FFWC Recommendations for Criminal Justice Reform: New York City Elected Officials Must Take a Leadership Role in Criminal Justice Reform
New York City has paid hundreds of millions of dollars in civil settlements to the wrongfully convicted in recent years. Yet, the City, the office of the Mayor, and other elected officials have had little or no voice in wrongful conviction matters.
Paying hundreds of millions in settlements should be motivation enough to seek changes that could both prevent wrongful convictions and reduce the cost to New Yorkers, both financially and as a matter of public safety. We challenge the office of the Mayor to be proactive, demand a major voice, you’ve paid for the right.
We suggest the City should have a seat at the table and become a leader in criminal justice reform which can help transform the lives of many New Yorkers and their families.
- Establish a wrongful conviction unit in the Mayor’s office. This can be very effective for advocates and social scientists to study wrongful convictions and identify vehicles for change.
- The Mayor’s office should take a leadership role by convening a commission on judicial conduct. Police and prosecutors have been complicit in wrongful convictions. In a recent report by the Brooklyn DA and the Innocence Project, 84% of wrongful convictions were result of misconduct/serious errors by prosecutors; 72% by police conduct.
- In many of these cases, trial judges recognized and publicly admonished police and prosecutors for their actions: coerced confessions, eyewitness misidentification, discovery and Brady violations, but upheld convictions and doled out long prison sentences. Judges need to be involved in the administration of justice and be accountable.
- Involve the NYPD in reform. To date has been absent from taking any responsibility for wrongful conviction or instituting the most basic reforms, even after our members uncovered the terrible misconduct by NYPD Detective Louis Scarcella. Fifteen Scarcella victims have been exonerated after serving collectively 300 years in prison. There are many more. Our organization was founded by victims of Scarcella.
- We were terribly disappointed in the De Blasio administration’s lack of support for those measures that could help prevent wrongful convictions, such as recording custodial interrogations and conducting live blind police lineups. Both of these measures could have been instituted by NYPD years earlier without legislation which finally passed with support from our constituents.
- NYPD could institute programs at the training academy, modify its interrogation procedures further to prevent false confessions; institute a cold case review of credible wrongful conviction cases to see whether evidence of innocence exists in the files, witness statements, etc.
- Mayor’s office could call for Conviction Review Unit’s (CRU) be established in all five District Attorney’s offices. As it exists now, Brooklyn, the model under Ken Thompson, is nonfunctional as is Manhattan, the Bronx and Staten Island. Queens is the only bright light.
- Proactive crime reduction measures. Crime is tied to guns on the street, which has been the sole responsibility of the police, who have a challenging job. Families and Friends of the Wrongfully Convicted can support those efforts with grass roots programs to remove guns through real buyback programs that take guns out of the hands of young people. The community programs should be supported and developed.
- Call for reducing sentencing and release for those who have served long prison sentences and have proven record while incarcerated. Call for reducing sentencing guidelines which in some cases have insane sentences, for example one of our founders who is innocent, Danny Rincon, was sentenced to 158 years in prison.
- Provide enhanced social services for those wrongfully convicted once they are exonerated and until they are compensated. Housing, clothes, re-entry programs etc. To provide mental health counseling and support groups for those families who are directly impacted by family member’s wrongful conviction. As well as financial assistance until the wrongfully convicted person can get back to being the head of household.
PIX11: New Brooklyn community center supports wrongfully convicted