Retired NYPD Lieutenant Calls For 'A Complete Revamping' Of Bail Reform, Allowing For Police Input

5 months ago

Retired NYPD Lieutenant and candidate for New York State Assembly Joe Cardinale joins Brittany Lewis to discuss issues impacting New York, including squatters, the migrant crisis, and bail reform.

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Transcript

00:00 You're running for the seat in New York State Assembly District 11.

00:04 How is this issue, when we're talking about squatter, when we're talking about crime,

00:08 when we're talking about migrants, how is this all impacting your community?

00:13 Everybody is up in arms.

00:15 Everybody wants to know why.

00:17 In Long Island we had that famous case.

00:20 First of all, we have a few famous cases going on out there,

00:23 but right now you had the body parts.

00:26 They dismembered two bodies and spread the parts over the two counties, Nassau and Suffolk.

00:32 I happen to be running for a seat that encompasses both counties,

00:37 a little bit in Massapequa and mostly in Suffolk County.

00:41 So these individuals get caught.

00:43 They know. They said, "Yeah, we did that. We distributed the body parts."

00:47 Ray Tierney, a great DA out in Suffolk County, couldn't hold them because of bail reform.

00:53 So they're out on the street with ankle monitors on to the extent that they work.

00:58 And one of the individuals committed shoplifting,

01:02 so this time the judge remanded her and said, "Well, it didn't take you long.

01:05 You have your monitor on and you still chose to do this, so now you're going to be remanded."

01:10 When people see this and they go, "Wait a minute. This is right now backyard.

01:14 Things are happening."

01:16 They see what's happening in New York City spilling out to the island,

01:19 and it's getting to the point right now--it's at the point.

01:22 It's not getting to the point.

01:23 We've been there where people are saying enough is enough,

01:26 and they know we need to change up in Albany, this seat being one of them.

01:30 So let's say you get elected. What are you going to do?

01:33 What's your platform?

01:35 Well, it's not if I get elected. It's when I get elected.

01:38 That's the outlook we have.

01:40 My platform is to change the bail reform, and not the way Governor Hochul--

01:44 I can almost guarantee you she will come out knowing that everybody's against this,

01:48 or she'll tell the Democratic Party I want changes to bail reform.

01:51 But it's a little--just a little, a little too late.

01:56 And I think what it is, it's a complete revamping of this whole bail reform.

02:02 It has to be done over, and this time with everybody on board--

02:06 law enforcement, the DAs, everybody on board--

02:09 because this way there's no finger-pointing.

02:11 The way it stands right now and how bad it is,

02:14 the cops will do their job, I will make an arrest.

02:17 And let's use the infamous DA brag in New York City.

02:22 The cops will make the arrest.

02:24 He'll look at it and go, "Nah, I'm going to decline prosecution on that,"

02:28 so it never makes it past his office.

02:30 Let's say it does make it past his office and goes to the judges.

02:33 Now the judges don't have the discretion that they have out in New Jersey

02:37 to the extent where they can remand somebody and say,

02:39 "No, you have to be in. There is no bail for you.

02:41 You're staying in until this case comes up."

02:43 So you don't have the one, two, three punch we used to have.

02:46 You only have it at the level of the police department.

02:49 And that becomes a problem down the road too

02:52 because the cops are seeing all their hard work go right out the window

02:56 because nobody's paying attention to it.

02:58 So you need to get the DAs on board, the sincere DAs.

03:02 You get them on board, you get the police departments on board,

03:05 and this is across the state. I'm not talking about just NYPD.

03:08 I'm talking about every jurisdiction, so it's a state law that we can abide by.

03:12 And now with the complex issue of the illegal migrants,

03:17 we also need to have the ability to turn them over to ICE

03:21 because they should not be here to begin with.

03:23 And illegally, there's a process that we have,

03:27 and they're here bypassing that whole process.

03:30 But we have so many criminals walking amongst us,

03:32 we have no idea what they've done in the countries they came from,

03:36 especially Venezuela, who emptied their jails for us.

