Judge says bail reform plan is an ‘insult’ to the judiciary

In a stunning rebuke of Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman’s recent “overhaul” of the state bail system, no-nonsense Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Edward McLaughlin has labelled the plan an “insult” to the judiciary.

“Lippman’s . . . reform of the ‘broken’ bail system insults judges, overlooks that bail review is available presently, fails to provide a complete record of bail/release decisions, and intrudes on the judiciary’s independence,” McLaughlin wrote in an Oct. 6 letter e-mailed to more than 100 New York judges.

“The accusation is that daily, countless judges in five boroughs, without consulting each other, knowingly made incorrect bail decisions,” he wrote. “Their actual bail decisions were correct.

That they produce an unwelcome result does not mean the decision was wrong or that the system is broken.”

Lippman — chief of the Court of Appeals, the state’s highest court — announced on Oct. 1 new bail initiatives to address what he called a “two-tier system of justice,” one for the rich and another for the poor. Under the new plan, a judge in each borough will be designated to review bail amounts in misdemeanor cases.

The “automatic judicial review” will be triggered when a defendant is unable to make bail, he said.

Nearly 50,000 city defendants are jailed each year because they cannot make bail, Lippman said.

But McLaughlin, 67, who is known for setting high bails and meting out stiff sentences, counters that a “huge number” of defendants who do make bail or are released without it don’t return to court. Nearly 51,000 warrants were issued for no-show defendants so far this year, he said.

“This mass thumbing of noses at the legal system following sincere judicial bail decisions seemingly is neither noticed nor noted in the chief judge’s announcement,” he wrote.

McLaughlin also accuses Lippman of undermining judicial independence “by implying that he could suggest a goal and that judges, like lemmings, would dutifully comply rather than make individualized, case-specific decisions.”

Lippman’s spokesman, David Bookstaver, declined to comment. McLaughlin did not return a call seeking comment.