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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. With us now, the new Manhattan DA, Alvin Bragg, in office just since new year's and already making waves by keeping his campaign promise to stop seeking prison time for many lower-level offenses. He's already getting pushback from Eric Adams' new police commissioner, Keechant Sewell, for some of the offenses that are on that list.

Some of the controversies include Bragg's intention to not always prosecute illegal gun possession or resisting arrest if there's no underlying crime in those situations, but let's not let the press and the critics spin it, let's hear it from Alvin Bragg in his own words. DA Bragg, thanks very much for joining us. Congratulations on your election since this is your first appearance since then, and welcome back to WNYC.

Alvin Bragg: Thank you so much, always good to talk with you. I thank you for, as you said, giving me the opportunity to respond in my own voice. I really appreciate it.

Brian Lehrer: We'll get into some of the specific pushback to be sure, but I don't want that to be the first word defining you. I want you to tell our listeners affirmatively what you're doing. Take a few minutes if you need them, and describe what was in that memo that you issued to your prosecuting staff last week about your plans for reform.

Alvin Bragg: Sure, I appreciate it. First, again, by way of background intro to your listeners, I'm a lifelong Manhattaner. I grew up in Harlem during the height of the crack cocaine epidemic and first came to these issues by both significant public safety challenges, I had a gun pointed at me three times growing up by people who weren't police officers and also some fairness challenges, having a gun pointed at me three times by people who were police officers. That's how I got into this work.

I've worked as a state and federal prosecutor for most of my career, doing cases focusing on things like armed robbery, like offenses involving sex offenses, and really focusing on the public safety of our community. Also, recognizing that we're not going to incarcerate our way out of this. We have significant underinvestment in resources like mine, Harlem, where I grew up, and we have a number of matters that shouldn't be criminalized. We have addiction. We have mental health.

We have, for example, people who are-- a literal case out of Manhattan from a few years ago, a homeless person who used a counterfeit bill to buy food and toothpaste. That, to me, is something we need to connect that person with services and reserve our criminal justice system for matters that people are sitting around the kitchen table talking about, which are the shootings, for example. I know that well. These are not just things from my past.

Late last year, I had a shooting on my block, right in front of my home. I had to walk through the crime scene with my two children, sidestepping shell casings just to get home, so I know these issues very well. I want to give them privacy, so we can do things like follow the money, follow the guns. That's what I've done throughout my career. That's how we get real enduring public safety, folks and the people who are most culpable and are the drivers of crime. That's the plan.

Brian Lehrer: That's the plan. Police Commissioner Sewell, it's now been widely reported, Channel 4 had it first and others confirmed it, that she sent an email to all 36,000 NYPD cops on Friday saying she is, "Very concerned about the implications to your safety as police officers, the safety of the public, and justice for the victims." I read that she and you have already spoken directly about that, is that accurate?

Alvin Bragg: Yes, we were in touch by phone last week and we both started on the job and then this weekend by text. I look forward to sitting down and talking with her. I've got a 20-plus year history of working side by side with law enforcement, including the NYPD and FBI and others. I think there are some things that we hope to get into the details on them that just are not so.

The memo was intended for our internal lawyer audience, and I think as it went more broadly, there are some things that I definitely think we're actually already on the same page about. I look forward to-- we're going to sit down this week with our teams. We got a government. We've got to work together. We're all focused on safety, as our Mayor has said. I look forward to talking with the Commissioner and addressing any concerns she may still have.

Brian Lehrer: When the Commissioner says she's very concerned about "your safety as police officers" writing to her rank-and-file, I assume she's referring maybe, among other things, to your intention not to prosecute resisting arrest unless there's an underlying crime. Do you think that's one of the things she's referring to? To people who might hear that, "What? Not prosecute resisting arrest," what is that going to do to the safety of police officers or just general authority of police officers where they should have authority? How would you explain it?

Alvin Bragg: Look, I'm not going to speculate on what her concerns may still be, but I do know, for example, I had a high school friend reach out to me and said, "If someone punches a police officer, is that okay?" The answer is, of course not. Of course, that's not okay. I've prosecuted those cases. I've prosecuted people who have punched law enforcement. That's not okay. Of course, it's not okay. I've never said it was okay on the campaign. Of course not is my response for that.

What I did say is there are, at times, when the only charge is resisting arrest, and I know from my youth growing up in Harlem, that when that only charge is resisting arrest, it begs the question, what was the first stop for? What was the arrest for? It's not we're talking about someone who's punched an officer, it's when the only charge is someone may have stiffened up their arms or something like that when going to be handcuffed, and I can't be told from the officer, they can't tell me what the actual arrest was for.

