that will you commit to making sure that we can do these things on nights and weekends because we should be yeah and so what's the what's the plan for that?

Uh we have we have a plan in place we met with some of the advocates recently who brought that to our attention and and we are going to make that happen.

But what's the what do you know can you share what the plan is the plan is to make sure that the uh um uh clerks on weekends and holidays uh are are able to uh are um required to take those i mean uh especially for like a three day weekend why should someone stay in jail for three more days that this was recently brought to our attention and and the plan is to make it happen.

The train to train the clerks to make it to happen and and it'll happen in each of the counties.

Yeah, now I'm trying to be selective here with some of my questions.

I know I don't have a ton of time.

Oh uh I wanna ask you about about out of state um uh about fugitive warrants.

So I want to know what the current training is for judges on out of state fugitive warrants, because OCA can train judges to, for example, to release clients on fugitive warrants from at least the neighboring states like Pennsylvania and New Jersey, for example, because they take oftentimes like around a month, sometimes more to resolve.

It's totally unnecessary.

Uh and you know the those clients when they're not when the bail isn't set, when they're not remaned, they're almost always going back to those neighboring states, New Jersey and and Pennsylvania to clear those warrants.

So can you talk about the current training and advising on how you handle particularly fugitive warrants from like New Jersey and Pennsylvania?

Considering the data that shows that these folks, when they are released, they're going to clear those warrants.

Right.

I mean the training is that there's that they didn't used to be the right to a release in those days, and so the training is that they should be exercising their discretion based on all of the facts and circumstances in the c in the case to consider their options, one of which is release.

Do you have data on how often that's happening?

And then I'll I'll hand it back to the chair.

I'm not sure we do have data, but we'll get back to you on it.

Great.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you.

We have questions from Council Member Salam.

Yes, thank you, Chair.

And thank you for your testimony so far, Judge.

Just a few questions.

DLC projects that the jail population could reach 800 80, 8, 800 uh by June 2027.

While borough-based jails can hold roughly 400 or 4,160 persons.

Given your case management reforms, what specific reduction in length of stay or population do you project by the August 2027 deadline?

And what is that projection based on?

Yeah, I did you did you say 8,000?

I don't know.

No, I'm sorry, I said eight yes, eight thousand eight hundred.

Well I don't know where you're getting that number from.

Right now it's six thousand.

Uh we we haven't projected that it's gonna be eight thousand.

So it's going down.

If this is if it doesn't close, so you know, we're kind of like pushing it out, looking and seeing the data and saying, okay, well, based on DLC popul DLC's um report, they're basically saying that by June of 2027, we would reach a population of 8,800 persons.

Um I'm a little surprised at that because now it's 6,000, uh, you know, I mean, maybe if there's an incredibly uh uh an incredible uh increase in the case.

It's from a report in 2025 that they were projecting.

Okay, yeah.

I mean I'm I'm I I doubt the premise of that.

Um, but uh the the more that the uh the more the more that the courts collaborate with the par the uh stakeholders, the DAs as well as the defense bar, um and and if the trends are continuing where there are consistently more dispositions than filing.

So filings have been down.

If that trend continues, um, you know, whether we're gonna reach 4,000, I'm not I I can't guarantee that, but the the the um and you should also know that it's not just the cases that should get counted, it's the number of the the uh uh uh the the number of the accused that's actually in jail because some people who are at on rankers have multiple cases.

So for example, right now I think the defendant the defendants with cases over two years old, I think the number is around 502, but the number of actual defendants is at uh 460 something.

Um and so that's the number that we think should really be looked at because those are the number of people in Rikers Island.

Um I wish I could give you more information about what our uh prediction is with respect to that.

All I can say is that we're working hard to reduce the number of days that it takes to resolve a case.

And the trends uh uh in every uh every um area are that we're we're doing that.

The the clearance what's called a clearance rate uh is is um is getting better, so which means that the difference between filings and dispositions every time we have a uh a a case where dispositions are way greater than filings that means that we've just reduced the caseload and that's been happening that happened uh this year that's ha it's happening in 2026 and it happened in 2025 and it happened in in a in a bigger way than we expected.

Thank you for that uh Mark J's data shows reducing the uh the interval between court appearances for long stay for long stayers by seven days could free roughly four hundred and forty one beds what is the current average interval and what's your target what is your target and I don't have my glasses on.

And what concretely is preventing courts from achieving it today.

Yeah I could give you mine if you'd like sure no no no so uh uh so on on that you know every time a case is on there's there might be a different day for a different reason for an adjournment.

So I I have never bought in and I've been doing this for a long time with the idea that if you reduce a case uh the the uh adjournment time that that will have any effect on anything it really depends on what it really depends on uh what stage is the case in right uh are we are we trying to finish discovery are we trying to get a decision on a motion uh or are we at a point now where everything's been done and we're trying to get a case tried and in those cases uh I prefer and and we uh encourage our judges to set shorter long uh shorter uh adjournment dates but but sometimes a a lawyer will come in and say because we got all these programs going on and we've already committed this very busy lawyer to try a case in Brooklyn and we know that case is going to be a four or five week case for us it doesn't make sense adjourning that person's case in in the other county to a 30 day period when we know that lawyer's gonna be on trial if we find out that lawyer's not on trial we then can advance the case get that lawyer over and and get that case tried.

So really the it's really like there are there are moments that really matter and one is has discovery been the uh complete have the hearings been done is this case like really ready for trial that's when the the 30 day adjournments really matter um and so we've been encouraging judges to do that.

But there's so many reasons like let's say a defendant that there's they're waiting for DNA results and the prosecutor is saying we're not getting those DNA results uh for 45 days or 60 days which is too long and one of the things that I think would be helpful is a bigger investment in uh the forensic uh uh units of of of New York City to uh more speedily resolve these DNA things but if uh uh if a doctor is telling the judge you're not getting these DNA results for 60 days why adjourn a c case for 30 days when everybody knows that DNA evidence is very is going to be very important and is going to have an impact on how the case gets resolved.

I know Chair if I may just one last one the citywide calendaring system and off calendaring conference were announced in October of 2024.

What measurable change in adjournment rates or time to disposition have you seen since implementation and how many courtrooms or parts are actually using those protocols?

Yeah so the uh the time has been reduced from the the the uh the the time of disposition we could get to those numbers okay thank you thank you council member judge um are you taking any steps to establish firm trial dates um or some other backstop to ensure cases don't linger or linger on indefinitely?

Sure.

So um once you don't we don't s uh establish a trial date until discovery is complete.

That's why but we've been focusing a lot upon the completion of discovery and then the hearings.

But judges are uh scheduling trial dates as soon as uh you you can say the case is now uh ready for trial.

Not ready in the sense that it's gonna go to trial right away, but all the things that needed to get done before trial has gotten done.

And so uh uh that's happening and and our our judges are doing that.

Uh uh, you know, the other thing that gets considered is coordinating between busy uh prosecutors and busy defense attorneys.

So even though uh all of those things have happened, you know, the DNA is done, the the uh uh discoveries all complete, hearings are done, lawyers' schedules also can uh adversely affect the ability of a judge to set a date because the lawyer has an older case.

So a lawyer in Queens who's we the judge wants that person to go to trial might have an older case in Brooklyn with a defendant in.

And so we have this uh uh uh uh, you know, coordination happening.

We have an initiative which basically makes sure that the oldest case where a defendant is uh incarcerated gets the priority.

So we uh use our authority to say, wait a minute, Queen's judge, do not force that defendant that that lawyer to go to trial, because we want this older case, this way older case to go to trial.

So there's even that sort of cross county uh collaboration that's happening.

No, that's good to know.

Um would you advocate for any changes to state law that would give judges more latitude to manage their calendar effectively and hold parties to trial dates?

Uh I mean uh th i it it would not really be I mean I would advocate the appellate courts to give judges more discretion because there are uh there's there's precedent which precludes a trial court from if a prosecutor answers not ready uh to move the case to trial over the objection of a prosecutor.

So it's more along it's it's more decisional law by our appellate courts that have sort of boxed in the judge's uh ability, and I don't think that's something that uh there could be a statutory change to.

It's clear from the data that homicide cases are often particularly hard to resolve swiftly.

Um would you support a change to state law that would put a speedy trial clock on homicide cases?

You know, I I haven't thought about that, but what what when it comes to the homicide cases, what I would love to see is the district attorney's offices have more lawyers uh trained to to do those cases because that is also uh one of the uh you know, if a district attorney's office has five specialized homicide prosecutors, but there are six or seven or eight homicide cases, um what w we don't like to see them being able to try the case when everybody else might be ready.

One of the things I I I say I've been saying since day one when I was appointed chief administrative judge is that the court will always be ready.

The court will always be ready.

So if the parties come to us and both sides answer ready, you better believe that that case is gonna get trial, tried.

It's only when one side or the other uh insists that they cannot be ready for one reason or another.

Um and oftentimes it's related to important matters.

When it comes from the defense, it's some investigation that has to happen or uh uh some other issue, and and judges really uh loathe to force lawyers to move the case to trial when um there are good reasons um to to not do that.

Thank you for that, Judge.

Um and my last question um for you is you've indicated that one of the issues standing in the way of reducing the jail population is the lack of su suitable community programming available to judges when they're inclined to agree to an alternative to incarceration and detention.

I just want to say on the record, I really appreciate it.

