Legal Aid Society

Leaving prison often hinges on completing rehabilitative programming. The pandemic caused many of these required courses to be put on hold.

Despite calls to reduce incarcerated populations, the number of people being detained for minor parole violations has been rising.

The advocates describe the reopening as unsafe and unnecessary amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

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.

New York attorneys have launched a campaign to release transgender, gender nonconforming, and nonbinary prisoners during the pandemic.

Twenty-eight people were to attend weeks-long drug treatment programs after violating parole. The COVID-19 pandemic nearly trapped them in jail indefinitely.

“Based on this analysis, New York City jails have become the epicenter of COVID-19,” a Legal Aid attorney said.

While those facing charges appear by video at arraignments, all others—attorneys, officers, the judge—are in the courtroom in close quarters, defense attorneys say.

At least one error led to a wrongful arrest, according to a Freedom of Information Law request, underscoring the need for better oversight of the Office of Chief Medical Examiner, advocates say.

Advocates say the removals are more evidence of a troubling and unregulated law enforcement tool, overseen by the city’s Office of the Chief Medical Examiner.

On Wednesday, the House Judiciary Committee voted 24-10 in favor of the MORE Act, which would legalize marijuana at the federal level.

The results of record-sealing legislation enacted in 2017 shows the need for automatic expungement, advocates say.

Richard Rivera served more than 38 years in prison after killing an off-duty NYPD officer during a botched armed robbery. He was released in July after being denied parole five times.

16-year-olds won’t have to reappear in adult criminal court if they’re arrested when youth court isn’t in session.

A new effort to reduce arrests and summonses is criticized as continuing to criminalize homelessness.

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 […]

Expert reports in a 2017 federal lawsuit explore an alleged pattern of discrimination against men perceived to be gay.

Though little is known about how Layleen Polanco died, advocates say her story highlights New York City’s flawed approach to criminal justice.

Imprisoned as a teen, Amer Zada is now eligible for release but can’t find approved housing—and a proposed law could make the problem worse.

With Appeal contributor Jon Campbell

As the borough’s district attorney race takes shape, advocates press for changes to the office’s approach to people who reoffend.

Opponents of the law say it unfairly targets people who need knives for work, and are battling it on multiple fronts.

The technology also allows authorities to mine call databases and cross-reference the voices of individuals prisoners have spoken with.

The decision also held that the city’s routine storage of DNA profiles from nonconvicted people in a permanent database violates state law.

Under Raise the Age, ‘there are kids similarly situated who are being treated totally differently.’

A new Bronx Freedom Fund report documents these extended pretrial lockups, which threaten people’s jobs and destabilize families.

An 11-month prosecution of a ‘forcible touching’ case in Manhattan sharply diverges from the office’s treatment of Harvey Weinstein, defense attorneys say.

The tactics outlined encourage courtroom ‘dishonesty’ and ‘gamesmanship,’ legal experts argue.

Their attorneys say the new video-teleconferencing policy is exacerbating backlogs and prolonging detention.

At the beginning of the year, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo laid out a plan that would eliminate cash bail for those charged with misdemeanors and nonviolent felonies. Last week, however, his plan stalled out during budget negotiations with state legislative leaders. For bail reform advocates, including public defenders and advocates for incarcerated people, the plan’s failure serves as […]

Polaris, a Washington, D.C.-based non-governmental organization best known for operating the National Human Trafficking Hotline, says it has located a new front in the fight against human trafficking: what it describes as “illicit massage businesses,” or IMBs. The nonprofit, which brought in $10 million in 2016 (of which $2.1 million is government funding, according to IRS […]

Yang Song fell four stories onto a sidewalk in Flushing, Queens on the night of November 25th. An officer with the New York City Police Department accompanied her, unconscious, to New York Presbyterian Hospital where doctors placed her on a respirator. They worked for hours: the 35 units of blood they transfused did not take, given the severity of her injuries from the thirty foot fall.

A 38-year-old woman, Yang Song of Queens, New York, died at New York Presbyterian Hospital on Sunday, one day after falling three stories from an apartment window in nearby Flushing. Little has been reported about Song beyond the New York Police Department’s assertion that she was a sex worker, and fell while officers from the Queens […]