A 17-year-old girl was shot near her Brooklyn public school on Monday afternoon. She is one of the many black children who have been victims after New York’s Raise the Age law stopped aggressive teens from being held accountable for harming others in 2017, resulting in a 204% rise in teen shooting victims.
Five years ago, 78 fewer teenagers were shot than in the previous year. Even worse, the number of killed black children in New York City nearly doubled by 2021, with 42 victims, or 80%, being black (including black Hispanic). There were 25 more black youth deaths in 2018 than in 2017.
As the state’s recent criminal-justice changes unleashed the most chronically violent on the most persistently disadvantaged, the racial inequality in violent victimization in New York City has only grown.
The extremely small portion of the community responsible for this violence does not have to worry much, if at all, about: being detained (thanks to the 2020 bail reform); being prosecuted (the 2020 discovery reform); having parole revoked, even for criminal violations (the 2021 Less Is More Act); or for juvenile offenders facing judges who will send them to Criminal Court’s adolescent sections or who will even know they have been arrested before (the 2017 Raise the Age legislation).
To disregard the widening racial inequality in victimization requires an act of will. In 2017, 55.7% of the city’s 292 murder victims were black (163 persons) – a disturbingly high percentage in a city where blacks make up less than one-fifth of the population. More over two-thirds of the 488 homicide victims in 2021 were black (327 people). In comparison, 28 white New Yorkers were murdered in 2017, and 29 white New Yorkers were murdered in 2021.
Regrettably, deliberate ignorance is the norm in Albany. The high-ranking black leaders who advocated for these legislative changes on behalf of black New Yorkers are now attempting to conceal the growing evidence that the black community is suffering the most as a result of their reforms.
David Soares, district attorney of Albany County, was due to testify last week at a New York State Senate committee on criminal-justice statistics. The night before the hearing, about 10 p.m., the Senate counsel called the District Attorneys Association of the State of New York (DAASNY) to disinvite Soares.
African-American victimization
The concern was that Soares, a black man, would highlight data showing that the recent criminal-justice reforms are creating “black victimization” and disproportionately impacting “my community,” as he had recently stated. At the hearing, DAASNY President Anthony Jordan instead read Soares’ words. White Jordan’s delivery of the bad news made it simpler for officials to disregard it, a task that would have been more difficult if delivered by a progressive black Democrat.
Soares’s testimony stated, “These reforms have had the most devastating effect on black and brown communities.” “An honest examination of the data — the rise in crime, the victims of that crime, and the location of the most violent crimes — reveals a clear connection.”
Sen. Jamaal Bailey, the black politician presiding over the session, fumed: “Quite frankly, some of the testimony as written is rather offensive, it’s a pejorative, and it’s condescending . . . This testimony is filled with condescending information, if I may be entirely honest and forthright. I’m wondering as to how such testimony even makes it to a public hearing.”
Sen. Zellnor Myrie, who is also black, used all of his allotted time to chastise the witness: “I do not believe this evidence is appropriate. This appears to be a political paper. There are a number of nonfactual, political, and overstated language in this document, and I do not believe that DAASNY is attempting to engage in good faith with the legislature to find the best answer.”
Ignorant of the truth
These authorities refused to even consider the notion that the reforms are damaging, reinforcing their dedication to a diminished criminal justice system. Bailey thrilled about the passage of Raise the Age: “The signing of this bill marks another step in the right direction to meaningfully change the lives of young people and families across the state. . . . The prosecution of young children, who are disproportionately black and brown, promotes racial imbalances within the legal system.
Since the adoption of Raise the Age, Albany County, where Soares serves as district attorney, has witnessed around 312 Raise the Age cases involving only 230 defendants: “34% of these defendants have been arrested multiple times.” 19% of re-arrestees were previously incarcerated as juveniles. 62% of those re-arrested were re-arrested for a violent offence, according to the testimony of Soares. And the great majority of these incidents occurred in minority communities in Albany.
How, according to Myrie and Bailey, are these reforms beneficial to black communities? Are blacks simply black when they are charged with a crime?
The only true beneficiaries of these rules as they currently exist are repeat criminals. Daily, their cost to black victims increases.
Hannah E. Meyers is a fellow at the Manhattan Institute and the director of police and public safety. Source: City Journal
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