I'll probably have the conversation about that, just knowing that there is someone in your role that looks at ATIs as a part of solutions and resolving some of these matters.

Do you believe it would be advantageous if certain community programs deserved capacity to help accommodate court referrals?

Yes, absolutely.

I mean, uh uh the there are and it would do reduce the number of people on Rikers Island waiting for those beds.

So once those beds get open, what once the they're able to send someone to a program, uh it you know, they they leave Rikers and that leaves another bed for someone else.

So absolutely.

And to the extent the city could uh increase funding for those programs, that will definitely have a that would move the needle on on uh the Rikers population.

Yeah, and the fan club and audience.

Um, we're still hearing that there are delays associated with cases being referred to treatment courts.

In particular, the delays are related to getting the necessary assessment completed to determine if people are suitable.

On a city level, what can be done to make treatment courts run more efficiently and effectively?

So there are clinicians that sometimes do do these reports, especially a mental health court, which makes recommendations and sometimes there's just not enough clinicians to do that.

We on our end have been hiring um uh resource coordinators, all of the necessary parties uh to like we're ready.

We we have all of our staff in place ready to take on more cases.

Um, and um, but but the folks who do, and it's not the court system, the folks who do the um psychosocial and the recommendations for uh um eligibility for treatment are not uh provided by either district attorney's offices or or other um uh other nonprofits, and so uh increasing the number of those groups who would be helpful as well.

Judge, I thank you.

Um we're done with this panel.

I really appreciate all of your candid responses today, and I think it was thoughtful and helpful for the conversation.

Thanks for having me.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um we're gonna call up our second panel, which includes Deanna Logan, director for the mayor's office of criminal justice, Nora Daniel, chief of staff of the mayor's office of criminal justice, Andrew Batello, executive director of special projects and operations with NYPD.

Um we also had expected to have the district attorneys on this panel and had been in coordination with several offices and last minute they um were not able to make it.

So look forward to reading their testimony and hope to have them in an upcoming hearing on this topic as we continue to move this conversation forward.

So if the names that I've called out can come to the day is to be sworn in by counsel, I'd appreciate it.

All right.

I'd like to swear in this witness panel.

If you could all please raise your right hands.

Do you affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth before this committee and respond honestly to council member questions?

I do.

Okay.

Um, thank you.

I'm not sure if you all were able to listen in to Judge Zaya's uh testimony and questioning, but I wanted to give a few moments to see if so, if you had any reactions to any of the things that were discussed in that panel.

I thought it was a great robust panel, and we're looking forward to the questions that you have for us so that we can help illuminate more of what's happening with case processing.

Thank you.

Well, I'm gonna start with a question that came to mind as he was reading his testimony.

One was that, and I'll just read the line from the testimony, but as a recent report from the New York City Bar Association highlighted, the New York City assigned council plan, ACP administration is understaffed and under resourced, and is thus unable to provide panel attorneys with the support that they need.

In fact, according to the Bar Association's report, since 2018, the mayor's office of criminal justice has failed to access over 50 million dollars debt in indigent legal services has allocated to the NYC ACP under two separate contracts.

Um I just would like to get an understanding as to why um mock J has failed to pull down that $50 million.

Okay, so I think we have to step a little bit back.

The assigned council plan is the supervisory portion that sits in MOCJ, that has two administrators that are appointed by the courts, and then has supervising attorneys that support the individual counsel that are appointed to the 18B panel.

So the actual attorneys that provide indigent legal services to clients are not in the assigned council plan, they are the ones that are pointed.

Back in 2018, the assigned council plan was part of the mayor's office of criminal justice, which was also within City Hall.

And so the budget is then accessible.

Much of the funds may not be drawn down into our budget.

So we we spend what is actually in our budget to support the assigned council plan and work with the indigent legal services as well as bar associations to really think about what the evolution of the assigned council plan should be and how it should be operating and working.

So how much of the 50 million is in the is the answer to be spent now.

The assigned council budget is approximately uh give me one second.

Sorry, I'm looking my CFO was here, and I just wanted to make sure because those numbers are changed.

Um, but I will get you the full budget for them, but we are pulling down from the funds that are available.

And why is it not the complete 50?

The allocated budget has to match what is the actual approved and assigned budget.

So each budget has the budget line of the per the PS the personnel and then the um OTPS budget that can be spent.

So we will draw down from that budget and spend it.

So things like training are now added in so that the assigned council plan members can go to the trainings with the ATB plan attorney so that they can understand that the needs and also that they can deliver training.

So we started making sure that the assigned council plan could deliver their own trainings as well as working with uh indigent defense providers in the portfolio where they are able to uh have plan members attend trainings that are being offered by other provider organizations as well.

Thank you.

Um next question is for PDE.

Can you please describe the process for officers to upload evidence so it can be transferred to prosecutors?

Sure.

Uh good morning, Chair, Council members, uh NYPD is grateful for the opportunity to to be here today.

So I guess I will start on the personnel front, and then I'll segue into the technological or the production front.

So NYPD policy foundationally is that the arresting officer is primarily responsible for the transmission, the transmission of material uh at the arrest arraignment processing window.

They are the one conferring with the early case assessment bureau that's on the district attorney side uh for the screening of that case, strength of the prosecution, weakness of the prosecution, uh, and whatever additional materials uh may be needed by the prosecution at that time, right?

It is a it is an open dialogue.

Uh, outside of that, if there are issues with discovery subsequent to that arraignment window, uh NYPD has dedicated personnel in every command citywide, numerous uh personnel.

There's a primary contact and a secondary contact that each of our local prosecuting agencies have a full and exhaustive list of they are to be, you know, contacted if there are any issues with uh discovery or contacting the arresting officer for any number of reasons, uh vacation or or they're just not available or not answering the phone, and then on top of that, to a higher level of degree or escalation, there's a centralized discovery liaison unit that turns out of uh the office of the chief of department under the chief of department.

Uh they are embedded in each of the five local prosecuting agencies, and they also work hand in hand with the district attorneys uh on two types of cases, and I can get into that if if you'd like me to, or or two buckets primarily.

So I guess we'll stay on the same track of that escalation, right?

So there's an arraignment, uh there's that initial conferral between NYPD and uh the respective, you know, screening ADA and ECAB in the district attorney's office, subsequent to arraignment.

They don't have the ability to reach or they're not having success for whatever reason with the dedicated command level personnel.

They would reach out to the discovery liaison unit.

So that would be a DA request.

So that's the first bucket.

That could be a particular request on any case.

That could be a request because there's a 18080 concern trying to meet grand jury requirements.

That could be a speedy trial concern or any number uh or any reason why any ADA citywide needs assistance.

The second bucket of cases that the discovery liaison unit assists with, and this is uh a larger bucket, is automatic or proactive cases.

So I mentioned that there are discover there is a discovery liaison unit embedded in each of our five local district attorney offices.

Those members of service are constantly monitoring uh the live arrest feed, and there are certain arrest types or crime classifications that the discovery liaison unit will assist with automatically.

They are uh, you know, the more complex type of arrests that have more voluminous discovery, primarily speaking, the DAs, the DLUs assist the district attorneys proactively with homicides, uh, with attempted murders, attempted homicides, uh shootings, non-fatal shootings, or confirmed shots fired, uh, criminal possession of a weapon in the second degree, you know, that coincides with uh the 2022 initiative that OCA launched with the Supreme Court specialized gun parts, right?

So the DLUs are there to facilitate discovery on those cases in the hopes of expediting you know the case processing on that as well.

So that pretty much sums up and also robbery in in the first degree.

So that pretty much sums up the second bucket of DLU.

Now, I know that was seemed like a lot, but there's also now like a technological aspect of this, right?

How are the materials being transmitted to the district attorney's offices?

So there are some outliers, but there are three primary transfer mediums or points of workflow where NYPD has established bridges, right, with the local prosecuting agencies.

So the first one, and this is most foundational to ECAB, right, because it has the underlying initial arrest documents that is absolutely needed for comprehensive screening by the district attorneys, the DA portal.

So that transfer mechanism receives the complaint report from NYPD, the most basic report that contains, you know, the pedigree identifying information of the incident, the time, the location, the occurrence, the crime, the allegations, so on and so forth.

The accompanying arrest report that corresponds with that complaint.

Who, which individual has been arrested pursuant to that complaint?

Property clerk invoices.

When there's an arrest, there's a sometimes an extensive amount, sometimes not so much amount of property or evidence that is inventoried by the police department, activity logs, and there are also any number of types of materials that can be transferred.

Scratch paperwork, anything else that may exist in that arrest processing arraignment window, the policy, the guidance, the technology dictates that it's automatically shared with the district attorney's office.

The second mechanism is called the enterprise case management system.

That is, if you think about arrests that have an investigative nature to it, right?

So sometimes there's just a patrol arrest, and it's very simple, but a lot of times, right, the NYPD has detective bureau, investigators, Intelligence bureau, Field Intelligence Officers, and other investigatory support units.

That is where their casework is documented.

Summary of the work that they do.

Attachments to those notes or DD5s as NYPD and the district attorneys refer to.

Some attachments may be photographs, they may be videos, they may maybe additional documents in in PDF form or in JPEG form for photos.

That is automatically shared with the District Attorney's Office upon the investigator sharing it.

Now I just want to touch on the first two uh mediums that I I just spoke about, the DA API portal and the ECMS portal.

