Man Called Schizophrenic As His Own Lawyer in SDNY Gets Detained Looking at BRIDGE

Man Called Schizophrenic As His Own Lawyer in SDNY Gets Detained Looking at BRIDGE by Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon Book Substack SDNY COURTHOUSE, July 24 – A defendant who has previously been called schizophrenic, but who had his New York State charges dropped, was brought this week on Violations of Supervised Release into the Magistrates court of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. Inner City Press was there and live tweeted, both times.    The defendant insisted both times on representing himself.  Inner City Press has gone back to the transcript of his previous May 7, 2024 appearance before the District Judge on his case, where he said "Sir, I'm sorry, but I need to talk on my case, sir." THE COURT: I told you you don't have a right to talk. You are represented by a lawyer. Only he speaks for you here. Now, if I hear another word from you, I'm going to hold you in criminal contempt of court for disrupting these proceedings and violating my order, and I will impose a jail sentence on you immediately."    This time, he did speak for himself. But every after the second day, he was sent back to the MDC as his mother cried in the courtroom gallery. There was talk of an outpatient mental health program; from the Government table came the question, Don't you mean inpatient?    Neither was implemented, and the defendant will be in MDC-Brooklyn at least until he sees the District Judge again - in September, more than a month from now.   In May 2026 SDNY announced a "new mental health court for federal criminal defendants, BRIDGE Court. BRIDGE stands for: Behavioral Rehabilitation through Intervention, Diversion, Guidance, and Engagement. BRIDGE Court is an intensive judicially supervised pretrial program focused on individuals whose mental health diagnosis is the predominant contributor to their offense conduct."   Isn't this an appropriate case for such a court? But "[t]o be considered for the program, each individual is required to complete a Statement of Interest Form, which is available at https://nysd.uscourts.gov." It seem unlikely this defendant will fill out that form from inside the MDC. And he has no lawyer. So Inner City Press reports on it, in detail, here. Watch this site.   The case is USA v. Clarke, 1:16-cr-212 (Kaplan / Tarnofsky) *** Your support means a lot. As little as $5 a month helps keep us going and grants you access to exclusive bonus material on our Patreon page. Click here to become a patron. Feedback: Editorial [at] innercitypress.com Mail: Box 130222, Chinatown Station, NY NY 10013 Other, earlier Inner City Press are listed here, and some are available in the ProQuest service, and now on Lexis-Nexis.  Copyright 2006-2026 Inner City Press, Inc. To request reprint or other permission, e-contact Editorial [at] innercitypress.com