The right to a speedy trial doesn’t guarantee one in the Bronx.
That’s because the borough’s notoriously backlogged court system still leaves some accused felons sitting in jail more than five years before their cases go to trial, the Daily News has learned.
Defendants routinely wait two to three years before a trial date is even set — a startling delay unheard of in other boroughs, lawyers on all sides say.
The system is so slow, some attorneys have dubbed it the “Bronx Gulag.”
“It’s absolutely awful,” said veteran defense lawyer Harvey Slovis. “This doesn’t happen anywhere else in the state. It’s especially troubling because some of the people sitting in jail are innocent.”
The backlog — which has built up over eight years — has delayed justice for suspects and victims alike.
Just 206 felony cases were brought to trial in the Bronx last year — fewer than in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens, according to the Office of Court Administration.
Meanwhile, the average time to resolve a homicide case by trial in the Bronx has risen dramatically. In 2008, it was 733 days. Last year it was 988 days — longer than any other borough and the citywide average of 783 days.
More than 70 Bronx homicide suspects arrested in 2008 or earlier were still awaiting trial as of Dec. 1, court records show.
At least nine of them had been in jail — and ordered held without bail — five years or longer.
“It’s wrong to treat people this way,” said Carl Henley, 28, who was recently acquitted in a gun case after being held on Rikers Island for 21/2 years.
“They let you rot in there because so many people have cases older than yours.”
Prosecutors and defense lawyers alike pin much of the blame on the 2004 merger of the Bronx Criminal Court, which usually handles misdemeanors, and the borough’s Supreme Court, which hears felonies.
Then-state Chief Judge Judith Kaye merged the two, thinking it would relieve a backlog of misdemeanors by putting them in front of Supreme Court justices who were between trials.
Instead, the felony backlog spiraled out of control, delaying justice in thousands of cases.
Court administrators began dismantling the merger late last year by assigning felony and misdemeanor cases to different judges.
Among the other issues slowing the wheels of justice:
- No speedy trial statute for homicide cases. Under state law, all felony cases except murder must go to court within six months. So Bronx prosecutors put off trying homicides in order to deal with less-serious felonies.
- Too few court-appointed lawyers. The pool of attorneys assigned to defend indigent felony suspects are overburdened — and often seek adjournments while trying other cases.
- Less funding for the court system. The state slashed $170 million from the judiciary budget last year, leading the courts to become “less efficient” and judicial decision-making “less expedient,” according to a New York State Bar Association study.
- Reduced courtroom hours. The Bronx Hall of Justice now closes at 4:30 p.m. because of the budget cuts.
- Fewer judges to deal with the backlog. In 2004, there were 48 judges. Now there are 39 — and no funds to hire more.
“All these things add up to men and women rotting away in what’s essentially a Bronx gulag,” said one defense lawyer who sits on the board of the Bronx Bar Association. “People are entitled to their day in court, but in this courthouse, that day is a long time coming.”
Efrain Alvarado, who took over as chief administrative judge of the Bronx Supreme Court in May 2009 under Kaye’s replacement, Jonathan Lippman, has assigned more judges to hear felony cases. He also funnels the oldest cases through his own courtroom in order to expedite them.
“We recognize the merger caused serious problems,” Alvarado said. “The impact on the felonies is not justifiable.
“We have to reduce the backlog, and we’re doing everything we can to attack it.”
Now, you don't even need to be arrested by the military to spend years in prison without trial. Thank you, budget cuts and bureaucrats!
Textbook definition of FUBAR. And to think certain lunatics (cough! Ron Paul! cough!) believe such things should be left to the state government, instead of the federal one.
Those gun nuts do not understand the meaning of "overkill," and will simply use weapon after weapon of mass destruction (WMD) until the monster is dead, or until they run out of weapons.
They have more WMD than there are monsters for us to fight. (More insanity here.)
Sidewinder wrote:Textbook definition of FUBAR. And to think certain lunatics (cough! Ron Paul! cough!) believe such things should be left to the state government, instead of the federal one.
Actually Ron Paul would probably say it's not the State Governments business either. This is a free market area so the free market will fix it. We must believe in the invisible hand or how can it exist?
"A cult is a religion with no political power." -Tom Wolfe Pardon me for sounding like a dick, but I'm playing the tiniest violin in the world right now-Dalton
fgalkin wrote:
Now, you don't even need to be arrested by the military to spend years in prison without trial. Thank you, budget cuts and bureaucrats!
As I recall, might be wrong, the US supreme court ruled decades ago that you can be made to wait as long as FOUR YEARS for a trial to even start. However this entire process is not exactly helped by defense lawyers being in the habit if making endless motions to delay the process. That has a more then slight clogging effect on top of all the other problems.
"This cult of special forces is as sensible as to form a Royal Corps of Tree Climbers and say that no soldier who does not wear its green hat with a bunch of oak leaves stuck in it should be expected to climb a tree"
— Field Marshal William Slim 1956
Jesus christ. I wonder, do these people get compensated for losing 5 years of their lives when acquitted? I mean, they get out, and are now unemployed, possibly homeless because they cannot pay the fucking rent when incarcerated...
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Nope. You'd only get compensation if you can prove in a lawsuit that no reasonable grounds existed to have held you without bail in the first place. It’s much easier to get compensation if your wrongly convicted but still involves lawsuit unless the case was so bad the legal system tries to pay you off out of hand.
Philadelphia had the same problem, too many cases, not enough judges. It was solved, or at least heavily reduced in one swoop about a year and a half ago by reducing possession of under 30 grams of marijuana to a fine and no criminal record. Cases involving possession of such amounts had previously been almost 50% of the entire city case load.
"This cult of special forces is as sensible as to form a Royal Corps of Tree Climbers and say that no soldier who does not wear its green hat with a bunch of oak leaves stuck in it should be expected to climb a tree"
— Field Marshal William Slim 1956
