After weeks of infighting and political grandstanding, Democratic leaders in New York said on Tuesday that they had reached agreement on a contentious issue holding up this year’s state budget negotiations: criminal discovery.
For years district attorneys have pushed for changes in state law governing the timing and scope of what evidence prosecutors must produce, which is known as discovery, before a trial. Prosecutors argued that they lacked the staffing and resources to comply with the demands and deadlines laid out in the law, resulting in serious cases being dismissed.
Their campaign was backed by Gov. Kathy Hochul, who spent considerable political capital pushing to loosen the rules for prosecutors — even going so far as to refuse to sign any budget that would not reduce the number of criminal cases that are dismissed on procedural grounds.
She has held numerous public events to push for the new measures, including as recently as Tuesday afternoon in Ulster County. Ms. Hochul said at the event that “there could be a resolution in sight,” and that she was eager to return to Albany to seal the deal.
Yet the framework of the agreement was announced on Tuesday by Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie. He said he and his staff had been speaking directly to prosecutors from New York City and their aides in recent days to find a middle ground and address concerns from some Democrats that criminal defendants would be at a disadvantage as their lawyers prepared for trial.
“The governor always said to me she wanted the D.A.s to be in a good place,” Mr. Heastie said. “The D.A.s seem to be in a very good place. Her team was briefed on the language last night and they seemed to be fine.”
While the exact bill language has yet to be released, Mr. Heastie said the deal reduces the amount of evidence that prosecutors must hand over to defense lawyers. They would have to turn over evidence “related to the charges of a particular case,” rather than just any evidence related to the case.
Mr. Heastie said that judges would also have more discretion in deciding how to punish prosecutors who do not hand over evidence.
The deal, which was confirmed by Mike Murphy, a spokesman for the Senate Democrats, will allow state budget negotiations to begin in earnest, two weeks after the April 1 deadline.
The state’s current discovery rules were crafted in 2019 as a corrective to a yearslong practice by prosecutors of withholding vital evidence until the 11th hour. The rules intentionally place the burden on prosecutors to turn over materials to criminal defendants or risk having the charges dismissed.
But almost immediately, prosecutors began to complain that the law went too far. Last year, prosecutors unsuccessfully pushed for discovery rules to be loosened. This year, Ms. Hochul made their campaign a priority, inviting district attorneys and victims of violence from across the state to make their case at the Capitol.
Michael E. McMahon, the Staten Island district attorney who was one of the prosecutors working with state leaders, said he was hopeful that the deal balanced the competing priorities of various interests.
“The deal makes clear to the judges that if the district attorney acts in good faith and shows due diligence, that a remedy to not handing over certain evidence should be fashioned that is proportionate to any potential harm to any defendant,” said Mr. McMahon, who also leads the District Attorneys Association of the State of New York.
“It also requires the defense bar to raise objections in a more orderly fashion,” he said, “rather than waiting until the last minute to try to force a dismissal.”
The governor’s requests were met with opposition in the Legislature, however, as many lawmakers worried that the changes would wipe out years of hard-won progress toward making the criminal justice system fairer to the accused.
The Legal Aid Society, which fought for the changes to the discovery law in 2019, had opposed Ms. Hochul’s rollback proposals. A spokesman said that the organization would reserve comment on the new deal until public defenders had a chance to review the text of the bill.
Ms. Hochul has repeatedly found herself at odds with lawmakers over criminal justice. Almost immediately upon assuming office, Ms. Hochul began pushing to undo some of the Legislature’s signature changes to state bail laws. Those changes had aimed to ensure that poor people did not languish in jail for minor offenses because they could not afford bail. While she was ultimately successful in winning significant changes, she spent nearly all her good will.
Even so, Ms. Hochul placed discovery reforms at the center of her public safety agenda this year. A key supporter of the effort was the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin L. Bragg, who was elected on a promise to balance public safety with fairness to criminal defendants.
Speaking with reporters earlier this month, Mr. Bragg stressed that the changes he was seeking were not meant to undo the criminal justice reforms passed in 2019. “No one’s trying to go back,” he said.
Benjamin Oreskes is a reporter covering New York State politics and government for The Times.
Grace Ashford covers New York government and politics for The Times.
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