Chanel Lewis, the Brooklyn man in the NYPD-Queens DA frame for the Karina Vetrano murder in Howard Beach was shipped out to Riverhead under unexplained circumstances, whereupon he was supposedly beaten by a fellow inmate, and Lewis received injuries that required his hospitalization
Reporting on this has been less than minimal, especially since the Vetrano-Lewis murder case got so much news coverage earlier in police and prosecutorial proceedings.
One report of the incident appeared in Newday last month. According to that very sketchy report, ".... The Brooklyn man accused of killing and sexually abusing Howard Beach jogger Karina Vetrano more than two years ago was checked out at a hospital after he got into a fight with another inmate at a Suffolk County jail, officials said Saturday.... According to a spokesman for the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Office, Chanel Lewis, 22, got into a fight on Friday and was sent to nearby Peconic Bay Medical Center where medical staff there cleared him for a return to the Riverhead Correctional Facility. Chanel is being held there while awaiting retrial.... The spokesman couldn’t elaborate about the nature of the fight or any injuries but said that after Lewis was returned to Riverhead he was housed in a different part of the jail. Internal disciplinary charges could result because of the fight, the spokesman added.... A spokesman for the Legal Aid Society, which is representing Lewis, declined to comment Saturday. Spokeswomen for the Queens District Attorney's Office, and the New York City Department of Corrections, which had originally housed Lewis at Rikers Island, didn’t return email messages for comment.... It remained unclear over the weekend why Lewis, who lived in East New York, was being housed in the Suffolk jail. Last December, Lewis had reportedly complained about his living conditions at Rikers, alleging that the city jail traumatized him..." (See "Karina Vetrano slaying defendant in Suffolk jail fight, officials say" by Anthony M. DeStefano, 2/10/19, Newsday/LongIsland/Suffolk [https://www.newsday.com/long-island/suffolk/karina-vetrano-defendant-jail-fight-1.27100858]).
One local paper gave it similarly terse coverage. That complete report is as follows: "Chanel Lewis, the accused killer of Howard Beach jogger Karina Vetrano, has been quietly transferred to a jail in Suffolk County for security reasons, officials said this week.... Lewis, 22, had been held at Rikers Island since he was arrested in February 2017 after police said his DNA was found at the crime scene.... His first trial last fall ended in a hung jury last November.... On Feb. 1, just 10 days after Lewis appeared before a Queens Criminal Court judge to set a date for a new trial, the city’s Department of Correction took the rare step of sending him to a jail in Riverhead, more than 70 miles away.... Officials declined to comment, but transferring prisoners to another jurisdiction is considered a last resort when officers feel they cannot guarantee the safety of someone in custody in a city jail.... News of the transfer did not became public until last weekend when Newsday published a report that Lewis had been sent to a nearby hospital for treatment following a fight with another inmate in Suffolk last Friday.... A spokesman for the jail there declined to characterize the extent and nature of his injuries but said he was returned to the Riverhead lockup the same day.... Lewis’ second trial is set to begin March 12 at the Queens Boulevard courthouse." (See "Lewis being held in LI jail for safety sake" by Michael Shain, 2/14/19, Queens Chronicle/ Home/ Editions/ Queenswide [http://www.qchron.com/editions/queenswide/lewis-being-held-in-li-jail-for-safety-sake/article_0b02ee62-af3e-52eb-966e-ca3404ce555e.html]).
Sounds like the dirty DA figured out a way to avoid another stupid trial on Tuesday.
ReplyDeleteActually it sounds like Chanel Lewis is getting the 'treatment' for making the cops, the Queens DA and Judges Gregory Lasak and Michael Aloise look like a barrel full of monkeys.
ReplyDeleteBy isolating Lewis from his family and watching him get roughed up in the jail in Riverhead, the prosecution looks like it is trying to force a plea deal.
This is an example of an extreme violation of someone's constitutional rights, and it's also a violation basic human rights under international law.
Clearly, New York State and the Federal authorities are failing in their oversight obligations in this instance. This creates an opportunity for somebody like Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to get congress to look into this dirty business that's coming out of a big part of her home district. AOC and others in the Grievances Caucus also need to call for an international investigation of the police, local prosecutors and the NYS government's behavior against this member of an oppressed minority in America.
This sort of thing is right in AOC's wheelhouse and it will help her to elect fellow Democratic Socialists of America endorsee Tiffany Caban, a former public defender, to be the next Queens DA; and that would be revolutionary.
AM New York has an interview with mob lawyer DiPietro whose advice to Queens DA was to get old people on the jury in order to get a conviction.
ReplyDeleteWhy the outrage over the Central Park 5 but not over Lewis? Does it make "conservatives" feel better to convict an innocent man and then pay him 20 million dollars a decade later?
Maybe DiPietro will represent the crooked ADA bRad Leventhal like he represented crooke brooklyn ADA Vecchione.
James DiPietro was directly connected to another BAD prosecution that had been widely reported on by this blog, the John Giuca case, and DiPietro was on the wrong side of justice in that one too.
ReplyDeleteAccording to Anthony M. DeStefano's most recent article in 'amNY', the prosecution team in the Vetrano-Lewis case will try to win the second time around by basically re-presenting the same evidence that caused a clear majority of jurors in the first Chanel Lewis trial to reject most of the prosecution's case.
ReplyDeleteIsn't doing the same things and expecting different results one of the signs of insanity?