You know, over the years uh we've worked with the DA's collaborative, right?

Not only to build uh the medium that both sides are speaking to each other for integration into the case management system, but also for automation.

So since criminal justice reform to where we are currently, now as the materials hit the system, they are automatically pushed or sent to the respective DA office, the DA is notified of that, and the ADA and and the paralegal and the discovery and the support staff uh gets the notification, they're able to review it, and then uh obviously turn that over subsequently down to defense counsel.

The last primary mechanism uh or method of transfer is evidence.com.

Evidence.com houses body worn camera of all of our members of service and fleet camera as well.

Some of our RMPs have docked dash cams as they're often referred to, and that again is sent to the district attorney's offices automatically, and that's again that occurs pre-arraignment in the screening process, and then as the case continues.

So that's uh the general overview.

No, thank you for that.

It was very helpful.

Um, does the department track whether officers are timely and uploading their evidence?

So as I mentioned, in that arrest arraignment window, and there's that dialogue, there are thresholds of what the DAs set as necessary, right, to properly screen a case.

Uh that may be contingent on a crime classification, it may be contingent on what actually occurred in you know the complaint incident or the arrest incident, but there's a dialogue there.

As as we look post-arraignment, there are obstacles in the ability to do that after that arraignment, if it's arraigned, we assume it is not declined or deferred, right?

So we have we see into that.

We know when a case is not arranged, we know when it's declined.

When we speak about speedy trial issues, you know, there are a number of reasons or scenarios that could alter the clock.

Could the case be subsequently dismissed?

Does or are there uh waivers of time?

Uh where are we exactly in that?

I don't think it's it's linear, you know, 90 days for a misdemeanor, 180 days for a felony on where that is, and because of that, you know, the district attorneys have been great partners in utilizing the personnel that have been designated and are responsible for discovery.

What I mean is when discovery materials are outstanding or they want to ascertain or verify if there are additional materials outside of the arresting officer subsequent to arraignment uh they do utilize the command specific personnel and then also the discovery liaison unit to meet to meet those deadlines uh that are defined statutorily.

Thank you for that clarification.

And then just in the event that an offer does not upload the evidence in a timely way, what happens?

Like our supervisors informed are there any other actions taken at all?

Sure we we speak with the district attorneys you know at a higher level than you know the arresting officer and if something is brought to light we we look into the case are there times where there is an undue delay unfortunately there are times where that occurs however are there scenarios where it is extremely voluminous on the police on the police department side to gather the materials that causes speedy trial to go yes are there times where it's taking the district attorney's office time to review a voluminous case file and they're exercising due diligence in doing so yes I think though you know there are times where the material may not exist yet a complex report uh you know the chief judge alluded to that in his testimony there are times where the materials aren't readily accessible uh you know the mechanisms in place transfer the materials as soon as they exist and are accessible and you know if if the department does find something then uh it's dealt with in accordance with uh the severity of of the issue um as I'm sure you're aware state law considers any material in the possession of law enforcement to also be in the possession of the prosecution can you def definitively say that NYPD is transmitting evidence to the district attorneys within a time frame that enables them to meet the disclosure deadlines imposed by state law including for incarcerated defendants sure chair thank you if you could just start with a yes and no and then go into it the department you want me read it again sure thank you okay because it's an important question that I really want to know the answer to as I'm sure you're aware state law considers any material in the possession of law enforcement to also be in the possession of the prosecution can you definitively say that the NYPD is transmitting evidence to district attorneys within a time frame that enables them to meet the disclosure deadlines imposed by state law including for incarcerated defendants so I ask that you start with a yes and no first and I will and I appreciate the question yes with the caveat that the material needs to be accessible so I explained material such as the complaint report and the arrest report and vouchers and body one camera and dash cam and case enterprise case management fives and attachments that exist unfortunately right there there's two things at play here's accessibility meaning certain materials are more difficult to retrieve review and produce than other materials that relate to the arrest that is the first thing the the second aspect of this is that when you look at the discovery statute and this arraignment window and 20 days for an incarcerated and 35 days for an at liberty discovery and evidence is not static.

Meaning that there are cases where individuals, including those that are at liberty and incarcerated uh it is dynamic, meaning that there is subsequent discovery that is being produced as the case adjudication as the criminal prosecution progresses.

So the systems that we have in place with the automation that was discussed are designed to send that to the DAs as they become in existence, as they are made final, as they are made whole.

They go directly to the DAs.

So if a report or a laboratory report on the PD side is signed off on and finalized at day 10, or even outside of those windows, that gets uploaded into the case and automatically shared.

Sometimes the materials do not exist or don't have the ability to go to the DAs in that time frame.

There are other materials that take longer.

I know MOCJ uh is in on this effort with the district attorneys as well.

There's an open dialogue here.

For instance, 911 records, right?

There is a backlog on that.

We take it very seriously.

We are doing everything we can on that, but I cannot say affirmatively that we're producing every single material related to the case in the time frame.

Thank you for that.

How many officers to um excuse me are assigned to discovery liaison units in the district attorney's offices within each borough?

Are there any civilians assigned to those units?

Are there limited or excuse me?

Are there limits in place as to what types of cases those liaisons can work on?

And if so, why are those limitations established, and are there differences between the boroughs?

Okay, I'm going to do my best to hit a few of those, and if I miss anything, please just tell me thank you.

So it's a strictly uniform position.

There are no civilians assigned to the discovery liaison unit.

There is one lieutenant who oversees the unit from a central position.

That lieutenant is based in one police plaza.

And then there are five sergeants also assigned to the discovery liaison unit.

Five sergeants would be one in each respective county district attorney office.

And then there are 25 additional uniforms in the rank of police officer and detective.

That varies a little bit on uh the head count for each of those ranks, and those 25 are split amongst the DA offices.

Now I think you asked for the the case types.

So I I touched on it a little earlier.

So I think it's easiest to think about it in two primary buckets.

There's proactive or automatic case assistance.

That's contingent upon the arrest type, the arrest charge, murders, attempted murders, shootings, shots fired, criminal possession of a weapon in the second degree, robbery, first degree, and then there are the DA requests.

There are times where the prosecution has difficulty obtaining materials that, materials that or arrests or materials relating to arrests that aren't in those proactive nature of cases, right?

This is a DA request.

So the arresting officer is maybe not available, or there is a speedy trial issue or a grand jury need to get that material as soon as possible.

So then they also work on a DA request.

So the district attorney's offices have guidance, they're great partners, they they utilize them uh whenever needed, and then there is direct case assistance embedded, embedded in each of the DA's offices when they need assistance.

We understand that district attorneys have requested additional NYPD staff in those units.

Have those requests been met?

What I can say is DLU in at this juncture is the highest staffing level of all time.

DLU has been in existence since 2021, NYPD implemented DLU at its own volition, preemptively to essentially assist and facilitate with as the the chief judge said, right, onerous discovery laws uh with the hopes of facilitating compliance and assisting with a more expeditious case processing mechanism.

You know, the the police department is grateful for the D district attorney's acknowledgement of just how beneficial the DLUs are.

The DLU's staffing right now, you know, is contingent, or rather the the caseload is contingent on staffing, and you know, the the police department, you know, balances the operational needs with with the resources that they currently have allocated.

I I'm more than happy to to bring back to the upper level executives uh, you know, the sentiment that you stated regarding the the DAs requesting more DLUs.

Do you support giving district attorneys access to NYPD databases so they can secure the evidence they need to move prosecutions forward?

So I can't speak to the overall agency position.

I can speak to what the department has implemented in tandem in collaboration with the DAs.

I can speak about the enhancements that have been implemented, you know, the automation of the DA portal of the ECMS portal and evidence.com has drastically improved the discovery workflow.

I'd just like to to give an example.

So the chief judge mentioned in his testimony that in 2025, dispositions were up uh between 10 and 11%.

I forget the exact number he cited, and simultaneously PD worked with the district attorney's office on two main projects and with mock J as well.

We automated body worn camera collection in the evidence.com environment, meaning prior to this, officers had to manually search for the videos, right?

So if there's a large patrol response, let's say there's uh an incident, a violent incident where it touches precinct boundaries, that arresting officer is now responsible to gather dozens, if not hundreds of body worn camera.

So we we leveraged the vendor with evidence.com to automate that.

We also automated the arrest portal, right?

So when you think about NYPD and mock J and the DA's commitment to continuing to enhance this workflow, right, maybe it's telling that dispositions are up in the same time frame.

So I'm just trying to get clarification on terms of why you wouldn't be able to speak on behalf of the agency's position on there.

Is it that there's not a position that's established or you know, I that's a very critical issue, or it's a large decision, right?

Um what I can say up front is you know that's a little bit above uh my level and and my pay grade, but there are mechanisms in place that are giving the DAs direct access already to the case file.

Thank you for that.

I'm gonna pass it to Councilmember Kaban.

Thank you.

Uh my questions are for the NYPD.

Um, I I want to start by sort of the the role that NYPD has in relation to the production of of people that are in the system.

Just like the DAs have a lot of control in this area, so does the NYPD, and unfortunately, we're seeing what is can unequivocally be described as a drastic increase uh in broken windows policing, which again, there is well over two decades of research that says this stuff does not bear um any progress on public safety.

But I I want to know about the NYPD's current policy on documenting the reason a DAT was denied.