To me, that's intuitive and makes sense, and it's a pretty narrow category. Something that's very important I know again from my youth and as my time as a prosecutor, we alienate witnesses like that. Someone who's not being charged of anything else but that, we need that person the next week, the next month to be our witness, so that person may be a victim to the crime and does not come forward. It is something that's really consistent with public safety and the safety of our officers.

If someone assaults a police officer, I take that currently and in my past very seriously. Of course, not, we're not going to ignore that. That's what I told my high school friend who reached out, that's what I would tell the commissioner, that's what I tell your listeners. Officer safety is of the utmost importance to me. Often, I've told lawyers, prosecutors I've worked with, we sit behind our desks, so we're in the courtroom, we draft a search warrant, we draft another legal document, but then we stay in our office.

We give that search warrant to an officer who then goes out, puts him or herself in the harm's way, so there is nothing that I give greater promise than safety of our officers. Without them, we can't do this safety work. That is a promise, and I thank you for giving me the opportunity to really address that head-on.

Brian Lehrer: When people say you won't prosecute resisting arrest and just leave it like that as a blanket statement unless there's an underlying crime, you're saying it depends how the person resists arrest. If they do it in a way that's violent toward the police officer, you will still prosecute them, am I hearing that correctly?

Alvin Bragg: Oh, yes. That charge is-- this, again, is maybe with a legal distinction as a cloud of some things, that's an assault. If the person pushes, if the person punches, the person uses that kind of physical force, that's an assault, and we're going to do assault charges. Of course, we are.

Brian Lehrer: The New York Times article on this includes the phrase certain robberies and assaults as things you will not seek jail or prison time for, robberies and assaults, did The Times get that right, certain ones?

Alvin Bragg: Again, I think this is our memo which was for our internal legal audience, which, obviously, is very well steeped in the penal code. I think we've got to divide this kind of matters into two categories. There is what I think is obvious, again, I will say, of course, the person that goes into the store with the loaded gun or unloaded and waves it around, that's a robbery. We're going to do that. I've done those cases. We're going to do that. That's very, very important.

What we were talking about in terms of what there's been some attention on is there's another category in the penal law called-- not about guns but dangerous instruments, which can be almost anything. If I pick up a pork chop and throw it at you, that could be considered a dangerous instrument. We were trying to get rid of a category of matters which aren't the gun cases. They're cases that are someone attempts and throws something at you like a pork chop.

I don't want to be frivolous about it, but that literally could be a dangerous instrument under the law and really to draw a division. Those are two different types of cases. The guns, and the armed robberies, loaded or unloaded, are serious and significant, we're going to do them. The ones that don't rise to that level are ones that we're still going to do the cases, but we're going to be looking at diversion and alternatives. I just think we should be focusing our attention on those instances with the guns, with things that are we sit around and think about, sort of public safety issues. That's where I want my officer's attention to be.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, we welcome your questions for Manhattan DA, Alvin Bragg. He's been open enough to come on here and answer questions from me and from you. So your respectful questions, supportive or not, or just curious to know more are welcome here at 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692, or tweet a question @BrianLehrer. We can also get into other things that the Manhattan DA might have on his plate. Might there be a city of New York versus Donald Trump case coming or anything else like that that you want to bring up? 212-433-9692. Do you argue, DA Bragg, that the policies that we've been talking about will make the public more safe, rather than they just won't make them less so while you try to undo some of the excesses of mass incarceration?

Alvin Bragg: I think there's no doubt that will make us safer. I can tell you, there's a body of research, and I can also tell you from my experiences. I talked about the witness we need next week and next month. I've been building cases that are complex and go to the heart of public safety, drug trafficking, gun trafficking cases, and have witnesses resist because they had a negative experience from a low-level crime. That directly impedes our public safety. Also, we all know about reading in the paper about someone who doesn't act, and it's their eighth arrest. Then we asked ourselves importantly, what happened the first seven times?

My contention and the research supports it, is if we get those people the services they need, whether it be addiction or mental health, that we can avoid those next times that we're then reading about when something very tragic happens. Again, I didn't just make this up, this is based on a body of research, but equally important, based upon my experiences growing up with public safety challenges. I have my experiences in state and federal prosecutor's offices, building cases that I think have gone a long way to building enduring safety.

Brian Lehrer: Justin in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC with DA Alvin Bragg. Hi, Justin.

