Cover photo: State Capitol Building (Credit – Matt Meduri)
Since election season is right around the corner, both parties are ramping up their messaging on one of the state’s most contentious issues: bail reform.
It’s no secret that it’s been a lightning rod for quality-of-life crimes across the state and it’s also public knowledge that a bipartisan slate of legislators have been fighting tirelessly to make some of these charges bail-eligible and restore judicial discretion in most cases.
If you have a chance, take a look at Page 14, our Civics 101 column. This week, we exhaustively list a litany of crimes for which defendants cannot be held on bail.
The kicker: our Page 14 article is just part one of a very long list. We look forward to running the second part next week.
Assaults, stalking, reckless endangerment, failure to register as sex offender, prostitution in a school zone, poisoning or attempting to poison an animal, aggravated labor trafficking, some degrees of arson, and a host of drug offenses.
These are just a few of the serious crimes that are currently not bail-eligible. It’s ludicrous that Albany would come to a point where they could think this is sensible.
Granted, some crimes have lesser degrees that are not bail-eligible, while the most serious offenses of certain crimes remain so. It’s also worth mentioning that some charges are not akin to the ones above, but it’s unsettling to see just how many are comparable to some of the more brazen crimes.
As a humorous side note, we were fascinated to learn that fortune telling is an actual crime in New York. It’s a class B misdemeanor applied to anyone who claims or pretends to tell fortunes for fees or other compensation, claims to be able to answer questions and/or give advice on personal matters, and claims to be able to influence or affect evil spirits or curses. The law does not apply to fortune tellers who engage in the practice for entertainment or exhibition.
Still, we found that to be a rather specific crime and we agree that con artists should be held accountable. We’ll even be willing to say that such a person could probably be released on their own recognizance, at least in most cases…benefit of the doubt…
Moreover, Democrats on the campaign trail are arguing that fear tactics completely blow the reaction out of proportion. They argue that since major crimes are down in Suffolk, it’s a non-issue.
They might have a point, but we owe our major crime handlings to our fantastic District Attorney Ray Tierney (R) and our equally-fantastic Sheriff Errol Toulon (D).
However, quality-of-life crimes, and even those more severe, such as drug sales implicit in the sale of fentanyl and potential related overdoses, allow criminals to remain at large while the County’s top cop is handcuffed on the issue.
We also learned this week that some Democrats knew that the overhaul would convince voters to back the Republican Party. The premonitions were apparently palpable in Albany, yet the progressive legislature engaged in their typical cart-before-the-horse behavior.
Only adding insult to injury was a Governor (Cuomo) who could not get along with a legislature increasingly growing out of touch with his more traditional brand of politics. Cuomo attempted to get on the progressive bandwagon in 2018, only to be effectively couped in 2021 amid sexual harassment allegations.
Sensing the impending dysfunction and recognizing the zero-sum game of a legislature with powers to override his veto, Cuomo simply took the loss and signed the budget – and bail reform – into law.
This is not how laws in our state should be made. It’s one thing to address a bail system that might penalize some to a point of no return fiscally (we do believe in second chances), and it’s also sensible to create a check on more affluent offenders to whom bail bonds don’t apply.
But it’s another to throw the baby out with the bathwater in the other direction: a free-for-all, Wild West-style of criminal justice reform where the people who crafted the bill are seemingly discovering its ramifications at the same time the rest of the state is.
These laws need serious changes as soon as the next legislative calendar starts. Albany would be wise to consult with law enforcement personnel from all corners of New York to bring back reasonable checks and balances while also deliberating provisions in line with the original intent of the legislation.
We believe in second chances, but Albany only had to “fool us once” for us to say “shame on them.”
