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NY lawmakers vote to make it easier to challenge wrongful convictions
By
Jon Campbell
Published Jun 20, 2023
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Photo by Paul Brady Photography
By
Jon Campbell
Published Jun 20, 2023
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New York will make it easier for a defendant to challenge a wrongful conviction even in cases where they have already pleaded guilty — if Gov. Kathy Hochul signs a newly passed bill into law.
The Democrat-led state Assembly voted largely along party lines on Tuesday to pass the measure that would overhaul the state’s process for overturning convictions when new evidence comes to light, which supporters say would help clear innocent people who may be behind bars or carry a wrongful conviction on their record.
But the bill — which the state Senate passed earlier this month — is not a done deal. It will next head to Hochul, a Democrat who has not taken a public position on the measure and is likely to face a lobbying effort from prosecutors who are hoping she vetoes it.
“I'll be looking at all bills very closely with my team and analyzing them and doing the right thing,” Hochul told reporters in Albany on Tuesday.
The Assembly’s 91-46 vote came in what amounts to overtime for the chamber, which was scheduled to wrap up its annual session earlier this month. But Assembly leadership summoned rank-and-file members back to Albany this week to take up dozens of bills left pending when the regular session ended, including the wrongful conviction measure.
The newly passed bill takes a number of steps to ease the process for post-conviction challenges, most notably by allowing more people who pleaded guilty to a crime to petition a court to reconsider their conviction.
Under current law and through court precedent, if a defendant pleads guilty in New York, they can only challenge their conviction if new DNA-related evidence is uncovered.
If signed by Hochul, the bill would expand that to other types of evidence, such as an expert who later backtracks on their testimony or a technological advancement that calls a prior piece of evidence into question.
The bill — sponsored by Assemblymember Jeffrion Aubry of Queens and Sen. Zellnor Myrie of Brooklyn — would also give people who are convicted the right to a court-appointed attorney for post-conviction challenges, as well as the ability to access the prosecution and defense’s evidence files even after their case has been decided, according to the measure.
Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie (D-Bronx) said too many New York residents are “sitting behind bars for crimes they did not commit.”
“This legislation will put into place the mechanisms to review cases of those who have been wrongly convicted and for them to present evidence of their innocence,” he said in a statement.
The legislation has support from the Innocence Project, a nonprofit organization that fights to release people who have been wrongfully convicted.
“Nothing is more fundamental to our criminal legal system than differentiating between guilt and innocence,” said Amanda Wallwin, state policy advocate for the Innocence Project, in a statement. “This bill represents a major step forward in fixing the system in New York. We are grateful to the Assembly for their action and look forward to a speedy signature from the governor.”
The state District Attorneys Association, which represents county-level prosecutors across the state, tried in vain to convince the Assembly to bottle up the bill.
The organization, led by Washington County District Attorney Anthony Jordan, a former member of the Assembly, sent a letter to Heastie making the case that the state’s current laws are sufficient.
The bill would be “bad public policy for the people of New York,” wrote Jordan, a Republican.
“It would be an entirely unnecessary ‘fix’ for something that is not broken,” he wrote. “In addition, the bill would overwhelm the criminal justice system, at a time when the next straw might be the one that breaks its back. Finally, the bill would eliminate finality in criminal convictions in this state, to the detriment of all New Yorkers.”
Assemblymembers will return to the Capitol on Wednesday to continue the extraordinary session.
Hochul will have 10 days, not including Sundays, to sign or veto the bill once the Legislature formally sends it to her desk. It could be weeks or even months until that happens; lawmakers generally send bills to the governor at her request, which doesn’t have to happen until the end of the calendar year.
Tagged
public safety
Kathy Hochul
new york state
Politics
Jon Campbell
Jon Campbell covers the New York State Capitol for WNYC and Gothamist. Prior to that, he covered the Capitol for more than a decade for the USA TODAY Network. He has twice earned the Walter T. Brown Memorial Award, an honor given annually by the Legislative Correspondents Association alumni for outstanding state government coverage. Jon grew up in the Buffalo area and graduated from the University at Albany. Got a tip? Email Jon at [email protected] or Signal at JonCampbellNY.90.
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