Justin: Good morning, Brian, and good morning to you there. Listen, I don't understand why one would compare resisting arrest to assaulting a police officer. If you physically assault a police officer, he's going to file an assault charge against you. Now, I know that police officers say, especially when they're dealing with Black bodies, resisting arrest in their world, even asking, "What are you harassing me for," is exercising your rights, they think you're talking back to them, and that always falls under the category of, "Oh, he's resisting." 90%, basically, of Black people who face resisting arrest charge is false. We need to fix it because when we are explaining these things, the gap between police safety and citizen safety is too wide. We need to address the two and tighten them more.

Brian Lehrer: You support the direction that DA Bragg is going on that, clearly. Justin, thank you very much. Another call. Jim in Trenton, you're on WNYC. Hi, Jim.

Jim: Yes, thank you, and thank you for your time. I just respectfully have a question for the new DA. I worked in the city for about 15 years, most of which have been very safe under Bloomberg, Giuliani, and de Blasio for that matter. I haven't been to the city since a pandemic, and a lot of colleagues of mine haven't either.

In the surrounding Tri-state area, when you've seen the absolute horrific crimes that have taken place in working districts in Midtown Manhattan that really have gone unnoticed and no attention from de Blasio, The Perfect Storm, but not even mentioning when people get pushed in front of subway tracks, workers get pushed downstairs, just trying to earn a living. That type of stuff is horrific. Really, when you hear about diversion programs and stuff, grizzled commuters that have been commuting to the city for a bunch of years, they just want results. They just want safety. They want to know something is being done. That's the simple fact.

Brian Lehrer: When you hear, DA Bragg, I assume you've been listening to the segment this morning. Is there anything specific that he said that makes you think that the city or the Manhattan DA's office will not enhance your safety?

Jim: Well, the thing is, what will he do regarding people who've been arrested, and they have a rap sheet that's three pages long? Like, for instance, the guy who burned down the tree in Midtown Manhattan, I believe he had a fairly long rap sheet. He was out on the street the next day, and now they can't find him. I'm also thinking about, just the random horrific crimes that are going on, like are diversion programs going to--- like, are these people going to be off the streets or not? That's what working people want to know.

Brian Lehrer: Jim, I'm going to it there to get your response in our allotted time. He's skeptical about diversion programs. That's the most specific point there, DA Bragg.

Alvin Bragg: Look, I thank Jim for raising it and certainly mindful of our commuters on the train ride myself. The trains are up and running. We're trying to get people back in the city, as our Mayor said. I'm also very particularly sensitive to the workers, we've got a whole plan laid out for worker safety, particularly people who are on the job. The instances I want to really raise up and focus, Jim talked about being pushed downstairs. If you push in front of trains, just violent acts, and certainly that is a priority for me. That's kind of the work, I guess, I've done, just old cases of the past. This is significant. I do think inappropriate cases, if it's driven by an issue for which services can be linked, that's got to be part of the equation.

One thing that I think has gotten lost in trying to give general guidance, which I think is my obligation to do in the office, is that every case rises and falls on its own. We give the general guidance, but we also encourage, really empower our system prosecutors to think about one particular case is going to advance public safety. Certainly, someone who, as Jim said, has a long rap sheet, that certainly is something of concern to me. It's always a factor in all the cases I've done before joining this office.

Brian Lehrer: Let me give you an example of that, that was in The New York Post, and granted, it's the New York Post, but this is what they report. Headline the other day, Serial Burglar Keeps Getting Cut Loose, Thanks to New York's "Great" Bail Reform. It's because the setback here cites bail reform is great. It's about 58-year-old Charles Wold, who The Post describes as a longtime drug addict accused of burglarizing seven different businesses in Brooklyn alone, plus another three in Manhattan in the course of just three months. It says he's got a long rap sheet over many years.

It says, "But each time cops hauled him in, he was released because of the state's controversial reform laws, court record show." The article is obviously trying to demonstrate that the bail reform is letting people with long rap sheets out even when they've committed recent, in this case, burglaries allegedly, and are committing more each time they get released. Are you familiar with that case, and some of the crimes were allegedly committed in Manhattan?

Alvin Bragg: I'm not specifically familiar with the details, and I don't want to talk about what is sounds like active cases of multiple boroughs, but I think I can address the point without reference to the specific case. Look, I live here. I live in an area where more of these crimes are happening than other neighborhoods. This is an issue of concern. I certainly hear it. I believe in the bail reform, we're having people detained pretrial based on wealth.

Obviously, the standard under our laws, whether you returned to court, but yes, that's a problem. That is a problem if someone is out and committing another burglary. That's a problem, of course, and we're going to work to look at that. I think in the short term under our law, we really want to be providing supports to make sure that person is returning to court and then adjudicate the matter, and then we're out of the pretrial detention and into a post-conviction, which is a different, obviously, part of the proceeding where there are more options available to the prosecutor's office.

