New York DAs offices Forum

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Anonymous User
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Re: New York DAs offices

Post by Anonymous User » Tue Jul 27, 2021 6:54 pm

Former major metro ADA (not NYC) chiming in on this discussion (between 3 and 5 years as ADA, now in biglaw). FWIW, I’m a political moderate, lean dem but vote Republican sometimes.

To the former ADA, I totally see where you’re coming from because I worked alongside teammates with similar mentalities. Particularly in large cities, as local politics get more and more polarized, various aspects of the system get more and more defendant friendly. Less bail means fewer pleas, undoubtedly. Fewer pleas means defense attorneys drag it out and judges let them, meaning police officers retire and witnesses lose interest. Add that to the judges who are often career public defenders and thus go against your requests at almost every turn and yeah—it can be hard being an Ada. Every defense attorney insists on a trial because if you answer ready when the day finally comes, they know they can plea and get the same deal.

But quite frankly, due to the other poster’s point, that’s how it SHOULD be. Prosecutors should be fighting with a hand tied behind their backs at all times, because a defendant’s ability to hold you to your burden and then some is more important than whether you get frustrated and maybe even screwed with some frequency.

Ultimately, as things get tougher and tougher for prosecutors, the credited response from my perspective is simple: do better. Work harder, work longer, get a higher % of your cases ready earlier in their life cycles, call victims right after arraignment to give them a personal connection to the assigned prosecutor. It’s hard from 9-5, but if you go 8-7, it can be done; whether you want to for that pay is another question. Meanwhile, conserve your own time by figuring out which cases are inevitably going to die on the vine and put minimal effort into those. Work your viable cases up so well that you’re answering ready on 5-10 trials every day, with worked up MILs having talked to key witnesses already that week. Sure a bunch will plea and a bunch of others will continue for some ridiculous reason, but this is how you get trials under your belt. It’s a game of numbers.

This isn’t necessarily directed to the other poster, I suppose. If you’re an ausa clearly you did something right. Rather, it’s directed to the aspiring adas. The job is tough for all the reasons discussed on this thread and many more. It doesn’t pay well.

But all you really need to do to achieve a modicum of success is just work harder than everybody else, and maybe a bit smarter. other adas will often simply get jaded because the system loves defendants so much. They will accept their status as “paper pushers.”

Don’t be like them. Take some pride in your work and push through all of the systematic adversity inherent to major metro (or at least major blue state metro) area criminal court systems.

lavarman84

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Re: New York DAs offices

Post by lavarman84 » Tue Jul 27, 2021 7:15 pm

Anonymous User wrote:
Tue Jul 27, 2021 1:34 pm
Yes that is what you learned in first year criminal law. You avoid practicality. Your last statement avoids the issue that these individuals are now free to continue additional crimes, while being allowed to go free crime after crime. Additionally, it strains the resources of all parties (as I previously mentioned).
It's as simple as the Constitution trumps practicality.
Would you also be willing to increase the funding of prosecutors offices, NYPD, Courts, and public defenders to accommodate for these increases in resources?
Sure.

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Re: New York DAs offices

Post by Anonymous User » Wed Jul 28, 2021 6:44 am

nixy wrote:
Tue Jul 27, 2021 1:59 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Tue Jul 27, 2021 1:31 pm
The difference is that in practice, remand is only used in murder. That's it. No other crimes. And while bail can be set on violent felonies, bail is being placed less and less on these defendants due to judges trying to extend the intent of the reforms to these matters. In addition, certain crimes, like the man or woman who committed an unarmed burglary in your house, that individual cannot have bail set on them, even if they broke into every house on your street for the past week.

