Queens Judge Set to Retire From Bench, Fueling Speculation of 2019 DA Run
Queens Supreme Court Justice Gregory Lasak will step down from the bench on Sept. 14, which sources say has created speculation that he may be eyeing a run for Queens district attorney when the office opens up next year.
August 29, 2018 at 05:18 PM
4 minute read
Queens Supreme Court Justice Gregory Lasak will step down from the bench on Sept. 14, which sources say has created speculation that he may be eyeing a run for Queens district attorney when the office opens up next year.
Lasak, who has served 14 years on the bench, did not provide a reason for his retirement, said Office of Court Administration spokesman Lucian Chalfen. Lasak did not respond to requests for comment left at his chambers and by email.
Queens District Attorney Richard Brown, 85, has held the office since 1991, making him New York City's longest-serving DA. He ran unopposed in 2015 and has not announced whether or not he will seek an eighth term to his seat.
“I will make no decision until sometime next year,” Brown told the Law Journal through a spokesman.
Sources with knowledge of the Queens political scene say that Lasak, himself a former assistant DA under Brown who left the office in 2003 after getting elected to the state Supreme Court, has long expressed a desire to run for DA.
“He's a serious guy, with serious credentials, and he is very well regarded by both the defense bar, and the police and prosecutors in law enforcement,” a source said.
During his 25 years with the office, Lasak was lauded as a star prosecutor. According to a 2003 Newsday profile on the judge, was promoted to head of the office's homicide bureau in 1984, when he was 30 years old.
In 1986, Lasak led the prosecution of Anthony LaBorde and James Dixon York, who were accused of killing a police officer and wounding another, but who avoided convictions in two trials because of hung juries.
Lasak was brought in for the third trial, where he clashed with legendary defense attorney William Kunstler and co-counsel Randolph Scott-McLaughlin.
Lasak is retiring from the judiciary before he was set to preside over the October murder trial for Chanel Lewis, who is charged with the 2016 slaying of Karina Vetrano while she was jogging in Spring Creek Park in Howard Beach, Queens.
But so far, City Councilman Rory Lancman, a Democrat who represents neighborhoods in eastern Queens, is the only publicly declared contender in the 2019 race for Queens DA.
Lancman, who has supported myriad criminal justice reform initiatives during his time on the council, has already given his run a progressive flavor, inviting comparisons to Larry Krasner, the reform-minded DA of Philadelphia.
“Rory Lancman is a long-time fighter for criminal justice reform in Queens and we're confident that Queens Democrats will vote to end overpolicing of communities of color, end cash bail, end trial by ambush, and confront wrongful convictions, over pursuing the same punitive criminal justice policies that have terrorized black, brown and poor people for generations,” said Lancman campaign spokesman Eric Koch. “Our next district attorney needs to be a fighter with a record of making our criminal justice system fairer for everyone—regardless of their race, income, physical abilities, religion, age, immigration status, sexual orientation or gender.”
Others who have been rumored to be interested in a run for the seat include Queens Borough president Melinda Katz; New York state Sen. Michael Gianaris, a Democrat; and Queens Civil Court Judge Peter Vallone Jr., who has previously served on the City Council and who ran and lost against Katz in the 2013 race for Queens borough president.
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