Assembly Bill A3665

                                BILL NUMBER:A3665A

TITLE  OF BILL:  An act to amend the criminal procedure law, in relation
to notice by the division of criminal justice services

PURPOSE:  This bill will create a procedure to validate and  ensure  the
accuracy  of  a  person's permanent criminal record as maintained by the
Division Criminal Justice Services (DCJS) as it relates  to  all  issued
warrants as part of a criminal proceeding.

SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS: section 1 of the bill adds a new subdivision 7 of
section  530.70 of the criminal procedure law creating a process whereby
DCJS is to verify  criminal  record  information  where  certain  arrest
warrant information contains contradictory information. DCJS is required
to  contact  various law enforcement entities and the courts in order to
clarify the contradictions. In the event no information is  forthcoming,
the arrest warrant will be deemed recalled.

EXISTING  LAW:  Under Subsection six of Executive Law §837, the Division
of Criminal Justice Services (DCJS) is required to establish a reposito-
ry to maintain a record of all arrests  and  prosecutions  in  New  York
State, creating the individual's rap sheet. The registry's data includes
a  record  of all warrants issued as part of a criminal proceeding. Once
these warrants are vacated by the court, this information should then be
sent to DCJS and recorded in the individual's rap sheet.

              

JUSTIFICATION: Due to failures in communication among the various crimi-
nal justice agencies, the process outlined in the Executive Law  is  not
always  followed,  resulting  in many individuals having rap sheets that
list warrants as  active  that  have  actually  been  recalled.    These
mistakes  can  cause  an  individual to be denied employment, housing or
public benefits for which they are eligible. It could  also  potentially
lead  the  individual  to be mistakenly arrested. The proposed amendment
offers an opportunity  for  individuals  who  have  incorrect,  outdated
warrant information on their record to have that information removed.

Currently, in order to correct warrant-related mistakes of this sort, an
individual  must  return to the court where their case was heard and ask
the clerk of the court to forward information  regarding  their  vacated
warrant  to  DCJS so that this information may be correctly reflected on
their criminal record. An individual must follow this process even  when
it  is  clear from the criminal record that further proceedings occurred
and that the warrant in question must have been previously cleared.

This process becomes more complex, or even impossible, where the phantom
warrant involves an old case. Under the Records Retention  and  Disposi-
tion Schedule issued by the Office of Court Administration (OCA), courts
are  ordered  to  destroy  records  of all returned warrants within five
years of the date of return or recall. Court case files, which may  also
contain  records concerning warrants, are also scheduled to be destroyed
after a period of time. This period can be as short a  six  years  where
the  case  was  terminated  in  favor  of the defendant or resulted in a

violation disposition. Even records of cases  that  ended  in  a  felony
conviction  are only retained for 25 years before they are destroyed. As
a result, once the courts no longer have any record of  these  warrants,
these  persons  have  no opportunity to have this inaccurate information
removed from their record. This legislation proposes that DCJS establish
a system so that:

For all current and future cases, whenever DCJS has a record that a case
contains an open warrant and then receives a notice of  new  proceedings
in the case - which makes it nearly certain that the warrant has already
been  executed or vacated - but there has been no notification forwarded
to the agency that the warrant has been vacated, DCJS will:

*Send an automatic notification to all relevant criminal  justice  agen-
cies

*These  agencies  will  have  30  days  to  establish whether or not the
warrant remains open and respond to DCJS

*If either a) DCJS hears the warrants have been vacated or b) if none of
the agencies provide any information about the warrant at the end of the
60 days, DCJS will assume that the warrant has in fact been vacated, and
will correct its records to reflect this.

For older cases that contain an open warrant as  well  as  a  record  of
later proceedings within the same case, DCJS will follow the same proce-
dure  as  above upon receipt of a written request from the person listed
in their rap sheet or their representative.

In addition to the notification process described above, two other safe-
guards ensure that individuals whose warrants do in fact  remain  legit-
imately  open  will  not have these warrants improperly vacated.  First,
under the OCA record  retention  policy  set  forth  above,  courts  are
required  to  keep  records  of any warrants that have not been vacated.
Additionally, the court must also keep a record of any case that remains
open for 50 years if the highest listed charge is a misdemeanor, and  75
years  if  the  highest  listed charge is One additional safeguard would
also exist if the individual in question had been incarcerated in a  New
York  Senate facility. According to regulations issued by the Department
of Correctional Services (DOCS), the individual in question  would  only
have  been eligible for a temporary release program after DOCS contacted
any relevant courts to make sure that any cases that appeared to  remain
open, according to their criminal record, had in fact been disposed of.

LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:; A10858A referred to codes in 2007 and 2008.

FISCAL IMPLICATIONS: To be determined.

EFFECTIVE DATE: This shall take effect January 1, 2012.