by Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon Book Substack
FOLEY SQUARE, March20 – With NYPD helicopters overhead amid the expected indicment and presentment of former US President Donald Trump, public defenders and civil legal services providers held a press conference on March 20 on the steps of City Hall, to demand more funding. Inner City Press was there - photo here.
The defenders have said, "a significant allotment of funding from Albany in the upcoming budget is required to address our hiring and retention needs, and help ensure that we, along with others in the criminal legal system, are able to access discovery – the sharing of documents and other evidence – in a timely and meaningful way."
Under changed discovery laws, cited at the March 20 press conference, a prosecution-side report argues that prosecutors have been able to meet the discovery reform obligations within the mandated time frames in only 21% of cases – in local courts across the state, that rate is 16%, and in New York City local courts, that number falls to 13%.
In the second annual judiciary survey on the implementation of the discovery law, released in December, 29% of judges in New York City reported that discovery obligations were met by the prosecution most of the time, compared with 79% of the judges outside New York City.
A larger disparity? Dozens of media camped outside Manhattan DA Bragg's office for Trump, almost no one covering the murder trial in an adjacent building of Daryl Campbell a/k/a rap podcaster Taxstone. Story here, vlog here.
Inner City Press is covering both- watch this site.
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