Um, you know, I my understanding is that uh you guys maybe aren't using DAT investigation forms anymore, which those are the documents that include a lot of the exceptions that aren't in the statute.

Uh but based on the information that I've been getting from folks who work with people in the system, and I'm based on my questioning at previous hearings.

I this does not seem to be what's actually happening.

So can you lay out exactly what the policy is around um the documentation of the reason uh a DAT or an appearance ticket was denied?

Councilmember, I I appreciate that.

Unfortunately, I think you're discussing or or talking about an operational decision that is essentially occurring in a command by a uniform member of service.

I think it's a little, it is outside of the scope that I'm able to attest to here today.

I mean, uh uh how many people are going before a judge uh and how many people are being processed rather getting an appearance ticket, I think falls under the scope of an oversight hearing of um the efficiency of the courts uh and in reducing the jail population.

The you know you can't get into jail without uh an arrest being precipitated.

So I don't know why you're not able to testify on that.

Sure, and and I'll be more than happy to follow up with you with respect to the the reasoning and and that question, and I'll try to get you data on reasons why DATs are being disqualified.

If we're able to capture that metric, I would have to I would have to.

And just as a reminder from the testimony from the executive budget hearing uh around this, the court decision uh at this at the state level says when uh a DAT or an appearance ticket must be given in the field, and well over 90% of the time, the NYPD is finding a reason or just flouting the law and taking people to the precinct to process them there, and it's causing a lot of problems.

It's not just backing up the system, but also we're seeing really devastating things happen to the people while they're in police custody.

And this the reason that was given was that there are other open warrants, um, but what failed to be disclosed is the data around how many times those open warrants were for the same kind of nonsense.

Where those open warrants were actually SAP warrants, right?

Where summons warrants is for taking up an extra seat on the subway for having an open container, things that should not justify uh somebody being processed and quite frankly categorizing them as like we had to process them because they had these open warrants amounts to to misleading fear mongering.

So I would like the data on that.

Um can you tell me the most common reason why an otherwise eligible DAT is denied?

Again, I'm gonna have to get back to you on that.

Okay.

It's been reported that the NYPD is surging its presence with 2,600 extra officers on late night and early morning foot patrols this summer.

Uh I will officers be instructed to make arrests on those foot patrols for quality of life crimes.

Like again, listing some of these things like loitering, disorderly conduct, uh conduct, parks violations.

Again, council member, it's very operational in nature.

Uh I can't speak to that.

So you also can't speak to whether these officers will be instructed on how to refer people to services rather than make an arrest.

Again, I can go back, I can speak to the upper level executives, find out about if there is any such messaging, and we can get back to you.

I I I mean, again, uh it you don't get into the courthouse without an arrest.

And so not having information about who we are subjecting to uh a criminal court proceeding, I think is unacceptable.

Like you didn't you didn't show up prepared for this hearing.

Everybody has their role to play, right?

Like you're making the arrest, there's a lot of discretion there.

The prosecutors then in ECAP have the ability to DP or decline to prosecute.

They have the ability to move cases along quicker.

The judge has the things that they can do.

Defense attorneys need more resources so that they can help put their the cases along more speedily.

But I will say to show up here and not be able to speak about how, when, and why arrests are being made and whether you're being judicious with that really big responsibility means that you didn't show up here prepared.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you.

Um, we're gonna pivot now to MOCJ.

Um, Mayor De Blasio, when discovery reform was passed, MOCJ took on the role of coordinating acquisition and installation of new data management systems for DAs and defenders.

Why is it the case that over six years later, those officers do not yet have the function and systems implemented?

So the data management systems have been a challenge to the to the system to the criminal legal system.

We worked with all of the stakeholders to determine and identify components that would be able to integrate with the current system.

As counsel is where we pursued a vendor not only for the district attorneys but also for the uh defense bar in order to actually have the have the infrastructure that would ingest the information from NYPD and then categorize and save the information and then allow for the prosecutors to then transmit that information to defense bar and then defense bar to receive that information in a coherent fashion because one of the things that MOCJ heard was that um discovery material was coming to them very um aggregated and not cataloged in a way that made it usable.

Unfortunately, in the vendor that was chosen, it seems that there was a capacity challenge, so that one of the DA's offices was able to get the very targeted work that needed to happen.

However, the vendor overestimated the ability to essentially copy the work that it was doing with the first GA's office and go across the system.

Having five DA's offices that have very distinct styles as well as distinct systems that they had originally created on their own, the vendor took on more than they could chew in terms of being able to actually then do the same very targeted work that they did for one borough and replicate that in a timely fashion for all the other boroughs.

What we now have are offices that have in the interim built their own internal systems such that they are using the funding that we have advocated for to add personnel and do their own forms of workarounds to be able to meet their burden of providing discovery.

We still are talking to all of the stakeholders about ways to move forward and where there may be opportunities for technological advancements that will move us to a more one city seamless approach to getting the information not only from the NYPD to the DAs, but appropriately to the defense bar so that we can more effectively handle cases.

Thank you.

What role, if any, does MOCJ have in ensuring that NYPD and other city agencies are providing discovery in a timely way to the DAs?

Mock J serves kind of as the logjam clearer, as it were.

We will get information about a challenge, and then we will specifically work with the stakeholders to move that logjam.

For example, we know that the office of the chief medical examiner is critical in getting DNA evidence and reports on various categories of cases.

And we heard that there was some slowdown in getting those reports.

So our team will go in and we'll talk to the OCME and we said, What's going on here?

And we realize that they have senior people that have to review the reports before they go out to the various DA's offices.

Well, why aren't they being reviewed?

Well, because we have but so many personnel and they don't have enough hours in the day to do that.

So then for us, we're like, okay, how do we solve this problem?

We go and we talk to our partners at the Office of Labor Relations and OMB, and we say, Here is a challenge that is glutting the system, and we need to alleviate it.

What do you think about being able to access uh funds that allow for overtime and making sure that the contracts allow for that in that category of employee?

And together with the stakeholders, we work out the way to get that done, and so that now the supervisors are able to have the time in the day to review those documents and that they're more timely being provided to the DAs and then the cases can move.

So that is an example of how we start to move and look at what the challenges are in the system.

Thank you for that.

Um, what steps, if any, has MOCJ taken the speed up and reform the 730 process, the 7, excuse me, 730 process for people who may not be competent to stand trial.

7:30 is definitely a challenge, and we have worked with stakeholders.

I'd actually like the first deputy of our office, since she's the one who helped facilitate this one to have the opportunity to take her flowers for being able to work through one of the challenges.

She had come to the days, we just need to swear her in.

Jill Starashevsky.

Thank you.

Do you affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth before this committee and respond honestly to council member questions?

I do.

Okay, go ahead.

I thank you for the question.

Uh the issue is that when someone is found unfit for trial, as you know, uh the process is the person needs to be transferred to uh OMH facility for restoration.

Uh there is a currently a backlog in that process in the fact that there is not enough uh beds for the transfer.

So, what we've been trying to do is to assess different ways to shorten that transfer time uh for those found unfit, um, as well as trying to uh develop a robust um we've been exploring uh outpatient restoration models.

So we've been working with our partners at CHS and with the DAs and the defenders to try to figure out what we could do there.

And perhaps most importantly, what we've done is we've worked with our partners at OCA to uh take certain steps to make it so that when the evaluation, the 730 valuation report is given to the court, there used to be a delay that uh the court received the report, and then there was an adjournment where the report was given to the prosecutor, and then the defense attorney would be given it in court, and that would then require another adjournment because the defense attorney had to have the opportunity to review the evaluation report, working with our partners, we were able to make it so that um now the way it works is when the 730 evaluation report is given to the court, the court clerk is required within 24 hours to share that report with both the prosecutor and the defense, and that um really um alleviates sometimes one, sometimes two adjournments, and so that helps to expedite uh the court process.

Okay.

Thank you for that.

Last session, the council passed local law 139 of 2025 to expedite access to court based alternative to incarceration programs by requiring that within six weeks of an attorney's request, an assessment would be conducted to determine if a person is suitable for a program.

Can you give us an update on where things stand with the implementation of this law?

And are attorneys requesting assessments.

Have you been able to meet the statutory timeline to turn those assessments around within six weeks?

So the that portion of the law was was passed last year, and I believe it um the uh operational date was this spring, and so our partners have have operationalized it within the program.

We don't have the data on that yet, but we will have the data on it shortly.

And you can share it with us once it became available.

Do you have an idea of timeline on that?

I'm not sure of timeline, but we can get it back to you.

Okay.

Well, thank you to the panel.

This panel is relieved.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next, we will have the public defenders.

Um, and that will include.

Oh, before I call them up, I'll just read this script real quick.

I now open the hearing for public testimony.

I remind members of the public that this is a formal government proceeding and that the quorum shall be observed at all times.

As such, members of the public shall remain silent at all times.

The witness table is reserved for people who wish to testify.

No video recording or photography is allowed from the witness table.

Further, members of the public may not present audio or video recordings as testimony, but may submit transcripts of such recordings to the sergeant at arms for inclusion in the hearing record.

If you wish to speak at today's hearing, please fill out an appearance card with the sergeant at arms and wait to be recognized.

If you have a written statement or additional written testimony you wish to submit for the record, please provide a copy of that testimony to the sergeant at arms.

