New York’s Legislature does not care about domestic violence victims.
That’s what the state Senate and Assembly signaled last week when they omitted from their budget drafts any amendments to New York’s radical, unjust discovery law.
The 2020 discovery statute created the largest unnecessary compliance burden on prosecutors in the entire nation — sharply advantaging criminal defendants over crime victims.
The law enumerates types of evidence (known as “discovery” material) that assistant district attorneys must collect, review and share with defense attorneys within very narrow time frames. Otherwise, their cases are dismissed.
Unfortunately for victims, the definition of “evidence” now includes anything remotely connected to a case — even if it’s completely irrelevant or redundant.
Continue reading the entire piece here at the New York Post
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Hannah Meyers is director of the policing and public safety initiative at the Manhattan Institute.
Photo by Dmytro Skrypnykov/Getty Images