Brian Lehrer: We'll continue with the new Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg in a minute and more of your calls. I definitely want to get to another part that people are hearing with some alarm in some quarters that you won't prosecute gun possession cases unless there's an underlying crime involving the use of that gun, but still, illegal guns proliferating in New York City. Definitely want to ask you if you inherited a Donald Trump-related case from Cy Vance and more as we go with DA Alvin Bragg for another few minutes. Brian Lehrer on WNYC.

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Brian Lehrer on WNYC with the new Manhattan District Attorney, Alvin Bragg, whose first-day memo to his staff made the news and strong pushback from places including the head of the NYPD from people including the head of the NYPD, the new commissioner Keechant Sewell, who says, some of these things will put police officers' safety at risk and doesn't respect the victims of crime enough. DA Bragg is on further explaining some of these positions. On the gun possession part, I'm going to let a caller do it. I think Alan in Brooklyn is going to bring it up in a way that might surprise both of us. Alan, you're on WNYC. Hello.

Alan: Good morning, and happy New Year, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you.

Alan: As you know, many states like Texas had been pushing for more and more liberalized open carry laws. In their states, if they want to do that, God bless him, I don't think that's New York's desire, because as a dense place, with subways and offices and theaters, where people are packed together very often, we don't really want to see open carry laws be the norm.

I'm not so much worried about the people in New York creating the major problem here, but if you decriminalize unlawful possession without any other crime, don't we invite in the kinds of crowds that were imported for January 6 to Washington, to menace us merely by supposedly exercising their rights to walk down the street with these guns without doing anything else unlawful, then you'd have the trouble of proving by their social media history that they were conspiring, which is only something you could do after the fact to prove some larger crime in the short term.

Brian Lehrer: Alan, let me get you an answer. It's an interesting way into the gun possession crime through January 6 than the Texas liberal gun laws and whether people could carry here.

Alvin Bragg: It's very interesting. You're right. He did ask, Alan, in a way that surprised me, but I think it's important. As your listeners probably know, even the Supreme Court is in the middle on our laws, which I think we need to and we are. The state is defending strenuously, and Alan used the word if we decriminalized gun possession. That makes me very nervous. That's not what I've said, and that was reported somewhere, I certainly want to address that. Like I said, I prosecuted people for possessing guns. I think possessing guns is, particularly oftentimes the people who are carrying them were people who have a history of domestic violence or prior gun offense is extraordinarily significant. I'm happy to address that more as well.

To go to Alan's specific question about guns coming in, that has been a particular focus during my career, maybe in a slightly different way than he raised it, but guns coming in out of state being trafficked, and then sold here illegally, which is a species of what he's saying, sort of about the people bringing them here, but still illegally. We have need to create a gun tracing technology now and compare it with social media, some of which, the social media tools you've seen in the January 6 investigations. Mostly how it comes up is not the people coming but the guns coming from other parts or the country where you get them more easily.

Brian Lehrer: I guess the question that people will ask is, why be tough on one side of that and not the other. If you want to be tough on the laws in other states that allow a lot of gun trafficking into New York, where's the line when you find a New Yorker with an illegal weapon, which means there's a potential to use that weapon in a crime, but when they haven't yet committed a crime with a weapon, where's the line for you as to when that should be prosecuted?

Alvin Bragg: Yes. I'll tell you the two cases I've talked about a lot that I don't think should be brought. One is involving my father, who was near the end of his life and had a gun he brought from another state years before to protect our home during the '80s in Harlem. I had him turn it in on a gun buyback. It hadn't been fired in 50 years, and he was certainly not in a position to use it. That, to me, that was not then and I don't think should be a gun possession case, no real harm. Question is, what's the public safety risk?

Brian Lehrer: That would be the extreme no harm example, though, right?

Alvin Bragg: Right. Well, you're I'm just giving you an example from my own life. I'll give you another one which could be closer, which was my brother-in-law, who I'm talking openly about this, who was arrested. Was engaged in a fistfight with four other young men, college-aged. After they were arrested, one of them had a gun on, so my brother-in-law was charged with gun possession for a gun he didn't know and didn't touch. Maybe that seems extreme to others, but those cases are happening. Those are two and maybe you view those as outliers. Those are the two I've talked about. We underscore this in the memo, how cases of the rise and fall and their facts of what we're wanting to do is slow people down to engage in what is the public safety risk, specifically.