As to your comment on discovery (which you glossed over all the other newly imposed factors), my comment was that it now requires prosecutors to be paper pushers and document seekers (especially from NYPD), by trying to provide discovery (and what even goes beyond the limits of discovery, such as Rosario material) on an unrealistic and arbitrary deadline, or else risk facing dismissal of a case or potential suppression of evidence. I don't see how you don't understand what an administrative burden this is, in comparison to the benefits of defendants in possession of discovery.
My point is that this making the prosecution’s job harder doesn’t have anything to do with whether it’s the right or wrong thing to do. Defendants’ rights aren’t contingent on not being a burden on prosecutors. I feel pretty confident that defendants (and reformers) consider the benefits to the defendants of getting discovery earlier to be pretty darn significant. If the discovery shows fatal issues with a police stop, for instance, wouldn’t a defendant want to know that in 30-45 days rather than on the eve of trial a year later? Wouldn’t you as the prosecutor rather know the fatal flaws in your evidence earlier rather than later? And if you were going to have to produce this stuff before trial anyway, why does this transform the job to paper pushing when it’s just changing the timeline for production?

I get entirely that the change has made the job less palatable *to you*, which is fair, but that doesn’t mean it’s a bad change.
"I feel pretty confident that defendants (and reformers) consider the benefits to the defendants of getting discovery earlier to be pretty darn significant. If the discovery shows fatal issues with a police stop, for instance, wouldn’t a defendant want to know that in 30-45 days rather than on the eve of trial a year later?"

If there was a fatal issue with a stop that is clearly evident from the paperwork, the case would not be prosecuted, as the ADA would decline to prosecute the matter as he/she would not survive a suppression hearing. Before the changes, defendants would receive discovery way in advance of trial, never on the eve. They would have months to craft defenses based on paperwork discovery provided (which often is routine paperwork), it is not a surprise gotcha game. What has changed is that it now opens up a host of new arguments by defense counsel to try and get cases dismissed, or have evidence suppressed, simply for failing to receive routine paperwork on time.

Say there was a lingering memobook by one of 10 police officers that responded to a shooting. Prosecutor obtains 9 of them, and doesn't realize the 10th officer even responded and made notes. Defense counsel interviews client and client says "10th officer was there and I saw him writing." Defense counsel makes motion 6 months after arraignment and says "Government didn't provide all discovery. I have on good authority that 10th officer was present at the scene of a crime and made notes that are discoverable. Since we never had full discovery, Government was never ready to proceed, and thus the matter should be dismissed due to speedy trial CPL 30.30." This is what these reforms have done: make prosecutors scramble for paperwork to satisfy this arbitrary timeline or risk having defense counsel move to dismiss by claiming the government was never ready to proceed because they didn't receive it on their timeline. What about the interests of victims? What about their justice? What about their safety? Witnesses who are victims of crime (contact information) now have to be disclosed as well. Their testimony from grand jury proceedings must be produced within this time frame. Defense counsel and their investigators then go and visit the homes of these victims, and try to get them to recant their testimony or interview them to try and elicit inconsistencies, without any attorney present.

It is a bad change. Anyone can see when you make arbitrary deadlines with severe consequences on any party, it is an unfair and bad change.

Anonymous User
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Re: New York DAs offices

Post by Anonymous User » Wed Jul 28, 2021 6:45 am

lavarman84 wrote:
Tue Jul 27, 2021 7:15 pm
Anonymous User wrote:
Tue Jul 27, 2021 1:34 pm
Yes that is what you learned in first year criminal law. You avoid practicality. Your last statement avoids the issue that these individuals are now free to continue additional crimes, while being allowed to go free crime after crime. Additionally, it strains the resources of all parties (as I previously mentioned).
It's as simple as the Constitution trumps practicality.
Would you also be willing to increase the funding of prosecutors offices, NYPD, Courts, and public defenders to accommodate for these increases in resources?
Sure.
Well if you believe in increasing funding for accommodating the increase in resources, then I believe we have found common ground.