You may also email written testimony to testimony at council.nyc dot gov within 72 hours of this hearing.

Audio and video recordings will not be accepted.

And now we'll call our first panel, which includes young me Lee with Brooklyn Defenders, Wes Keynes with Bronx Defenders, Elizabeth Fisher with Neighborhood Defender Services of Harlem, Stan German New York County Defender Services, and Tina Luango, the legal aid society.

And I know you all are giving statements, and the clock is set for five minutes for each of you.

You can begin when you're ready.

Whatever order you like.

However, you'd like to um I I'll go first.

Hi.

Uh I'm going first.

Okay.

I'm Tina Longo.

I'm the chief attorney at the Legal Aid Society's Criminal Defense Practice.

We are the citywide provider of trial, appellate, parole, uh, and post-conviction work.

We have uh trial offices in each of uh New York City uh New York City, and we are celebrating our 150 years serving the city uh and have been the public defender for the city before Gideon v.

Wainwright.

Uh I have served as the uh public defender uh and began my career in the New York City office of the Legal Aid Society uh for over 25 years.

Um I I wanted to start.

My colleagues are each going to take specific issues to address.

I I sort of wanted a step back and set the sort of groundwork.

First and foremost, thank you for this hearing.

It's critically important, particularly right now.

But it is also telling, I think, a little bit about who is not at this table and who has not come before this this uh you as the chair and this council, who is not here to answer questions about desk appearance tickets and over policing, because I think what it says is that people, the district attorneys and the police department, see this as a very narrow issue that you're trying to address.

When in fact it is not.

Yes, what we are trying to, and what we are talking about here, and what we are trying to get to is what is the problems and what are the solutions that are driving court delay.

But you cannot have that conversation.

You cannot have solutions without identifying the problems and with each stakeholder coming forward to say, here is what we see, here is the role we play, here are the solutions we implement.

But you're not really getting all of that.

You have the court come, and we really do appreciate our judiciary, our chief judge, and our statewide administrative judge for taking proactive steps.

We appreciate that Makjay was here to provide some context.

We appreciate that you heard a lot about this discovery technology.

And I certainly appreciate our colleagues who come as the public defenders, and every single day right now in courts across this city, our staff are dealing with those delays.

More importantly, the people we represent, those impacted are suffering those delays.

It isn't really about court delay.

It's about intentional decisions made about where we are going to as a city invest our time and money.

So as we are hearing from the judge, and as my colleagues likely will talk about, we need program services, we mean mental health services, our clients need housing.

Our public defenders need higher salaries.

We have offices right now negotiating contracts.

Some of them have our union has said that they will strike.

And I want to say, I will give them this, that the district attorneys also lose felony assistants, DAs that are ready to try serious cases at high rates because of the lack of pay, because of the lack of keeping up with the cost of living in New York City for people who have dedicated themselves to public service.

At the same time, though, NYPD's overtime budget is nearing a billion dollars, and has almost hit a billion dollars four years in a row.

At the same time, we are looking at the attrition of our staff, our social workers, our investigators, our litigation assistants, NYPD in this city, is set to bring on a brand new class.

Those are intentional decisions about where we are placing our resources.

So it is hard for us to think through how do we fund all the solutions we need within the court system and within our offices that must have the staff to meet the challenges that are brought by what is real justice.

So I say that to set the framework that the problem doesn't start at the courthouse door, and the solution will never be found in tinkering around the council members uh who have taken part in this important hearing this morning.

I think, you know, to just piggyback off what Tina just said, if the city is really committed to closing Rikers Island, it has to build a meaningful alternative pathways away from Rikers, which ultimately means far more investment in the community-based services that address root causes, root cases, and break the insidious cycle of criminalization, incarceration, and recidivism.

With that being said, I really want to get and focus on real issues and offer some real solutions, because I don't think we really heard solutions from uh prior testimony.

So, madam chair, you spoke about the 730 crisis, right?

Right now, it is taking someone who has been found unfit and committed to OMH custody about 5.4 months to make it to an OMH hospital.

And that's from the time that the commitment order is signed.

If you attack on about another two or three months in order to get the 730 exam, is one party or the other going to controvert that?

We're probably looking at closer to seven or eight months that somebody who is mentally unfit is sitting on Rikers Island not getting the services they need.

There are two things that can absolutely happen right now to help alleviate this problem.

MOCJ alluded to one of them, which is out restoration, right?

Out restoration can be ordered by a court in particular and suitable cases, but it requires DA consent.

The reality is that we worked with MOCJ to identify cases that we thought would be suitable for out restoration.

We sent that list to the district attorney's office in Manhattan, and it was dead on arrival.

There was no discussion, there was no consideration.

The word back was simply they will not consent to out restoration for somebody who is found unfit, regardless of the circumstances.

The other tool in the toolbox is OMH.

Now, OMH has a capacity problem.

We all understand that there aren't enough beds.

But OMH also has statutory authority to send folks to other hospitals and other facilities, as long as they have the proper psychiatric care that that person can provide.

We are in a crisis right now with mental health and Rikers Island serving essentially as a mental health hospital, which is which it is not.

So it's going to take creative solutions and creative thinking in order to solve those issues, and those are just two of the matters.

With regard to trial capacity, and after Judge Zayas uh said what he said about, you know, the court is always ready.

I ran out and I told the judge, well, Judge, what we've seen in Manhattan over the last several months is that cases are being what we in uh the courthouse called no parted.

What that means is the DA is ready to try the case.

We're ready to try the case.

We show up into the courtroom and there are no parts available.

That means there's nowhere to send this case to be tried.

The reality is that in Supreme Court, New York County last year tried 230 cases.

King's comes in at 133.

We've always outperformed the other boroughs when it comes to the number of trials we do in New York County.

We simply need more judges and more resources so we can try these cases.

Because when a case is no parted, it doesn't just get adjourned for a day or for two days.

It could be adjourned for a month, it could be adjourned for two months, vacations, witness availability changes, which is adding to the delay.

Okay.

So Kings County does 37% more cases than we do on a yearly basis.

Yet New York County sends more people to Rikers Island than Kings County does.

And the reality is that 64% of the cases that are being sent to Rikers Island in Manhattan are misdemeanors and nonviolent felonies.

If we're truly going to get that jail population down, we need leadership from MOCJ and the city and this chamber and the DAs to figure out how do we off-ramp the people who are charged with misdemeanors and nonviolence so that we're not sending them to Rikers Island and adding to an increased jail population.

And the last issue I want to address is the ATI courtrooms.

We have seen increase uh numbers of individuals who are being accepted into ATI Manhattan.

But the process, the process that uh DA Bragg's office uses to screen individuals is simply onerous, and it's something we don't see in any other borough, right?

We can spend months upon months having to supply medical records to not doctors but to prosecutors.

They require proffers, something no other borough does.

Every single person, we have to prepare them, we have to go in, we have to have a meeting, you gotta tell your life story.

And if the answer is no, we could have spent eight, nine, ten months trying to advocate for somebody to get in, only to be told at the end it's not gonna happen.

And so, you know, the treatment court expansion act, I know that's an albody issue, but the fact is we have to take mental health away from the DAs being the gatekeepers.

Let the judges and the courts administer it the same way we did with drug diversion about 15 years ago.

Good afternoon.

Thank you, madam chair and committee members for the opportunity to testify before you today.

My name is Wesley Keynes, and I am the deputy executive director at the Bronx Defenders and a formerly incarcerated member of the Bronx community.

The Bronx Defenders is a public defender nonprofit that is radically transforming how low-income people in the Bronx are represented in the legal system.

Each year, our holistic defense teams defend more than 20,000 low-income Bronx residents in criminal, civil, child welfare, and emigration cases.

We appear before this council to testify on how the city can effectively reduce the jail population.

While discussions about court operations are important, we cannot meaningfully address the jail population without first acknowledging what drives people into the system in the first place.

The population at Rikers is driven by arrests, overpolicing, and decades of underinvestment in the communities most impacted by our criminal legal system.

If the city is serious about reducing the jail population and closing Rikers, it must invest in communities and reduce unnecessary contact with the legal system before people ever reach a courtroom or a jail cell.

First, the city must end the continued and in fact renewed reliance on broken windows policing that we know does not make communities safer.

Far too many New Yorkers continue to be arrested and funneled into our criminal legal system for conduct that poses little to no threat to public safety.

Custodial arrests for offenses such as fear evasion and occupying multiple subway seats do not make communities safer.

After falling approximately 16% on average year over year from 2014 until a record low in 2020, low-level policing has been growing steadily ever since.

Low-level arrests in 2025 were up approximately 16.2% from 2024, approximately 55% from where they were in 2019, and a staggering 193% from where they were in 2021.

Totaling the most arrests in a year since 2017.

Recent reports show that the number of people arrested for lying down or taking up more than one seat on the subway went up 3,000% in 2025 compared to 2024.

2025 arrests for the possession of controlled substances were up a hundred and thirty-six percent from 2022 totals.

Petit Lawsony arrests in 2025 were up approximately 35% from 2022 totals, and 2025 had the most petit laws in the arrests since 2014, and the second most since 2006.

These numbers make clear that New York City is moving backwards, increasingly relying on police to respond to poverty, homelessness, treatment, and behavioral health needs.

Every one of these arrests represent a person whose lives were further destabilized by criminal legal system involvement, often for conduct that poses little threat to public safety, but carries lasting consequences for employment, housing, family stability, and health.