Part of the memo process and me as leading the office is to be drawing people to that attention in every case and thinking about the variables in each case. Maybe the two examples I gave are a little bit, in your word, extreme, and the other ones we've talked about someone, let's say, with a gun going in tucked to their waistband into a store, to me, that's a clear one, we're going to do that. As a case, it's got to be done. That is a risk to public safety. In other parts of the country, maybe that's legal, but it's not here. It's one of the good things about our laws. If someone has unconcealed weapon in their waistband, I think we're all assuming that something bad could happen, and that's when we need to intervene. I hope those polls provide some guidance to your listeners.

Brian Lehrer: Few minutes left with the new Manhattan DA, Alvin Bragg. Well, let's do one more caller, and then I want to ask you about other things not related to the way you've been making news this week with your new reform policies. Elizabeth in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC with DA Bragg. I know you also wanted to ask about gun possession. I guess we just covered that, but you also wanted to talk about the smash and grab crimes.

Elizabeth: Right. Well, let me just say, by the way, thank you for taking my call, Brian, and long-time listener, first-time caller. Just one more thing about the gun possession that DA Bragg was just saying. I can't imagine somebody being convicted when he doesn't even own the gun. When it's not in his possession at all, that sounds very strange to me, but anyway, I'm glad to hear that somebody who's got a gun sticking in his waistband would be arrested for it, and that is a serious crime in my opinion.

Also, because it said that robberies would just be considered misdemeanors unless there was a weapon involved or whatever. I have heard lately of a lot of these smash and grab robberies in jewelry stores in such where they come in, they smash the glass, they grab a bunch of merchandise, and run out, and they may not have a gun or any other serious weapon. To me, that's a serious crime. I don't see how you could dismiss it as a misdemeanor. I definitely think that should be considered a felony.

Brian Lehrer: Well, let's see if the premise is right. Would that, as described, be a misdemeanor to you?

Alvin Bragg: No. I'm so glad of those of you who raised so many issues that I want to address, and maybe I can just take them in the order you said them. My brother-in-law served more than a year in jail on that offense. That actually did happen. Yes, completely agree, as I just said, a gun in the waistband at the store is very, very serious. The smash and grab, I'm so glad you raised those because it's another area in which I think things are being conflated.

What I've said in the policy, and again, I use a real example of a homeless person going into a store and unlawfully getting toothpaste and food, real example. That homeless person, the DA's office recommended a sentence of 5 to 10 years, ultimately got a three to six-year sentence. That, to me, is in a different category. A homeless person trying to get food and toothpaste is different. That's the thing I've said I don't want to do anymore.

On the other hand, an organized group storming hardworking people who are providing, as we come to call during the pandemic, essential. They've always been essential by providing us with goods for sale. That's serious. I completely agree with you, Elizabeth. That is of a completely different kind and sort. Some of what has happened is that these two categories have been pushed together. That's why I'm so grateful to Brian for letting me come on and pull them apart and talk about them the way actual cases happen. I completely agree with you that people storming and it's happening more and more and we need to put end into it. People storming stores and just taking goods, that is a long way away from someone who's hungry and needs a loaf of bread.

Brian Lehrer: Elizabeth, thank you for your call. Can you talk about anything you may have inherited from DA Cy Vance pertaining to Donald Trump or the Trump Organization?

Alvin Bragg: I probably can't talk about it in a way that would be satisfying to you or your listeners, which I'm sure does not surprise you or them. It continues to be, as reported, a top priority matter. We've got folks who-- you used the word inheritance, so I'll use it as well, who are phenomenal lawyers, who are on it, and will continue to be a matter of consequence in the office that I'll be giving a personal attention to you.

Brian Lehrer: Anything else that you're doing that you think should make news when only this one set of things has been making news from week one?

Alvin Bragg: Well, we are looking, as we said, at the most serious crime. We had someone who was a victim of a hate crime pass away. Looking at that matter and going forward with that, we obviously had a very serious homicide in East Harlem this weekend. That's where I want our focus to be, on the hate crimes, on the murders. We talked a little bit about gun traffic, but I think it's a word I want to go back to it. I think there is so much we can be doing and we're planning to do it to stop the flow of guns in so we don't have these incidents in the first place.

We've got great dynamic lawyers here who will bring the case and prosecute it.A lot of the things we've talked about here today, armed robbery or these smash and grab cases. Some of us, we can stop on the front end, and that's better for all of us. By focusing on the gun trafficking, which was alluded to by one of your questions, we can really stop these incidents before they occur. That's going to be a significant focus in the months ahead.

Brian Lehrer: All right. Let's hope. The new Manhattan DA, Alvin Bragg. Thank you so much for coming on and answering everybody's questions. We look forward to having you on many times.

Alvin Bragg: Thanks so much.

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