Long Island body parts suspects freed again under New York bail rules
Two of the four people charged in connection with a pair of dismembered corpses discovered scattered over Long Island's South Shore have been freed again.
Steven Brown, 44, and Amanda Wallace, 40, appeared briefly in a Suffolk County court Monday, days after their arrests in connection with two sets of chopped up human remains recovered in separate locations.
On Friday, two other people charged in the body parts case, Alexis Nieves, 33, and Jeffrey Mackey, 38, also walked free for the second time.
Two people who said they are the siblings of one of the two victims told reporters at the court he was Brown's cousin, Malcolm Brown, 53. Separately, Suffolk County police identified the other victim as Yonkers resident Donna Conneely, 59.
All four suspects face charges of evidence tampering, hindering prosecution and concealing human remains after a child found a severed arm in Babylon recently on her way home from school.
The grim discovery led police to numerous other body parts from two different victims in multiple places in western Suffolk County.
Under New York's bail reform laws, passed in 2019, charges of merely chopping up and disposing of dead bodies aren't eligible for bail, according to Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney.
OFFICIALS RAIL AGAINST BAIL REFORM AS 4 SUSPECTS CHARGED, THEN LET GO IN NY BODY MUTILATIONS CASE
"This situation, with these four defendants being released, would have never happened if the prosecution would have been able to argue dangerousness," he told reporters during a news briefing Thursday afternoon.
According to the Justice Department, "dangerousness is an unpredictable and untreatable tendency to inflict or risk serious, irreversible injure or destruction, or to induce others to do so."
"In New York state, we cannot argue dangerousness as a factor in our bail applications," Tierney said. "That is contrary to the federal system."
The DA has previously appealed to state lawmakers to make "common sense" fixes to the state's bail system.
If the suspects are indicted on more serious charges, such as murder in connection with the deaths, they could be held without bail.