Anonymous User
Posts: 428123
Joined: Tue Aug 11, 2009 9:32 am

Re: New York DAs offices

Post by Anonymous User » Wed Jul 28, 2021 6:51 am

Anonymous User wrote:
Tue Jul 27, 2021 6:54 pm
Former major metro ADA (not NYC) chiming in on this discussion (between 3 and 5 years as ADA, now in biglaw). FWIW, I’m a political moderate, lean dem but vote Republican sometimes.

To the former ADA, I totally see where you’re coming from because I worked alongside teammates with similar mentalities. Particularly in large cities, as local politics get more and more polarized, various aspects of the system get more and more defendant friendly. Less bail means fewer pleas, undoubtedly. Fewer pleas means defense attorneys drag it out and judges let them, meaning police officers retire and witnesses lose interest. Add that to the judges who are often career public defenders and thus go against your requests at almost every turn and yeah—it can be hard being an Ada. Every defense attorney insists on a trial because if you answer ready when the day finally comes, they know they can plea and get the same deal.

But quite frankly, due to the other poster’s point, that’s how it SHOULD be. Prosecutors should be fighting with a hand tied behind their backs at all times, because a defendant’s ability to hold you to your burden and then some is more important than whether you get frustrated and maybe even screwed with some frequency.

Ultimately, as things get tougher and tougher for prosecutors, the credited response from my perspective is simple: do better. Work harder, work longer, get a higher % of your cases ready earlier in their life cycles, call victims right after arraignment to give them a personal connection to the assigned prosecutor. It’s hard from 9-5, but if you go 8-7, it can be done; whether you want to for that pay is another question. Meanwhile, conserve your own time by figuring out which cases are inevitably going to die on the vine and put minimal effort into those. Work your viable cases up so well that you’re answering ready on 5-10 trials every day, with worked up MILs having talked to key witnesses already that week. Sure a bunch will plea and a bunch of others will continue for some ridiculous reason, but this is how you get trials under your belt. It’s a game of numbers.

This isn’t necessarily directed to the other poster, I suppose. If you’re an ausa clearly you did something right. Rather, it’s directed to the aspiring adas. The job is tough for all the reasons discussed on this thread and many more. It doesn’t pay well.

But all you really need to do to achieve a modicum of success is just work harder than everybody else, and maybe a bit smarter. other adas will often simply get jaded because the system loves defendants so much. They will accept their status as “paper pushers.”

Don’t be like them. Take some pride in your work and push through all of the systematic adversity inherent to major metro (or at least major blue state metro) area criminal court systems.
This is rich coming from a 3-5 year ADA who was prosecuting low-level crimes by the time he/she sold out to make money in Biglaw. Work harder and longer is not an answer. The NYC ADAs I know already work harder and longer, and previously with one hand tied behind their back. Now they are hog tied, arms and feet.

The only way to make this job better is to advocate for a repeal of the laws. You can see it playing out in the media how crime has spiked and only continues to get worse. I encourage people to go and protest and write their representatives about how terrible and hurtful these new changes are.

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Anonymous User
Posts: 428123
Joined: Tue Aug 11, 2009 9:32 am

Re: New York DAs offices

Post by Anonymous User » Mon Aug 02, 2021 4:03 pm

.

Anonymous User
Posts: 428123
Joined: Tue Aug 11, 2009 9:32 am

Re: New York DAs offices

Post by Anonymous User » Tue Aug 03, 2021 7:21 am

Anonymous User wrote:
Wed Jul 28, 2021 6:51 am
Anonymous User wrote:
Tue Jul 27, 2021 6:54 pm
Former major metro ADA (not NYC) chiming in on this discussion (between 3 and 5 years as ADA, now in biglaw). FWIW, I’m a political moderate, lean dem but vote Republican sometimes.

To the former ADA, I totally see where you’re coming from because I worked alongside teammates with similar mentalities. Particularly in large cities, as local politics get more and more polarized, various aspects of the system get more and more defendant friendly. Less bail means fewer pleas, undoubtedly. Fewer pleas means defense attorneys drag it out and judges let them, meaning police officers retire and witnesses lose interest. Add that to the judges who are often career public defenders and thus go against your requests at almost every turn and yeah—it can be hard being an Ada. Every defense attorney insists on a trial because if you answer ready when the day finally comes, they know they can plea and get the same deal.

