Criminal Justice 📍
NPR
Some of the nation's leading defense lawyers have been trying to wrap their heads around what they consider abnormal behavior by the U.S. Department of Justice over the past year.
Now, they're debuting a tool to help track criminal cases that appear to involve irregular charging practices, including aggressive legal theories and possible political retribution against President Trump's foes.
"We created the Case Tracker because you cannot defend against an enemy you cannot see," said Steven Salky, a lawyer in the Washington, D.C., area who oversees the project. "The Tracker is intended to spotlight for the next several years the unusual cases being prosecuted by the Department of Justice."
The new database includes the federal cases against Sean Charles Dunn, who threw a sub sandwich at a federal immigration officer, and Jacob Samuel Winkler, a homeless man accused of directing a laser pointer toward the Marine One presidential helicopter. Juries in Washington, D.C., acquitted both men. Nekima Levy Armstrong holds up her fist after speaking at an anti-ICE rally for Martin Luther King Jr. on Jan. 19 in St. Paul, Minn. National Anti-ICE protest at Minnesota church leads to 3 arrests but no charges for a journalist
The tracker, sponsored by the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL), also monitors cases where government charges of resisting federal law enforcement have been undercut by videos and eyewitness accounts from protesters.
Arrests for Violent Felonies in NYS, 1970-2021
There are significantly fewer violent felonies in New York then in the 1990s and early 2000s, similar to other states, but also a slight uptick after the decline during the pandemic year of 2020.
Change in Number Arrests for Violent Felonies, by Year
Crime is an issue that is getting a lot of debate this year, with the recent uptick in crime across the state. However, it follows many years of crime decreasing in most counties across New York.
