July 19, 2020 Your Neighborhood — Your News®
LOCAL
CL ASSIFIEDS
PA GE 7
PROTESTERS DEMAND QUEENS DA KEEP
PROMISES MADE ON CAMPAIGN TRAIL
BY BILL PARRY
Three months to the day after 63-
year-old Ozone Park resident Walter
Ance died of COVID-19, which
he contracted while behind bars on
Rikers Island, dozens of protestors
rallied outside the Queens Criminal
Courthouse in Kew Gardens
Monday in order to publicly shame
District Attorney Melinda Katz
for not fulfilling her campaign
promises.
Ance had been held without bail
for more than a year for allegedly
stabbing his wife and The Legal
Aid Society argued for his release
saying he was at high risk due to
diabetes and prostate issues. Katz
declined his release at the height of
the COVID-19 crisis.
“Social distancing is impossible
inside Rikers Island, and saving
human beings’ lives should be our
top priority during a pandemic,”
Policy & Strategy Vice President
Kandra Clark said. “As a community
that believes in the power of
personal transformation, individuals
and community healing and using
restorative justice approaches
to mitigate conflict, Exodus Transitional
Community calls on Melinda
Katz to keep the promises
she made, to move away from mass
incarceration, and to operate with
fairness. Our communities and organizations
like Exodus have created
other ways to deliver true justice
and safety for our communities,
but DAs like Melinda Katz have
kept choosing incarceration. After
decades we finally have a new DA
in Queens, but still too many of our
fellow New Yorkers are suffering on
Rikers Island.”
Protesters held signs citing
pledges the group feels she has not
fulfilled, along with a photo depicting
Katz as Pinocchio. They called
on the Queens DA to stop utilizing
cash bail to hold people in jail, to
Protesters demanded that Queens DA Melinda Katz honor the promises she made on the campaign trail.
consent to release as many people
as possible to help stop the spread
of COVID-19 inside the walls of
the Rikers Island prison complex
and to stop opposing the release
from prison of people wrongly convicted
by her predecessor, the late
Richard Brown.
“No one should die in jail or
prison. We need to focus on building
communities and stop using
jail and bail as an excuse for public
safety,” Just Leadership USA
Member-Leader Peggy Herrera
said. “We can’t arrest or incarcerate
our way out of the challenges
that face our communities. Mental
health, homelessness and poverty
are not crimes! Neither is a mother
who calls for help for her son who
suffers from mental health issues.
Low-level offenses do not deserve to
end in a death sentence, and people
should not have to sit in jail because
they can’t afford bail or take
a plea in order to be released. Rikers
Island only adds more trauma.
Melinda Katz, Queens needs to do
better.”
Katz countered saying when she
took office on Jan. 1, she made significant
policy changes to reduce the
population in city jails and that she
is committed to “ultimately ending
cash bail because a person’s financial
status should not be a factor”
in whether they are incarcerated
pre-trial.
“As a result, over 70 percent of
those charged with bail qualifying
offenses have been released either
on their own recognizance or with
supervision,” Katz said. “Since my
first day as district attorney, the
number of individuals in jail on a
Queens County case has been reduced
roughly in half.”
Katz added that since the
Photos by Dean Moses
COVID-19 pandemic hit the city she
has worked daily with the mayor’s
office, the courts, public defenders
and defense attorneys to “prioritize
and expedite the release of the most
vulnerable,” and that her office
actively pursued dispositions and
modified sentences to effectuate
early releases.
As for Ance’s case, the DA explained
in April that he was facing
attempted murder charges for allegedly
stabbing his estranged wife.
“The stabbing for which he was
incarcerated was the culmination
of years of physical and mental
abuse that the defendant allegedly
inflicted upon the victim,”
Katz said in a statement. “Despite
repeated arrests and orders of protection
that were in pace, in March
of last year Ance walked into the
victim’s bedroom and stabbed her
once in the chest. Body-worn video
footage from police who responded
to the scene shows the victim holding
her chest and the couple’s son
crying and telling police what he
witnessed saying ‘he just stabbed
her.'”
The protesters said that Katz
ran on a platform of fairness
and justice, but she is failing to
deliver on her promises.
“We are here to remind Melinda
Katz of her campaign
promises to end cash bail,” Rise
& Resist Member Jody Kuh said.
“No one should be getting sick
and dying behind bars, but Melinda
Katz’s broken promises
are exposing people to COVID-
19, including those who haven’t
stood trial and have only been
accused of a crime. We all have
the obligation to ensure that all
are given the same opportunity
to protect themselves against
this virus.”
The protesters complained
that Katz continues to seek
cash bail, opposes the release of
wrongly convicted people and
continues to prosecute people for
charges of low-level crimes that
she promised to decline.
“Melinda Katz said that she
would end money bail, but on the
very first case I watched under
her regime in Queens, she asked
for money bail,” Court Watch
NYC and VOCAL-NY Member
Jon McFarlane said. “She lied.”
Katz said she will uphold justice
and ensure the rights and
safety of victims and defendants
are safeguarded.
“I will continue, each and every
day, to work toward a more
equitable system, to restore trust
and to help build a community
that truly sees each other, hears
each other and respects each
other,” Katz said.
Additional reporting by Dean
Moses.
Vol. 98 No. 29 UPDATED EVERY DAY AT QNS.COM
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