59 BUSTS AND STILL ON THE STREETS

Serial NYC purse snatcher has 59 busts — and still avoids jail 

 

By Larry Celona, Tamar Lapin, Ben Feuerherd and Evan Simko-Bednarski

 

New York Post

February 9, 2022

 

 

The purse thief has reportedly been in and out of the life of crime for 27 years. The office of Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg asked for supervised release of the serial purse snatcher

 

The system is working — in this alleged crook’s favor. 

A robbery suspect with 59 busts under her belt has been through a revolving door of arrests — and avoided jail again this week for yet another mugging, cops say. 

Serial purse snatcher, Nicole Green, 46, who was picked up on a robbery charge Monday was freed by a Manhattan judge that day, after DA Alvin Bragg’s office asked for supervised release, the Post has learned.

The latest charges come just days after she managed to dodge a stay in jail last Thursday for violating terms of her release in another robbery case by missing a court-mandated hearing.

The inability of the system to jail Green has disgusted law-enforcement members.

“This is crazy,” a Brooklyn cop said. “The public is being put in jeopardy. 

“The only thing that surprises me is that she waited two days to do another robbery,” the source added.

A Manhattan cop added, “Am I missing something? She doesn’t show up for a supervised appointment, so they give her another chance? At one point, the courts have to realize that some people can’t be trusted to show up when there are no penalties.”

“I would rather tell her to stop robbing people,” another Manhattan cop said.

Cops say Green has a rap sheet 27 years long. 

Green’s most recent arrest was on Monday, when she kicked a woman on a Queens-bound E train, grabbed her purse and took money from her wallet according to cops. She was charged with robbery in the third degree.

But Green was released without bail that night, on the condition she stay off the subway.

This was days after she was brought in on a warrant last Thursday for missing a meeting over charges in a November subway robbery.

No bail was requested by the DA’s office, and Green was released. 

Last month, Green was arrested again, on second-degree robbery charges, for allegedly fighting with a woman on a subway car at the Lexington Avenue and 63rd street station and stealing her wallet.

Prosecutors requested $25,000 bail in that case, according to a spokesperson from Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office, but the judge ordered her release.

While New York’s 2019 bail reform law made non-violent felonies like third-degree robbery ineligible for cash bail, a 2020 tweak to the law gave judges discretion to set bail in cases like Green’s, where a suspected offender is awaiting trial on another set of charges.

Green appeared before Manhattan Criminal Court Wednesday afternoon and was allowed to stay free.

Green’s attorney, Glenn Hardy, told the Post that his client expects to be “vindicated” at trial. She’s due back before the court on March 2, and remains on supervised release.

“She has full faith and confidence in the criminal justice system,” Hardy said.