New York bail reform laws strike again.
Convicted sex offender Bui Van Phu, 55, is accused of sucker punching Jesus Cortes, 52, outside of a restaurant in the Bronx.
Cortes went under brain surgery. Doctors put him in a medically induced coma. His brother Juan said he is “day to day.”
He told NBC New York: “My brother is in this condition because of these criminals walking the street. I don’t wish this upon anyone. The only thing I want justice is for my brother. Apparently, this person has a criminal record.”
Police arrested and charged Phu with attempted murder.
But the Bronx District Attorney’s office charged him with third-degree assault and second-degree harassment, which are misdemeanors. The District Attorney is Darcel Denise Clark.
The Bronx Criminal Court released him “on supervised release without bail” since the new charges are not eligible for bail.
The Daily Mail reported that documents state the charges changed because Phu “intentionally (caused) physical injury and with intent to harass, annoy or alarm another person.”
The DA spokesperson said: “The police charged him with Attempted Murder and when we got the case we evaluated and charged based on evidence we had. The investigation is continuing.”
It’s weird because, in January, Clark promised to “continue to treat incidences of violent crime with the utmost seriousness and will do everything possible to protect the people of the Bronx from violent criminals.”
The punishment for third-degree assault is up to one year in prison. The judge could sentence the person to three years probation, though.
Second-degree harassment in New York is considered a violation, not a crime. The punishment is up to 12 days in jail. But most of the time, a violation “will resulting a ‘time-served sentence, which oftentimes is no jail time at all, or just the time spent in arrest processing.”
If Phu pleads guilty to the second-degree harassment, he won’t “have a record.” But since he has a record, I guess it won’t go on it.
There appear to be no previous interactions between the men.
Phu has a disturbing criminal past:
Bui was convicted of first-degree sex abuse in the Bronx in 1995 and was sentenced to six years to life in prison, according to state records. He was paroled in 2019 and is now registered as a Level 3 sex offender — the most serious designation — for sexually abusing the 17-year-old girl in 1994, according to state records.Bui was also charged with criminal possession of a weapon and robbery in the city back in the 1990s, police sources said.
So Bui is out on parole. He allegedly confessed the crime to his parole officer: “I hit someone and he’s in the hospital. I don’t know if he’s dead. The police are looking for me.”
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