Cut- ’em-loose judge springs another violent homeless repeat offender

In a miscarriage of justice that’s only likely to become more typical in the Mamdani era, Judge Ariel Chesler rejected Manhattan prosecutors’ request for bail to instead release a vagrant with 20 priors who’d allegedly just slashed a church worker. 

Told by a volunteer janitor he couldn’t use the bathroom at the Church of St. Catherine of Siena, Frank Fernandez reportedly slashed him in the arm with a boxcutter; the homeless man is a known troublemaker who haunts the area around the church.

The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office requested $30,000 cash bail or $90,000 bond; the judge instead gave Fernandez supervised release.

The Adams administration has been striving to force dangerous homeless people off the streets and into inpatient care; the next mayor believes sweet reason is the right way to appeal to mentally-ill menaces.

The state’s benighted criminal-justice “reforms,” the “anti-carceral” philosophy dominating DA offices and the even-more extreme “let ’em loose” approach of so many city judges have all badly exacerbated the danger posed by these deeply troubled individuals.

And as of January, the new mayor will surely be naming even more anti-jail judges to the bench; he also means to close Rikers Island before even inadequate replacements get built.

The new mayor’s big idea on this front is to send out social workers without police backup to handle most emotionally-disturbed-individual calls.

It’s going to be a long four years.