We know firsthand from our experiences in arraignment courtrooms across this city.

For instance, arraignments for cases where the most serious charges is low-level drug possession have steadily increased every year since 2021 when this data became first available, and are up over 200% citywide from 2021 to 2025, a 339% increase in the Bronx, the borough with the highest increase.

A majority of these low-level drug offenses are ultimately dismissed, which highlights that these are cases that should never have been prosecuted in the first place.

Prosecutions that disrupt lives, congest courtrooms, and divert resources from communities.

What is more, the negative impact of increased law enforcement focused on low-level drug offenses is felt most harshly in black and brown communities.

Almost 80% of people arraigned for low-level drug possessions are black and are Hispanic.

The city must reject calls to increase the NYPD's headcount, and instead invest in housing, education, youth opportunity, mental health services, and violent prevention programs.

I know I'm at time.

Yes, I'm wrapping up.

Ultimately, the most effective way to reduce the jail population is to reduce the number of people entering the system to begin with.

That requires ending unnecessary low-level policing, investing in communities, expanding access to community-based services, and ensuring that support is available before a person reaches a courtroom or a jail cell.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I want to echo my colleagues' thanks to the committee for holding this hearing.

Some of the efforts that we have heard about today will reduce the amount of time that certain individuals spend on Rikers Island.

But I want to be clear, we are simply rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic without the district attorneys of this city here to take accountability for the decisions that they can make that could solve our case processing problems.

The only real solution to cases moving faster is to have fewer cases to move, fewer arrests, fewer arraignments, fewer people cycling through system that never should have touched them.

And only then can our offices direct our limited resources toward the cases where legal system involvement is genuinely warranted and move those cases swiftly.

I want to turn directly to discovery because there was a lot of discussion about efforts to comply with the discovery law in the testimony today.

But I want to talk about what is actually happening in our courtrooms and in our cases.

The more this state legislature chips away at the defense'sue.

The law is not to full and speedy discovery, the slower prosecution because when they fear the consequences of not providing discovery in a timely manner, we see that they do provide it.

We have cases in Manhattan where DAs are saying on the record that they are refusing to turn over surveillance video that they have three or four months into a case, despite the statutory guide the statutory uh requirements.

There is a blatant disregard for the timelines in the statute.

We are also seeing DAs file certificates compliance while simultaneously acknowledging that they haven't obtained materials central to the case from the NYPD.

I myself have handled a case recently where the prosecutor filed a certificate of compliance while failing to turn over the lead detective's entire enterprise case management system file that the NYPD testified about earlier.

Their explanation was that despite due diligence, they had been unable to obtain that case file.

The detective in that case happened to be a member of a task force embedded within the DA's office.

If what the NYPD representative here today was saying is true about the automatic access that the DAs have to these files, then why are we not receiving them five, six months sometimes into a case?

The DA's office inability to obtain discovery from the NYBD cannot be the reason for delaying a case.

They could solve this problem tomorrow by simply giving the DAs access to the NYPD files.

They simply refuse to do so.

And that refusal is having a human cost.

Cases are stalling, people are waiting, and Rikers is staying full.

Now, I want to go back to the fundamental problem of volume.

Despite a steady decrease in major crimes, arrests are up from pre-pandemic levels, and more people are entering the system at every point.

But prosecutions are also up, and that matters just as much.

Arraignments in our office have risen steadily since 2023.

By 2025, we were handling 15% more cases than two years prior.

And while our numbers this year are approximately the same as they were in 2023, we are facing unprecedented levels of attrition in our office due to underfunding and high caseloads.

In June and July, I am losing five experienced felony attorneys.

And that might not seem like a lot, but I have an office of 30 attorneys handling caseloads.

In two months, I'm losing one sixth of my attorney staff.

People working at our offices can no longer afford to work and have families in this city at the pay that we are able to give them.

None of this, none of the choices that they have the ability to make requires money.

None of it requires new legislation, it doesn't require new ideas.

It requires them to just make different choices.

They have the tools, they have the discretion.

What they have lacked is sufficient pressure to use those tools and use that discretion.

And we are asking you to use what is within your power to apply that pressure.

Thank you so much for having this hearing today, which we all in New York City, all five public defender offices felt was crucial to appear and to give testimony.

My name is Young Me Lee.

I'm the director of law and appeals at Brooklyn Defender Services, where I have worked for more than 28 years now.

One of my primary jobs is to assist lawyers and to also monitor our clients who are incarcerated at Rikers Island.

So I just want to throw out a BDS kind of surprising piece of data.

In the past year, we represented more than 1,400 people who had bail set.

Most of them bail with set in criminal court arraignments.

Of those 1400 cases, more than half of them resulted in dismissals with close to 45 receiving ACDs.

So what is this number tell you?

It tells us that bail is overused by judges.

I know that OCA has been making efforts, and I was very glad to see OCA come and give City Council testimony because I do believe they are making an effort to really look at the jail population at Rikers Island.

But when it comes to individual judges, and I think this is citywide, probably statewide, but definitely in Brooklyn, we see judges setting very high bail on cases that shouldn't have bail set at all.

We see judges circumventing that third bail form requirement that was part of the 2019 bail reforms, that is the partially secured bond or the unsecured bond.

In the more than 1400 cases that I reviewed, not a single one had unsecured bond.

All of them had partially secured bond.

The default was 10%, even though judges can do 1% to 10%.

We have also seen, and I know legal aid recently did a writ on this, we have seen judges when a surety appears who has a work history, who has pay stubs, they go to court to bail someone out on a partially secured bond, and judges will either chastise the surety for trying to bail out a loved one and not follow the script that OCA has given them, but also find that they are not approved, just based on their income alone, I'm sorry, based on their income, and disapprove them.

These are individual cases that were when bail can be posted, judges are even after setting unnecessary bail, are now denying sureties from posting bail in the partially secured bond cases.

Based on our numbers, and these also include a huge portion of the dismissed cases, 247 cases of those 1,400 bail cases had a much higher partially secured bond amount than the commercial insurance company bond.

We had one case where bond was set at 2,500, cash at 2,500, and partially secured bond at 10,000.

A clear indication of that particular judge circumvented, circumventing the partially secured bail amount that's required in all bail setting cases.

And they have not come here to testify.

DOC has had suddenly, I want to say in the past two years, removed the credit card bail online option without explanation.

This was a method where sureties who lived out of state, who had credit cards, who had other family members could post bail online.

That method has been completely removed.

Credit card bail is still an option, but uh when people post bail with their credit cards at a DOC facility, which is Rikers Island right now, a lot of people don't realize that there is a usurious 8% fee charged, which is the fee that is charged also by commercial insurance company uh bond companies.

Just to wrap up, the city council can ask for transparency, just in terms of asking OCA to provide data on the bail amounts that are set, the three different forms that are required to be set when bail is posted, when partially secured bond uh uh bonds are disapproved by individual judges.

Um, and finally, I just want to highlight that this is uh a problem citywide.

Supervised release is overused by judges.

More than 50% of people who are on supervised release are charged with non-qualifying offenses.

Sure.

Uh I'm just gonna wrap it up.

Um there are many cases, whether they're qualifying offenses or not, who many people who are sitting at Rikers Island who maybe should be on supervised release, but there are too many misdemeanor cases, too many nonviolent cases who are receiving overprogramming through the supervised release program.

Thank you.

And I'll end it with that.

Thank you.

Since the discovery reforms were passed seven years ago, your offices have received tens of millions of dollars for implementation needs.

Can you describe how you spent your share of this money and what is the status of purchasing, installing, and fully implementing use of discovery data management systems?

Sure, I'll I'll start and my colleagues might have additional information.

First and foremost, let's recognize that um the um discovery initial discovery changes in the law went into effect a month before COVID hit, and then um Governor Cuomo suspended all criminal uh procedure law statewide for over a year and a half.

During that time, however, we kept pressuring um the city, the state, and the district attorneys saying we need to be prepared.

You're not sending us discovery during dependency of these cases.

At some point, the courts are gonna open up.

At some point, we are going to need to have electronic flow of discovery.

Um, we didn't get the millions of dollars you're talking about until um three years later.

By that time, the backlog had already been set, and still to today, we have homicide cases and other serious cases that still have to be tried based on that backlog.

That said, you heard uh Mock Jay testify when you asked this question, uh, about the technology that each of our offices had to figure out how to stand up brand new systems just to set sort of the level set here.

Before COVID, the entire city of New York's court system operated on paper only, really.

We never had electronic filing.

We did during COVID.

They have now removed that, and we're back to paper in many ways.

But New York State, particularly a city like New York, was far behind the rest of the nation, and we still are.

So where are we right now?

We still don't have a good vendor to provide uh electronic discovery monitoring systems.

It was referenced earlier today.

Each of us engaged, many of us engaged in our offices with that company, and it was it has been a problem.

That said, we also have been suggesting to the city and state that this shouldn't be an individual office's responsibility, right?

We could have, New York City has an enormous IT investment that looks at systems all the time, and yet there's nobody building out an infrastructure that would allow us to simply not have to conduct uh one-on-one contract negotiations with vendors.

There was a systemic way to do this.

The city and the state failed to do it.

So now we're picking up the pieces.

What have we done at Legal aid Society?