No one cares..Liam will lead Ulrich to be Mayor in 2021
ReplyDeleteNobody cares about Ulrich or Liam whatshisname anymore.
ReplyDeleteHere's something that ties into the Chanel Lewis case, former Judge Gregory Lasak, who had the Vetrano-Lewis case before he retired to run for DA, is being looked at by the Conservative Party and Ulrich's Queens Republicans to be their Candidate for Queens County DA.
The fly in the soup is that Lasak has tried to do a head fake to the left for the Democratic Party primary, and getting the Republican-Conservative endorsement would be the 'kiss o' death' to any chance he might have in the Dems' primary.
Don't be surprised if the GOP and Cons pull one of their placeholder candidacies to be switched to Lasak after the primaries are done.
Ulrich and Liam always win
ReplyDeleteGreat fake news 11:06
ReplyDeleteThe time for parties to look at someone has passed. Petition cycle began 2 weeks ago.
ReplyDeleteUngh-uh, 7:39 PM!
At best, your comment is diversionary; my comment was substantially correct.
Let me amend my comment slightly. Replace: 'is being looked at by the Conservative Party and Ulrich's Queens Republicans' with 'had been looked at by the Conservative Party and Ulrich's Queens Republicans'. As for the rest, let it all stand as it originally appeared in my comment at 11:06 AM.
UPDATE: THE "LEWIS TRIAL AND UPCOMING QUEENS COUNTY DA RACE" EDITION
ReplyDeleteTHE VETRANO-LEWIS MURDER CASE, SCHEDULED FOR JURY SELECTION LATER TODAY, HAS MADE NEWS AS A THORNY QUESTION FOR THE QUEENS DA CANDIDATES TO ADDRESS --- THE FIRST ISSUE TO BE DISCUSSED INVOLVED THE ALLEGED "CONFESSION" MADE BY CHANTEL LEWIS WITHOUT BENEFIT OF COUNSEL AFTER PROLONGED ISOLATION AND OVERNIGHT QUESTIONING BY POLICE
It's all there in glorious black and white in Theodore Hamm's article for the Gotham Gazette ( See "Heading to Retrial, High-Profile Case Prompts Important Question for Queens DA Candidates" by Theodore Hamm, 3/12/19, Gotham Gazette/ Opinion [http://www.gothamgazette.com/opinion/8347-vetrano-case-prompts-important-question-for-queens-da]).
The best quote, presenting the most interesting position on the issue, was the one by Tiffany Cabán. She said that she would treat the issue on a case-by-case basis; however, as an important caveat, Cabán vowed that she would “... not accept videotaped confession where no lawyer was present under traumatizing circumstances....”
Chanel Lewis suffered from such traumatizing circumstances when he was questioned and prompted by detectives prior to making his purported "confession".....
I'm sure the Chantel Lewis case repeatedly will pop up as a hot-button issue, and in a variety of contexts, during the current Queens County DA's race, which hasn't even heated up yet.
No one cares..Ulrich with Liams help will be the next Queens Boro Prez
ReplyDeleteAre Ulrich and the other guy hoping that Katz wins as DA?
ReplyDeleteAnyone else as Denaro event at juniors? Looked horrific, and his tweets are horrible. Time for Liam to become a man and take over GOP.
ReplyDeleteWith Liam M's penchant for blessing the rugs of politicos and the prominent presence of a rug on top of Teddy G's head, there is only one mountain left for Liam to climb in order to mark his place atop the Brooklyn GOP Chairmanship.
ReplyDeleteRELATED MATTERS: THE "AVENGING SWORD OF JUSTICE --- MOVES INTO THE QUEENS DA RACE" EDITION
ReplyDeleteMANY SUSPECT THAT JOHN KENNEDY O'HARA IS ONE OF MY TOP BSIs --- I WILL NEITHER CONFIRM NOR DENY THE SUBSTANTIVE UNDERPINNINGS TO THAT SUSPICION.....
It has been widely reported that John Kennedy O'Hara was instrumental in the process of selecting Kenneth Thompson as "the alternative candidate" to run against Brooklyn DA Charles Hynes in 2013; and then in Thompson's two-fold defeat of Hynes, in both the Democrat Primary and again in the General Election.
O'Hara has broadened his reach and is now a supporter and advisor to Queens DA Candidate Tiffany Caban. His name has already appeared in several articles that have mentioned Ms. Caban's candidacy, and O'Hara's comments about her have been laudatory.
In a new piece, O'Hara noted that Ms. Caban is the first DA candidate ever to promise justice in the form of investigations and possible prosecutions of ADAs who are found to have broken laws in the prosecutions of defendants.
I hope the prosecutors involved in the persecution of Chanel Lewis take note that they might be among the first investigated after a Tiffany Caban election.
UPDATE & BACKFILL: THE "ABC NEWS" EDITION
ReplyDeleteCHANEL LEWIS RETRIAL --- ABC NEWS REPORTS THAT JURY SELECTION IS COMPLETE --- OPENING STATEMENTS ARE EXPECTED ON MONDAY
Everything in the way of details about proceedings related to the prosecution and retrial of Chanel Lewis is quite sparse, and the routine reporting on the case has been terse or non-existent.
No one cares..Ulrich and McCabe win
ReplyDeleteHe got moved because the other inmates wanted to hurt him . He got his ass beat in the new jail anyway. That's what happens to weirdo rapist in prison/jail. - ex con
ReplyDelete