Chair Farías raises Brooklyn courtroom birth case and data accountability
Farías cites a May 2026 case where a nine-month pregnant woman gave birth in a Brooklyn courtroom and asks why it is not in DOC data. Chard says the person may have been in NYPD or OCA custody, not DOC custody.
Yeah, we have in May of 2026, a woman who was nine months pregnant gave birth in a Brooklyn courtroom.
I guess we have different reports on whether or not she was handcuffed during birth or post that.
I guess what I'm trying to understand is with our data, this is a person that was in a courtroom that was technically still incarcerated under DOC custody.
Why is that data point not a data point that you folks are referencing in your data?
Or is it that because they're in the courtroom and they're in NYPD custody, they're technically not on your...
On your data set?
I don't know that that person was in our custody.
I think generally speaking,
Again, when someone's remanded into our care, they come into our custody.
When someone has a court appearance, there is a point of transfer when someone's going into a courtroom, at which point OCA staff may take custody.
But in this specific case, I'm not aware of kind of where they were in their court and legal proceeding.
If someone's pre-arrangement.
That person would not be in our custody.
They would come in until after arraignment.
If someone is going to a court appearance and they weren't in our custody prior to going, they're not in our custody.
So if that person was in NYPD custody at that time, then that would be where the report would be generated from.