By Ryan Schwach<\/p>\n
The Queens district attorney\u2019s office quietly brought charges against Jabez Chakraborty, a 23-year-old Queens man with schizophrenia who was shot by police during a mental health crisis in late January, denying his right to testify on his behalf, his lawyers allege. <\/p>\n
Attorneys from the Legal Aid Society representing Chakraborty said in a February motion that Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz\u2019s office secretly brought grand-jury charges against the man while he lay shackled to a Queens hospital bed. They called on a judge to dismiss the case. <\/p>\n
Chakraborty was shot by police on Jan. 26 after his family called 911 in the hopes police would come to their Briarwood home and involuntarily remove their son \u2013 who was in the throes of a mental health crisis \u2013 for treatment. <\/p>\n
Instead, two police officers showed up and were met by Chakraborty, who was wielding a knife and moving toward them. Police officer Tyree White fired his gun, striking Chakraborty four times. <\/p>\n
Chakraborty has since been charged by the DA with attempted assault and criminal possession of a weapon, charges his lawyers say were unfairly moved without their knowledge and without giving Chakraborty a chance to testify before a grand jury. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe prosecution failed to produce Mr. Chakraborty for a timely arraignment and failed to advise any of the attorneys who reached out on his behalf about the grand jury presentation,\u201d Laura Eraso, Chakraborty\u2019s attorney, said in the filing. \u201cInstead, the prosecution used the days following Mr. Chakraborty\u2019s shooting and immediate arrest to investigate and try to build a case against Mr. Chakraborty, and to protect the NYPD and Officer White, who shot Mr. Chakraborty inside his home multiple times at close range in front of his family members.\u201d<\/p>\n
Eraso argued that the DA\u2019s office did not keep her, the Legal Aid Society, or Chakraborty\u2019s family appraised in the course of the investigation into the shooting or grand jury proceedings. <\/p>\n
On Feb. 12, more than two weeks after the shooting, Legal Aid filed in court to protest Chakraborty\u2019s \u201cprolonged detention\u201d without any filed charges. <\/p>\n
\u201cUp until that point, QDA continued to maintain to lawyers, community groups, and elected officials that they were still investigating,\u201d the filing read. \u201cIt was not until the writ was filed that the prosecution finally scheduled Mr. Chakraborty for arraignment on the charges.\u201d <\/p>\n
Chakraborty was ultimately arraigned on Feb. 13 before Queens Judge Jessica Earl-Gargan. <\/p>\n
In response to Legal Aid\u2019s argument, the DA\u2019s office says that it did not rush or hide the proceedings, but were instead waiting for Chakraborty to be medically cleared by the hospital. <\/p>\n
\u201cDefense counsel argues that the People \u2018deliberate[ly] delay[ed]\u2019 arraigning defendant that unfairly prevented defendant from exercising his rights to testify and request witnesses be heard before the grand jury,\u201d Assistant District Attorney Hugh McCann wrote in a filing in response. \u201cBut counsel knows full well that defendant could not have been arraigned before he was medically cleared.\u201d<\/p>\n
McCann attested that he reached out to Jamaica Hospital several times to check on Chakraborty\u2019s medical status, and if he was cleared to be arraigned, but that he wasn\u2019t medically cleared until Feb. 12, the day before he was virtually arraigned from his hospital bed. <\/p>\n
\u201cAs soon as he was cleared, the People immediately made arrangements for defendant to be arraigned,\u201d McCann said. \u201cThus, there is absolutely no basis for counsel’s accusation that the People denied defendant his right to testify or seek to present witnesses before the grand jury by delaying his arraignment.\u201d <\/p>\n
McCann said the DA had no intention of proceeding with a \u201csilent\u201d arraignment, because they were under no obligation to serve Chakraborty with charges because he was not medically cleared \u2013 nor did they need to allow him to testify before the grand jury. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe subject of a criminal investigation has no right under either the state or federal constitution, or, for that matter, the common law, to testify before a grand jury,\u201d McCann wrote. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Ryan Schwach The Queens district attorney\u2019s office quietly brought charges against Jabez Chakraborty, a 23-year-old Queens man…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":161821,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[9,24,63,122,124,123],"class_list":["post-161820","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161820","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=161820"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161820\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/161821"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=161820"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=161820"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=161820"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}