End COVID-19 Arraignments in Red Hook!

We were recently notified that individuals arrested in Brooklyn, Queens, and Staten Island and have flu like symptoms will be brought to the Red Hook Community Court for arraignment. We have not been informed of any plan for medical care of those individuals or transportation if they are released. 

We are concerned about how this action will impact the health of our Red Hook neighbors, many who have underlying health issues that make them more vulnerable to the virus - but we are also concerned that the state would be arraigning people for low level crimes during a public health crisis. 

We are calling on both NYS and NYC Elected Officials as well as NYC District Attorneys to keep individuals out of jail amid the COVID-19 crisis and to keep COVID-19 arraignments out of the Red Hook Community Court. We support the Communities United for Police Reform demands to impose an immediate moratorium on police enforcement of low-level and quality of life offenses; unnecessary summonses and arrests, including fare evasion arrests and drug arrests for marijuana. 

As young people already impacted by the criminal justice system through over policing and criminalization of youth, we are united in this demand. In the midst of a public health crisis, we need resources and medical care, not to be put in harm's way by the criminal justice system.