In lieu of that, we've hired litigation assistance, so we utilized our money to bring in a brand new role at Legal aid Society of people who are uh uh trained specifically on uh categorizing, analyzing, reviewing, and helping attorneys um prep for hearing and trial.

Problem is our budgets have been flat.

I now have those same folks going to law school, which is a really great success story for those folks.

But I know my budget is tight and I can't rehire them right now without additional funds.

So I'm gonna be behind the eight ball again.

And uh that's just one example.

Um each of us have had to sort of go out on its own to try to figure this out, but it has not been easy.

I was gonna ask if everyone could be really tight with their respondents, because we do have a couple more panels after this.

I'll be very brief.

We increased our paralegal staff by 400% over the last four years, and you know, all of that uh workflow for discovery reform works through the uh increased capacity that our paralegals have.

At BDS, we've obviously increased our discovery paralegals who receive download and then upload our discovery.

Our um our computer system so that we can store all of that discovery and ensure that everything is maintained uh for a number of years, even after uh a conviction or a dismissal or an acquittal.

Um, but the the computer technology to store that data uh the cloud storage that's required is costly, but we have a system in place now.

Is it fully up and running?

It is, it is.

Uh, at neighborhood defender service, we similarly have had to improve our technology and our computer systems for being able to store that discovery, but also to invest in the security around it.

Um, there have been major concerns around uh attacks on our systems on um hackers in our in our systems, and so we've had to invest a lot of resources into making sure that our clients' information is safe and secure.

Similarly, at the Bronx Defenders, we have invested in discovery administrators.

Um, we also had the challenge of engaging with the vendor who was super problematic in being able to address these unique office and borough um dynamics.

Um we have invested a lot in cloud storage to Young Me's BDS example as well.

And you fully up and running and functional.

We are up and running.

I would not say that is an idea.

No, it is not.

Thank you to the panel.

We're gonna call it the next panel, um, Helen Skipper, Zachary, Kat Senderson, Jennifer Parish, Chaplin Phillips, Ryan Aquinota.

Yep, thank you.

I can begin.

Okay.

Oh.

Good afternoon, Chair and members of the committee.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify today.

My name is Helen Skip Skipper.

I serve as the executive director at the New York City Justice Peer Initiative, and I come before you as a directly impacted woman, a lived experience advocate of scholar vis, meaning a scholar and activist, and a practicemic, meaning a practitioner and academic who studies these systems while working inside the community to change them.

I also serve this city as the vice chair of the New York City Board of Correction.

I offer this testimony from a place where these roles meet.

Lived experience, public accountability, community expertise, and a deep belief that people closest to the problem are closest to the solution.

So, really, I already know that the jail population has been cited at over 6600 people.

This number changes daily, but the direction of the crisis is clear.

If New York City is serious about closing right in island and moving to a smaller borough-based jail as required by law, this population must come down.

Let me say that plainly.

We do not get to the borough-based system by polishing the machinery of detention.

We do not get anywhere in the continued criminalizations of those with behavioral health concerns.

And I speak this point out of experience, even though I am the vice chair of the New York City Board of Correction for the last three years, I need to say.

Every time I appeared before a judge, I was suffering from a drug addiction and unchecked mental illness.

At no point did I receive support or treatment.

And because of that, I spent 25 years of my life going in and out.

The treatment court expansion act, if it hadn't been around at that time, would have stopped that.

So I want to push for that also.

I would like to respectfully ask that we, those of us who are in service, those of us who are pushing to do the right thing, that we push for the Treatment Care Expansion Act, which can also lower the population.

We push for DLC to utilize the 6A program more.

And we push for more funding for alternatives to incarceration and detention.

And we employ more people with lived experience.

We have been through the fire, but we don't smell like smoke.

Thank you.

Thank you for that.

And um, I'm sure you if you've been following our hands, we have been pushing on the 6A and a number of the things that you've mentioned, but thank you for your advocacy.

Thank you so much.

Appreciate you.

Hi, I'm Zachary Katzenelson with the Independent Rikers Commission.

Thanks for the opportunity to testify.

Thank you especially for holding this hearing.

It's a little known area, but with profound ramifications.

Imagine what that would mean for Rikers for the ability to manage the population, keep people safe.

Imagine that would mean for crime victims to actually get answers and accountability that much sooner.

No harm to public safety, it's just reaching the conclusion of a case sooner.

I want to talk about six things briefly where I think the council could act to help.

One is requiring the NYPD to give DA is give DAs access to their databases, make it mandatory to require NYPD officers and their supervisors to upload evidence within 48 hours.

Give an explicit deadline, make sure supervisors then maybe they have 48 hours more to approve things.

Move it out the door.

Three, require NYPD to fully staff the discovery liaison units.

What we heard today is that the requests have been made and they have not been granted by the DA's officers.

Fourth, set a deadline by which those data management systems will actually be implemented.

We've had years of no implementation.

It's time to actually set a deadline whereby it actually happens for DAs and defenders.

Set reasonable deadlines for the office for the OCME for medical examiner, they'll actually turn around forensic testing.

We've been hearing that it takes up to nine months, for instance, to get autopsy reports, these hold up cases.

It's not acceptable.

Find out what's reasonable and get the resources there to make sure it happens.

And last, require correctional health services to finish competent competency assessments for people that may not maybe be so mentally ill they can't stand trial.

Have that happen within 14 days.

Fourteen calendar days.

These are reasonable steps that will make a major difference.

Thank you so much.

I'll be happy to share them directly with you.

Of course.

Thank you.

I was looking for it.

If you submitted it, but thank you for that.

Good afternoon.

My name is Jennifer Parrish.

I'm a member of the Jails Action Coalition, Treatment Not Jail, Halt Solitary Campaign, and I work at the Urban Justice Center Mental Health Project.

Thank you for convening this hearing about the court delays that contribute to overincarceration at Rikers.

People are suffering because of these delays, and no one's suffering more than people with mental health concerns.

In fact, we know that people with mental health concerns spend more time in jail than those who do not.

And we should all be ashamed that the New York City jail population overwhelmingly includes people with mental health treatment needs and those who've been diagnosed with serious mental illnesses like schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, major depression, and PTSD.

We are relegating them to a place that actually exacerbates their mental health needs, and we're doing this mostly pretrial.

I joined my colleagues and encouraging the council and the mayor to encourage the state government to adopt the Treatment Court Expansion Act.

This would in New York City, it would speed the process for diversion by taking away the power from the prosecutors to be the gatekeepers and actually allowing a fair court system where they are arguing their position about diversion and not being the ones who control it.

But the mayor and the council have an important role in this process, as Chief Judge Zaya said or um said during his testimony.

If we had more community resources to provide for diversion, we would be able to get people out much quicker.

And we know that there are people who are sitting on Rikers Island right now who qualify for assertive community treatment teams, intensive mobile treatment teams.

They are not assigned because the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene will not assign them to a team because we simply do not have enough.

We should be funding these programs adequately.

We also know that they qualify for supportive housing and that people who are in jail are the least likely to be able to be placed in supportive housing.

And in fact, oftentimes people have a supportive housing application that's been approved, CHS Correctional Health Services is required to do these applications for people with serious mental health concerns, but oftentimes the public defenders don't even realize that.

So we need a level of coordination by the mayor's office to ensure that all the agencies are working together to try to move people with serious mental illness off of Rikers Island.

Thank you.

Good afternoon.

My name is Ryan Aquata.

I work with Freedom Agenda, a member-led project at the Urban Justice Center.

But prior to my work at Freedom Agenda, I spent several years working in the Bronx Criminal Court for an alternative to incarceration program at the Fortune Society, working with anyone that the district attorney in court would allow me to.

We helped people find housing and jobs, get their GEDs, reunite with their families, get connected to treatment, and so much more.

Our program regularly did amazing things for the people in the community.

But to be completely honest, the courts frequently did not allow me to work with most of the people that I interviewed who were detained on Rikers Island.

Sometimes the DA would refuse to consider an alternative solely based on the nature of the charge, despite the evidence that ATIs are much more effective at preventing future arrests than time at Rikers.

And given that our city budget funds the DAs, the city should be doing more to ensure that they're not creating unnecessary obstacles to diversion.

But honestly, most often the obstacle was that I couldn't piece together an adequate treatment plan for someone with serious behavioral health needs.

I'd make referral after referral to programs across the five boroughs and beyond.

But if someone had a dual diagnosis or a serious mental illness that wasn't currently being medicated or any kind of history of violence, each program would reject the application in turn.

They tell me that the person needed a higher level of care, a level of care that no facility seemed to offer.

So people with serious mental illness are being failed by the jails and by the court system.

Often, even when a judge and DA are willing to release someone to a treatment program, because so many of our programs are at capacity, the wait lists are too long, people languish on Rikers and sink deeper into crisis, which harms everyone there and ultimately drags cases out for years.

So the city needs to ensure that we're adequately funding the programs that get people off Rikers at scale.

That means funding enough mobile treatment teams to eliminate the long wait lists for those services, funding enough crisis respite centers to comply with local law 118 of 2023.

It means helping Harbor House, the only residential treatment program in the five boroughs who will work with the people no one else will get the three million dollars in capital funding they need to renovate a building and bring online 60 more beds.

Means funding an outpatient competency restoration pilot so that New York City can catch up with the dozens of other states and municipalities that are already doing it, and it means funding MOCJ's ATI programs and re-entry services at a scale where they can both grow what's working well and also pilot new programs and initiatives that'll better serve the people that existing programs don't.

