On August 9, 2018, The Bronx Defenders along with Emery Celli Brinckerhoff & Abady, LLP and Morrison & Foerster, LLP secured a settlement in Trowbridge v. DiFiore on behalf of New Yorkers who are affected by systematic delays in the processing of misdemeanor cases in the Bronx. According to the terms of the agreement, the…
The NYPD routinely confiscates cash, cell phones, and other personal property from people arrested in New York—particularly impacting people in the low-income communities targeted by broken windows policing, who can least afford it. A City budget document states that NYPD retained $7 million in unclaimed cash and property auction proceeds as revenue in fiscal…
Kaitlin received her J.D. from Michigan Law. After graduation she worked as a public defender at the Legal Aid Society of Nassau County, where she represented clients in misdemeanor court, felony screening court, mental health court and human trafficking court. After leaving the Legal Aid Society, she spent two years as a Research Fellow for…
In 2016, Still She Rises Tulsa was launched as a project of the Bronx Defenders with the goal of using our holistic defense model to build something completely new: the nation’s first public defender office dedicated exclusively to representing mothers targeted by the criminal justice system. What better place to launch a project focused on…
For information or questions regarding Still She Rises, please send a message to the project coordinator.
“The NYPD’s practice of refusing to release money and property allegedly tied to criminal activity is slated to become the subject of a federal class action lawsuit. A Bronx law firm, which sued the city in January over its civil forfeiture policy, amended the complaint Friday to add more plaintiffs who said they were unable…
“Kaleb Hagos was arrested by police on September 23rd, 2015, and had $2,931.68 in cash confiscated, along with an iPhone he was carrying in his pocket. Since then, the case against him has been terminated, and his lawyers at the Bronx Defenders have repeatedly tried to retrieve his phone and money—but to date, the Bronx…
Contact: media@bronxdefenders.org The Bronx Defenders Seeks Class Cert. in Property Retrieval Suit June 3rd, 2016, New York – The Bronx Defenders filed an amended complaint today in Encarnacion v. City of New York, and will ask a federal judge to grant class certification in their lawsuit challenging the NYPD’s unconstitutional practice of retaining people’s property…
The Bronx Defenders is proud to congratulate Runa Rajagopal, director of our Civil Action Practice, for receiving a 2016 New York City Bar Association Legal Services Award! Runa was one of five honorees who received this distinguished award for her outstanding work and dedication as a public defender. The Legal Services Awards were established to recognize the efforts…
Our Executive Director, Robin Steinberg, published the following piece in Daily News about our lawsuit challenging systemic court delay in the Bronx. “This situation constitutes nothing short of a constitutional crisis. People in the poorest borough in New York, with the highest percentage of black and Latino residents, are being forced to choose between returning to…
Karume James, a staff attorney in our Criminal Defense Practice, published the following piece in The Huffington Post about the need for reduced fare MetroCards for low-income New Yorkers and the impact such a program would have on our clients. “Among the many “broken windows” cases we get at The Bronx Defenders, I’ve always found arrests for…
The NYPD makes tens of thousands of arrests every year, the vast majority of them for low-level misdemeanors. Property is seized in nearly every one of those arrests, including cash, cellphones, IDs, keys, cars, and even prescription medicine. The South Bronx is one of the poorest and most over-policed congressional districts in the country,…
The New York Times Editorial Board weighs in on Trowbridge et al., v. Cuomo et al, our federal lawsuit challenging the epidemic of court delays in the Bronx Criminal Court. “This Dickensian nightmare is all too common in the Bronx, according to a class-action lawsuit filed Tuesday in Federal District Court by the Bronx Defenders,…
“Public defenders in the Bronx filed a lawsuit Tuesday against lawmakers in New York. They charge that courts are chronically understaffed, jeopardizing the right to a speedy trial for many defendants.” Listen to the story here. For more on the lawsuit, see our press release.
“Court delays in the Bronx — so troublesome that state officials had to create special courts to clear a backlog of felony cases — remain unresolved and have “fatally undermined the right to trial” for tens of thousands of people charged each year with low-level offenses, according to a lawsuit filed on Tuesday.” Read the article…
On May 12, 2016, Annie Pineda, Director of Pro Bono at The Bronx Defenders, will speak at the 2016 Equal Justice Conference in a panel entitled “Getting to Know You, Getting to Know All about You: What Legal Services Organizations and Law Firms Should Know about Working Together.” From the organizers: “This session will offer insider…
Contact: media@bronxdefenders.org Broken System Undermines Right to Speedy Trial and Due Process for Thousands of People Charged with Low-Level Offenses, Causing Significant Social and Economic Hardships NEW YORK (May 10, 2016) – A federal class action lawsuit was filed today against Governor Andrew Cuomo and the administrators of New York State’s Unified Court System for…
Longreads profiles The Bronx Defenders. “The quality of the lawyering among public defenders in New York City is universally understood to be very high; that wasn’t Robin Steinberg’s concern. She saw inadequacy built into the very structure of public defense. In the nineties, she noticed that more of the clients she was defending were being…
Emily Galvin, an attorney in our Criminal Defense Practice, published the following piece in Slate about the need to rethink prison employment. Most people are at least intuitively aware of the connection between poverty and prison. As Bryan Stevenson, the founder and executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative, has said, too often the opposite of poverty…
Runa Rajagopal, Director of Civil Action Practice at The Bronx Defenders, will join the following panel on Friday, May 6, 2016, as part of the Bridging the Divide Series at John Jay College in New York City. Panel: Nuisance Abatement And Broken Windows Eli B. Silverman, Professor Emeritus, author of NYPD Battles Crime: Innovative Strategies in Policing;…
Social workers and civil legal advocates from The Bronx Defenders will present the following two workshops at the 2016 National Organization of Forensic Social Work (NOFSW) Conference in New Orleans, LA, on June 17-19, 2016. Saturday, June 18 (3:15-4:45) Developing Written Advocacy Skills: Persuasion and Disruption This workshop will provide instruction on how to develop…
Robyn Mar, Deputy Director of the Criminal Defense Practice at The Bronx Defenders, will present at an event at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, entitled “Resetting Bail — The Price of Justice in New York City,” on Wednesday, May 11, 2016. The event is hosted by the Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice and…
Christa Douaihy, supervising attorney in our Civil Action Practice, published the following piece in The Huffington Post about the NYPD’s use of obscure laws to facilitate the eviction of families from their homes without basic fairness or due process. The Movement for Black Lives has, among many things, created a renewed sense of urgency for policy makers to address our…
Olga (she/her/hers) graduated from Skidmore College with a Bachelor of Arts in Government and a minor in Italian. After graduation, Olga worked as an Intake Specialist for a legal service provider in NYC called Her Justice, where she assisted abused women in family, immigration and divorce matters. She later worked as a Court Assistant for…
Last February, attorney Anisha Gupta represented a Latino man charged with two misdemeanors: trespassing and resisting arrest. At her client’s arraignment, the first appearance before a judge where a bail determination is made, Gupta thought her client would be quickly let out on his own recognizance — meaning a release without posting bail; the prosecution…