But quite frankly, due to the other poster’s point, that’s how it SHOULD be. Prosecutors should be fighting with a hand tied behind their backs at all times, because a defendant’s ability to hold you to your burden and then some is more important than whether you get frustrated and maybe even screwed with some frequency.

Ultimately, as things get tougher and tougher for prosecutors, the credited response from my perspective is simple: do better. Work harder, work longer, get a higher % of your cases ready earlier in their life cycles, call victims right after arraignment to give them a personal connection to the assigned prosecutor. It’s hard from 9-5, but if you go 8-7, it can be done; whether you want to for that pay is another question. Meanwhile, conserve your own time by figuring out which cases are inevitably going to die on the vine and put minimal effort into those. Work your viable cases up so well that you’re answering ready on 5-10 trials every day, with worked up MILs having talked to key witnesses already that week. Sure a bunch will plea and a bunch of others will continue for some ridiculous reason, but this is how you get trials under your belt. It’s a game of numbers.

This isn’t necessarily directed to the other poster, I suppose. If you’re an ausa clearly you did something right. Rather, it’s directed to the aspiring adas. The job is tough for all the reasons discussed on this thread and many more. It doesn’t pay well.

But all you really need to do to achieve a modicum of success is just work harder than everybody else, and maybe a bit smarter. other adas will often simply get jaded because the system loves defendants so much. They will accept their status as “paper pushers.”

Don’t be like them. Take some pride in your work and push through all of the systematic adversity inherent to major metro (or at least major blue state metro) area criminal court systems.
This is rich coming from a 3-5 year ADA who was prosecuting low-level crimes by the time he/she sold out to make money in Biglaw. Work harder and longer is not an answer. The NYC ADAs I know already work harder and longer, and previously with one hand tied behind their back. Now they are hog tied, arms and feet.

The only way to make this job better is to advocate for a repeal of the laws. You can see it playing out in the media how crime has spiked and only continues to get worse. I encourage people to go and protest and write their representatives about how terrible and hurtful these new changes are.
Same anon. I wasn’t prosecuting low level crimes during the latter part of my Ada years. I got promoted a good bit before my peers in my “class.” I was good and the results showed, but the work ethic probably was the reason. I work pretty much the same amount now in biglaw. (And let’s be real—the vast majority of 5 year adas would sell out to Biglaw if they could…)

I was at a pretty competitive DAs office and it just always seemed like the adas spent a bunch of their time complaining, pleading out cases to nothing to get them off their plates, and starting to drink at 4pm…and then spent these “happy hours” complaining to one another. You’re really going to tell me you didn’t see a good amount of that while you were an Ada?

But anyway, I agree with a lot of what you’re saying. If the rules/laws were simply more prosecution friendly, it would be easier for prosecutors to prosecute cases. If it were easier to prosecute cases, there’d be more Gs etc.

But I mean if the standard of proof was changed to a preponderance of the evidence, then there’d also be more Gs. Frankly, whining about the rules — while valid — still feels like a bit of a cop-out.

Ultimately, it is possible to succeed as a prosecutor, but it’s hard because the chips are inherently stacked against you all the time (and people who say that the system stacks the chips against defendants these days are straight up wearing kool-aid goggles). most prosecutors I know were content doing enough to avoid be considered bad, but few wanted to or were able to do enough to really stand out.

So yeah, maybe crime rate would go down if the far left didn’t control the narrative in major metropolitan areas because, to your point, this results in policies that are more and more defendant friendly.

But until the political pendulum shifts, and even after it does (if it ever does), the recipe for prosecutor success remains: just do better, work harder. I assure you that if 1-3 year ADAs all worked biglaw hours and had biglaw intellect, it’d be a different ballgame out there.

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