Manhattan
District Attorney Cy Vance Jr. is blaming the coronavirus pandemic to
justify dropping charges in a major construction fraud case tainted by
allegations of prosecutorial misconduct, THE CITY has learned.
In
what appears to be the first instance of COVID-19 knocking out a
high-profile criminal prosecution in New York City, Vance revealed in
court papers filed Monday that he won’t put a key bribery case back
before a grand jury.
That’s
because the actions of sitting grand juries have been suspended and no
new panels have been convened since mid March when the coronavirus
forced the shutdown of much of the state’s court system.
The
case dropped by Vance involved one of several defendants in a
wide-ranging construction bribery prosecution that’s now the subject of
an internal review. At issue are accusations that the lead prosecutor in
the case, Diana Florence, withheld evidence undermining her star
witness.
One
of those defendants was Henry Chlupsa, a former executive of an
engineering firm charged with bribing the witness, a city bureaucrat,
for inside information to win multi-million-dollar contracts.
Manhattan
Supreme Court Justice Thomas Farber convicted Chlupsa in November
following a three-week non-jury trial. Weeks later, Chlupsa’s attorney,
Nelson Boxer, learned that the DA’s office had failed to turn over
thousands of internal emails and interviews with the informant in which
he claimed he never took bribes from anyone.
In January, Nelson asked Farber to vacate the conviction and dismiss the indictment.
In a court filing
Monday, Assistant District Attorney Kenneth Moore Jr. agreed the
conviction should be vacated, conceding the DA’s office hadn’t handed
over the disputed material as it should have.
Moore
insisted, though, the criminal charges against Chlupsa were still
viable. But because of the COVID-19 restrictions on grand juries, the DA
decided not to bring a new case against the now 77-year-old Chlupsa,
Moore said.
“In
an effort to conserve resources, especially in light of the coronavirus
pandemic, and for the other reasons described below, the People will
not be seeking to re-present new charges against the defendant to a new
grand jury,” Moore wrote.
“In the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, no new grand juries will be convened for the foreseeable future,” he noted.
3 comments:
Judge Dread said...
The unmerciful uncivilized unfair pieces of shit they hire in the so-called NYC "judicial system" which is about the biggest crock of shit there is out there.
Wretched Judges will one day be judged themsevles by God before they burn in hell next to all the evil doing layers.
To Judge Dread: Don't feel bad, the go-light, corrupt judge system is nation wide. We complain about it everyday out here in mid-America. They take on the God persona as soon as their asses hit the bench.
Did this guy somehow "donate" to some NYC Major's failed President campaign?
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