03:39 So let's go back for one second.

03:41 You're talking about bringing everyone to the table.

03:43 How do you do that?

03:44 Because I really think we're at a flashpoint, and correct me if I'm wrong,

03:47 because at now Detective Diller's funeral, you saw Governor Hoko get turned away.

03:53 There was an argument there.

03:55 How do you say, "Hey, we need every side to come to the table.

03:58 We need to come up with a solution," and what does that solution look like?

04:02 You know, the face of politics is so--it's so bizarre right now,

04:09 and especially me just jumping into this aspect of my career.

04:14 I really just see that the other side is basically stoic in their approach.

04:20 They just do not bend, and the reason is because they have the supermajority up there.

04:25 They have the trifecta.

04:26 They have the governor, they have the Senate, and they have the Assembly.

04:30 So now with all that, they're allowed to do whatever they want.

04:33 So there is--now, I tell you what, we'll do this,

04:38 but if you do this, I want to put this into the bill.

04:41 So they control it.

04:42 There is no balance of power up in Albany right now, and it's the same thing.

04:45 I would not want a one-party rule in the United States Congress or Senate.

04:50 I wouldn't want that.

04:52 That's not the way the founding fathers built our country, built the basis for our freedom.

04:57 They based it on fairness.

05:00 There is no fairness right now.

05:02 Everybody talks about the Ronald Reagan years.

05:05 That was great because Tip O'Neill could sit down with President Reagan,

05:08 make a differ on things, and then get to the table and broker a deal

05:11 because it was true bipartisanship.

05:14 But when you have a cocky one-party system right now that says we'll do--

05:18 pick and choose what we want to do when we want to do it,

05:21 and you'll sit by and watch it because you're the minority, that doesn't work for me.

05:25 I know that Republicans are the minority right now when it comes to New York State.

05:30 So is there any chance of conversation, do you think?

05:34 There's a chance of conversation if we pick up a few more seats in the Assembly

05:38 because then we will have the veto power.

05:41 You can sit back and I watch elections.

05:44 They're bought. A lot of elections are literally bought.

05:47 They'll put a ton of money into an area.

05:49 They'll come out, and it's the same old, same old politics.

05:51 You could say both sides do it, but I have to say the Democrats are famous for it.

05:56 They'll come out, and they'll promise everything.

05:59 They'll promise you the world, and they'll hand you a map afterwards and say,

06:02 "Here's your world." That's not what it's about this time.

06:05 This time we have candidates that want to go up there and want to make the difference.

06:09 It's not just myself. There's a lot of law enforcement running across New York State,

06:13 and it can make the difference, and they say, "Well, why law enforcement? Why not this?"

06:18 Well, anybody could jump in, but when you have the issues of bail reform

06:21 and the illegal migration here, and they gel together because there's such a fine line between the two,

06:30 then yes, we do have the answers to that. We do know what direction we have to go.

06:34 We just have to help people understand it when we explain it to them.

06:37 So if bail reform gets back on the table, I want it to be a standalone.

06:42 I don't want it to be with anything else. Let's concentrate on just bail reform.

06:46 Do not bring anything like discovery into it, because that's another issue that was put down on paper

06:53 that's totally disgusting, certain aspects of that.

06:57 I don't know whether you're aware of it, but if you have a victim of a sexual assault

07:02 and it's in that person's house, discovery now allows that individual to come into your house

07:09 with his or her attorney and get their discovery in the house where it occurred,

07:16 in the place where it occurred.

07:18 I know what's behind it, and a lot of law enforcement, they agree with me.

07:21 They feel that the victim is going to say, "I don't want to go through this and drop the charges."

07:26 So it's all a game. It's all a political game.

07:29 And you know what? It's not a game to me. People's lives are at stake. It's time for a change.

Retired NYPD Lieutenant Calls For 'A Complete Revamping' Of Bail Reform, Allowing For Police Input

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