Don’t Delay on Closing Rikers
The city says COVID-19 budget constraints will set back its plans to close the jail but people incarcerated there are suffering from the disease right now.
Brooklyn Defender Services
Jonathan Ben-Menachem
The NYPD ‘Cancelled’ Police Court Appearances, Leaving People to Sit in Jail
Memos obtained by The Appeal and anecdotes from public defenders reveal how, for a week during protests over police brutality, the NYPD stalled cases by directing officers not to testify in court.
As Coronavirus Spreads, So Does Panic and Confusion at Immigration Courts Across The U.S.
Lawyers, judges, and advocates for migrant children wonder what it will take to close all 69 immigration courts. ‘I hope that it won’t take a death, but I worry that it will,’ one lawyer said.
Needed In Jails In A Heat Emergency: Air Conditioning And Oversight
Spotlights like this one provide original commentary and analysis on pressing criminal justice issues of the day. You can read them each day in our newsletter, The Daily Appeal. Over the weekend, much of the United States experienced a heat wave. In The Atlantic last week, Robinson Meyer described what was coming as “a vast blanket of […]
The ‘Hypocritical’ Loophole in New York’s Pledge to Stop Prosecuting Marijuana
People caught vaping marijuana oil face the same charge as for low-level heroin possession.
More Than A Month After Anti-ICE Protests, Detained NYC Immigrants Still Denied In-Person Hearings
Their attorneys say the new video-teleconferencing policy is exacerbating backlogs and prolonging detention.