And I've linked to that all of those budget demands in my written testimony and outlined several other things the council can do to address this issue.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you to the panel.

And you'll send us the written testimony, right?

Okay, thank you.

Um we'll call it the next panel.

Yona Zeitz, Michelle Evans, Michael Tucker, Blake Walker.

I'm gonna give another call for Chaplin Phillips.

Um you could begin in any order.

Just take your mic off of mute.

Turn on your mic.

Yep, there you go.

All right, there we go.

Hi, I'm Shell Evans.

I'm an independent journalist, formerly incarcerated at Rikers Island and author of Rikers Island Criminalized Survivor.

Um I am here today listening to the testimony and have concerns.

Um I have 20 years' experience as a software engineer, and so when I hear the um complaints about vendors and blaming vendors for the lack of of um sharing information and valid systems and and I I don't I don't find that to be a valid excuse.

I find that um to be hard to be believed.

Um I worked for ESPN, I worked for Time Warner, I worked for very big systems, IMG Sports Entertainment, World Cup.

I did their website, I did Tyre Woods website.

I worked on very high scale systems, and the fact that they are blaming vendors for for not being able to share information and not being able to um to get uh access to this information so that it can be handled swiftly so uh defendants aren't languishing on Rikers Island is is a little disconcerting.

I I would ask that the city look at um their vendor policy and and maybe ways to bring it in-house to develop these systems in-house.

Um that that was very concerning for me.

Um, the discovery issue.

Um, I was denied discovery while I was in there.

My case uh languished from 2019 to 2022 when it was finally settled.

Um, of course, it was during the COVID pandemic, but I was denied access to discovery.

Um, my lawyer requested uh laptops so that I could um watch the discovery that they had videos and stuff of that nature, and I was denied that.

So that's another issue that concerns me for defendants, unable to make decisions that that are um that are informed because they're being denied discovery of availability.

If you're out in the community, you can get on your computer, you can look at this discovery.

If you're locked up in Rikers, there's nothing you can do.

They deny it and and you're a sitting duck.

Um, also the uh they highlighted how what was it like 90 99% or nine, some high 90% of cases don't go to trial, and that's due to the lengthy uh minimum sentences, they scare inmates into taking pleas.

Um I was facing five to twenty-five, and when you're facing 25 years, you stop caring about whether you're guilty or innocent.

Uh, you care about not spending 25 years for something you didn't do.

Just to ask a follow-up question.

When you say that you were denied your discovery, what were the reasons that they gave?

They my lawyer didn't tell me.

She said she requested a laptop so that I could view my discovery and that they denied it, and that was all the information I was given.

And so it delayed you getting, did you eventually get the discovery?

No, never did.

You never got it.

Never did.

I had to make decisions blindly.

So that's a big concern for me.

I why if a system wants you know to be fair, why why would you prevent a defendant from being able to see that that's evidence of that discovery that that has been um you know uh gathered against you?

Um so that was a concern.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chair Brooks Priors for holding today's oversight hearing.

My name is Jonah Seitz and I'm the advocacy director at the Catal Center for Equity Health and Justice.

Our members are from across the city and include people who have been formerly incarcerated, and families and loved ones, and many remembers know how horrific Rikers is, and they're incredibly troubled by the closure plan being off track.

And this year's executive budget takes some steps in the right direction, and we will definitely acknowledge that, but it ultimately falls short in making significant investments to reduce the jail population, and it leaves the closure plan in limbo.

Reducing the jail population will require decisive and large-scale action by the Mandami administration, the city council, and the courts.

Um, and the increased funding for the DLC and the expansion of the NYPD means that the mayor is not meeting his commitments to sustainably fund, you know, investments in things that will reduce the jail population and essential services that New Yorkers rely on.

And the solutions to reduce the city's jail population and advance the closure of Rikers have been thoroughly documented, and it's at this point it's a matter of political will.

And the mayor and the city council can no longer continue approving the DOC budget without more details on the Burr Base jails cost overruns and timelines.

The city clearly has no intention to meet the legal closure deadline of 2027, but it has not reconfigured the plan to close Rikers and provide a definitive timeline.

Um, and so we urge this committee and the full council to hold up the budgeting process until the administration puts forward a measurable and funded plan to shut down Rikers.

The city council must use its legislative and budgetary powers to reduce the jail population, advance the closure of Rikers, and hold the mayor accountable to the closure plan.

Lives are at stake, and you know, since the city council passed the closure plan in 2019, nearly 80 people have died on Rikers.

Thank you for the time.

It's not a while.

Hello.

Oh, sorry.

Good afternoon.

And thank you, uh, Chairperson Brooke Powers.

My name is Mike Tucker.

I'm here representing the Grimes Fuller family.

Uh you can't say criminal justice reform and looking into all of these agencies without talking about Damian Grimes Fuller.

Inmate at Reconciling, booking case number 113, uh 2200739.

This man has been incarcerated in a pretrial setting for eight years, 2,920 days.

I went and spoke on June 10th at uh the city executive budget hearing, and I asked that you'll use your subpoena power to subpoena the Department of Corrections head as well as CHS.

These organizations are getting millions of dollars.

This man has a severe mental health issue, and he has been denied access.

Uh, only reason that this uh case has been looked into is because I reached out, starting with the public advocate's office, as well as Mr.

Zeister sitting right next to me, uh the mayor's office, anybody that I can get to look into this man's case.

It doesn't have any reason why a person should be set in pretrial hearing settings with mental health issues and being denied services, his vice rights are being violated, and they're asking for more money.

What are you doing with the money that you already have?

Why haven't this man be taken been taken to trial?

This extends to the DA's office, the legal ways uh society as well.

You got 18 B lawyers that are representing this man that are not speaking up for this man.

I'm here pleading with you and begging you to please look into this.

Ask for a full investigation because questions need to be answered.

Thank you.

Thank you for that.

I'm just gonna ask a member from the committee staff to just capture the information of the gentleman you're talking about.

Thank you for that.

This uh oh, sorry, we're waiting for you.

There you go.

Peace and blessings, everyone.

Thank you.

I'm chaplain Dr.

Victoria Phillips, everyone calls me Dr.

V.

I'm the CEO and founder of Visionary V Ministries and the co-founder of the Jails Action Coalition.

Um, I would like to say, um, Jack, the Jails Action Coalition, we actually formed in 2002-11 because of the barbaric conditions on Rikers Island.

Over the last two decades, I've worked in Rikers in the capacities of nursing, um, cognitive behavioral therapy, monitoring those with serious mental illness, and some forms of chaplaincy.

Um, I say that because that's all those areas have afforded me different access to the island in different ways.

So I've been able to see far things greater than anyone in a civilian manner probably would.

Um there are a lot of things I've testified on the record about for the last 15 years regarding Rikers.

And so I just want to highlight a few of them that goes along with the testimonies that were said today.

Um, it was mentioned today that um, you know, there's reasons why people aren't produced for court.

And it as I was sitting there listening, it it reminded me of a time several years ago when I testified before the city council and raised the concerns of officers who directly told a detainee in front of me, um, well, we're gonna write you up as a refusal.

After he was so upset that no one came to get him for court, and the officer that was um in the unit was just like, Well, what you want me to do about it?

We'll write you up as a refusal.

And I want to remind this council that those things very much do occur and that it should not be ignored because if the truth comes from someone formally incarcerated.

So I want to remind this council of that.

I also want to remind this council that, you know, um it was just released and and said that DOC would actually be starting a pilot for implementing local law 42 in the fall or for December.

Uh can I get a few more?

Thank you.

Yeah, anything you don't get to, you can put in right.

In writing.

Um, but there's no dates for that.

And I want to highlight that, and I'll finish by highlighting this.

DLC continues to lie, and I want you to really understand what that means for someone in in custody who does not get care.

68% of those in custody right now with the mental health concern will not get adequate mental health treatment.

And I want to put names on, like Mr.

Carter, because Mr.

Carter is someone who cycled throughout all of our systems that this city is responsible for um adequately giving funding for, and they failed him.

And then he ended up in Rikers Island and died within less than 72 hours of being there when he should have never been there.

And over the last two decades, I've seen countless people that should not be there decompensate.

I've seen wardens reach out to me because they do not know what to do with them or where to put them.

And I want to just, you know, I'm the one who reaches out to parents and loved ones and sisters and brothers and help them through their grief and funeral arrangements and everything.

Every time somebody dies, four people died this year.

Three of them were around mental health concerns.

Last year in 2025, the rates of deaths were three times that where they were in 2024, and most of those deaths were around medical access or care.

And so I'll just close by saying we cannot just be happy to have a mayor of hope, and we're still not bringing true change.

And when we say that money needs to be allocated into the community, the community is what prevents people from coming into the system.

And if the resources are not there, we're still failing ourselves on domestic soil, and that is not acceptable for me with a mother buried in military cemetery.

Have a blessed day.

Thank you.

Thank you to this panel.

If there's anyone in the room that wish to testify, we ask that you see the sergeant.

I'm seeing none online, but I also want to check the room to see if Young Kwan or Ramona Feriva is here.

Not hearing anything.

Okay, so with that, we are going to close out this hearing.

I do thank everyone for their time and their contribution to such an important conversation today.

Thank you.