By Michele Evans / NYweeklyRecord.com / Date: 8/8/2026
Category: Criminal Courts / Prosecutor Accountability / Court Administration / Civil Rights
NEW YORK CITY, NY –
A federal appeals court has opened a door that New York’s prosecutor discipline system long kept closed. The Second Circuit ruled that the public has a qualified First Amendment right to attend formal disciplinary hearings and inspect certain related records involving prosecutors.
The July 29 decision in Civil Rights Corps v. LaSalle affirmed a July 2024 ruling from the Southern District of New York. It does not make every complaint public. It does require the state judiciary to justify secrecy with specific findings instead of treating confidentiality as automatic.
That distinction is the heart of the case. New York Judiciary Law Section 90(10) has made attorney grievance matters confidential by default. Civil Rights Corps challenged how that rule was applied to complaints against current and former Queens prosecutors.
The organization filed 21 complaints in 2021 based on information already in the public record, including judicial findings. The complaints accused prosecutors of misconduct. A complaint is an allegation, not a disciplinary finding, unless a court or grievance authority has established the underlying conduct.
The Second Circuit recognized a qualified, presumptive right of access to formal proceedings in the Appellate Division, Second Department, pertinent records and selected grievance committee dispositions. The state may still seal material, but only after making case-specific findings on the record that justify closure.
That is not blanket access to every intake file or preliminary screening decision. The ruling is limited and qualified. Privacy, fair-process and investigative concerns may support sealing in a particular matter. What changes is who carries the burden and whether the public can test the reason for secrecy.
The case grew from a wider accountability campaign. Civil Rights Corps says it filed 50 complaints from 2021 through 2023 involving New York prosecutors. The allegations included hidden benefits to witnesses, tolerance of perjury, concealed evidence pointing to innocence, racial discrimination in jury selection and misleading arguments to juries.
Those claims vary in their procedural posture and proof. Some were tied to public judicial findings. Others remained allegations submitted for review. The appeals ruling does not decide whether any individual prosecutor committed misconduct. It decides whether formal discipline can remain invisible without an adequate explanation.
Two early complaints involved former Queens prosecutors Brad Leventhal and Charles Testagrossa, according to the Queens Daily Eagle. A judge had found that information about alternative suspects was deliberately withheld in a 1996 murder case that led to the wrongful convictions of George Bell, Gary Johnson and Rohan Bolt.
The men were later exonerated after spending decades in prison. The Eagle reported that neither prosecutor was publicly disciplined and that both later left their jobs. The absence of a public disciplinary record made it difficult for New Yorkers to know whether the grievance system investigated, rejected or otherwise resolved the complaints.
That information gap is not abstract. Prosecutors wield the power to charge, demand bail, negotiate pleas, disclose evidence and recommend punishment. When courts find serious misconduct, the public has a direct interest in knowing whether professional oversight followed and whether the same conduct could recur.
The state court system and the Queens District Attorney’s Office did not comment to the Eagle for its report. Their silence leaves unanswered how the judiciary will implement the ruling, what records will be reviewed for release, and how quickly the public will see decisions that were previously inaccessible.
The New York State Bar Association has warned that the ruling shifts burdens and creates confidentiality challenges. Those concerns deserve practical answers. Witness privacy, sensitive evidence and unproven accusations require care. But administrative difficulty alone cannot justify a system in which formal accountability disappears from public view.
The Second Circuit’s approach demands balancing. Courts may protect genuinely sensitive information while still explaining why access is restricted. Redactions, limited closures and narrowly tailored orders offer options short of total secrecy.
For people harmed by wrongful convictions, the ruling provides no automatic discipline and no compensation. It does provide a way to see more of what the oversight system did after misconduct allegations reached its door. Transparency cannot undo lost years, but it can expose whether institutions learned anything from them.
The decision also places responsibility on the grievance committees. If a complaint is dismissed, the public may be able to evaluate the reasoning in covered dispositions. If formal charges proceed, the hearing can no longer be closed by default without a documented basis. If records remain sealed, the state must explain why.
The next test will be implementation. A right on paper matters only if records are released in usable form, hearings are announced, sealing decisions are specific, and affected parties can challenge unnecessary closure.
New York’s prosecutor discipline system has not suddenly become fully public. It has become more answerable. For a system entrusted with policing some of the most powerful lawyers in government, that crack in the wall of secrecy is a significant beginning.
Sources
United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit opinion in Civil Rights Corps v. LaSalle
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