THE REVOLVING DOOR SLAMS INTO ANTI-GUN UNIT

Suspects walk free after arrests by NYPD’s new anti-gun teams 

 

By Craig McCarthy and Gabrielle Fonrouge

 

New York Post 

April 24, 2022

 

 

Four men that were allegedly arrested for carrying weapons were allowed to walk free within hours of being picked up due to lax judges and bail reform laws 

 

Four men allegedly busted with weapons — including some that were loaded — by the NYPD’s new anti-gun unit were allowed to walk free within hours of their arrest, thanks to lax judges and bail reform, The Post has learned. 

The NYPD said the new Neighborhood Safety Teams made 25 gun arrests in their first three weeks since launching in March, but The Post was only able to obtain court records or information for 12 of the cases.

Of those 12, just one man remains behind bars — meaning 11 of the defendants are back on the street, including the four who were cut loose with no bail. The others had posted bail that was set in their respective cases.

One of the sprung includes Tyquise Bell, 23, who was allegedly nabbed by NST cops on March 30 in the Bronx after they spotted a 9mm Taurus pistol inside the lower leg of his pants, court records say. 

“I found it for sure. Two days ago. I’ve only had it for two days,” Bell allegedly told police during the bust, according to a criminal complaint. 

During his arraignment the next day, the Bronx District Attorney’s Office and Judge Srividya Pappachan, a former public defender and a Bill de Blasio appointee, agreed to spring him on supervised release because the charges weren’t bail eligible, records show.

 The NYPD said the new Neighborhood Safety Teams made 25 gun arrests in their first three weeks since launching in March, but The Post was only able to obtain court records or information for 12 of the cases, only one of who still remains behind bars

 

A day later in Brooklyn, two more NST arrestees were freed shortly after their arrests on gun charges.

Xayvion Rodgers, 19, was drinking out of a Casamigos tequila bottle around 1:30 a.m. in Bedford-Stuyvesant when an NST unit spotted a loaded 9mm pistol on him, court records say. 

Rodgers took off running from the cops and dropped the gun, which his co-defendant Robert Griffin, 19, picked up and shoved into a plastic shopping bag, the records show. 

Inside the bag was a loaded B6C Sarsilmaz pistol with one cartridge in the chamber and 12 cartridges in the magazine, court papers show.  

 

Judge Vidya Pappachan released Tyquise Bell after he was charged with gun possession

 

The duo was charged with second-degree firearm possession, a felony charge for which bail can be set, but during their arraignment, Judge Phyllis Chu freed them both on supervised release, records show. 

Prosecutors from the Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office asked Chu, another de Blasio appointee, to hold Rodgers on a $10,000 cash, $20,000 bond or $40,000 partially secured bond. But she declined.

When Griffin was arraigned, prosecutors consented to supervised release after seeing that his co-defendant had just been sprung by Chu, the DA’s Office said. 

Later that month, a Brooklyn judge sprung Marcos Malvar without bail following his March 26 bust by NST cops on felony firearm possession charges, according to court records.

 

            Judge Laura Johnson released Marcos Malvar, who was allegedly pulled over with drugs and guns inside his car

 

Malvar, 21, was pulled over in a car that had drugs inside — and cops also turned up a loaded Hi Point Model CF .380 firearm, a semiautomatic weapon, with three rounds of ammo inside his bedroom dresser. 

He was also charged with criminal obstruction of breathing for allegedly choking his girlfriend, the mother of his children, records show. 

Assistant District Attorney Ari Rottenberg said during Malvar’s arraignment on both cases that the offenses were bail eligible but “given the specific circumstances” of the matter, he recommended Judge Laura Johnson cut him loose on supervised release, according to a transcript of the proceeding. 

Johnson ended up releasing Malvar on his own recognizance.

 

Shootings this year are up 10% across the city compared to the same period in 2021

 

The Brooklyn DA’s Office said that despite Rottenberg’s statements in court that the charges were bail eligible, bail couldn’t actually be set on the firearms count under state law.

Recent changes to the controversial bail guidelines that were passed in the state budget still wouldn’t have allowed prosecutors to ask a judge to hold Malvar, the DA’s office noted. Starting May 9, judges can only set bail for felony firearm possession charges if the defendant had previously been charged with having an illegal gun and is then found with one again.

The NSTs — a revamped version of the NYPD’s controversial anti-crime unit disbanded in 2020 and a key pillar to Mayor Eric Adams’ fight to curb gun violence — launched in March in response to the city’s surge in gun violence.

City Hall and the NYPD have so far given varying arrest data from the program’s first three weeks.

Most recently, on April 6, Chief of Department Ken Corey said the NSTs made 135 busts and that 67% of the suspects had a prior arrest record. Of the 25 gun arrests the NYPD said the teams have made, four of the suspects were juveniles, five had open felony cases and seven had been previously convicted of a crime.

Of the 135 total busts, which were for a range of offenses, 91 had prior arrest records, 57 had a prior arrest for a major felony and 21 were on parole or probation.

Of the dozen cases reviewed by The Post, Dwayne Davis, 44, was the only defendant to be held without bail after he allegedly shot someone multiple times on March 18 in the Bronx. He is charged him with attempted murder and felony firearm possession.

So far this year, shootings are up 10% across the city compared to the same period in 2021, with 354 reports of gunfire — a rate of more than three shootings per day. 

 

Angellyh Yambo was shot to death just a block from her Bronx high school after Jeremiah Ryan allegedly opened fire with a “ghost gun” during a dispute 

 

The scourge has killed and maimed a host of innocent bystanders, including several children. 

On April 8, 16-year-old Angellyh Yambo was shot to death by a fellow teen just a block from her Bronx high school and two other kids were injured after Jeremiah Ryan, 17, allegedly opened fire with a “ghost gun” during a dispute. 

On March 31, 12-year-old Kade Lewin was killed when a stray bullet struck him in the head while he was sitting in a parked car with two relatives in Brooklyn. And on March 25, a 3-year-old girl was hit while leaving her daycare but miraculously survived. 

Just days earlier, a 7-year-old girl was grazed by a stray bullet while standing with her mother at a Coney Island intersection and in January, a Bronx baby just days away from her first birthday was shot in the face while strapped to a car seat in her mother’s vehicle.