History
When he first took office in 1975, Robert M. Morgenthau became only the third elected District Attorney of New York County in nearly four decades. In over 30 years in office, District Attorney Morgenthau has maintained and enhanced a tradition of excellence and high ideals in public prosecution.
The modern era of professional, non-partisan prosecution in New York County began in 1935 when a New York Grand Jury, fed up with the ineffectiveness of existing efforts to control widespread racketeering in the city, requested the appointment of a special prosecutor. At the behest of Governor Herbert Lehman, Thomas E. Dewey was named Deputy Assistant District Attorney in New York County; with his own staff, offices and budget, Dewey operated as an independent prosecutor for rackets cases. Dewey took the lead in investigating extortion rings, prostitution, gambling and corruption in organized labor and government. Under Dewey, who was elected District Attorney in his own right in 1937, the Office convicted a host of organized crime members and associates, including the notorious "Lucky" Luciano and Tammany Hall boss Jimmy Hines.
Frank S. Hogan, one of Dewey's top assistants, succeeded Dewey in 1941; he was re-elected nine times and served as District Attorney for 32 years, until he resigned from office in 1974. Under Hogan, the New York County District Attorney's Office continued to conduct major investigations into corruption and racketeering, including, for example, highly publicized probes in the 1950s and early 1960s into the fixing of college basketball games and the television quiz show scandals. In high profile cases as well as more routine, though no less serious, cases of homicides, robberies and other street crimes, the Hogan office developed a national reputation for competence, non-partisanship and fairness; the Office was widely, and accurately, known to be as concerned with exonerating the innocent as with convicting the guilty. In one of its most celebrated cases, the Office, after an extensive investigation, exonerated George Whitmore, Jr., who had confessed to the brutal 1963 killing of two young women in their Manhattan apartment; the real killer was later identified, prosecuted and convicted.
Since first taking office after his election as District Attorney in November 1974, Robert Morgenthau has continued to stress the fundamental importance of objectivity and evenhandedness in prosecution. "The job of the prosecutor," he has said, "is not to obtain convictions like notches on a gun. The prosecutor's job is to protect the public and to administer the laws." At the same time, Mr. Morgenthau has worked to improve the Office's performance in critical areas, expanding and re-shaping the Office's capacity to meet the new challenges presented by modern urban life.
Faced with rising levels of violent street crime and property offenses when he took office in 1975, District Attorney Morgenthau restructured the Office, implementing early screening of felony cases by experienced assistant district attorneys and "vertical" prosecution, which guaranteed that felonies and other serious cases would be handled by the same assistant from start to finish. Over the years, he has created many specialized units in the Trial Division to deal with crime problems requiring special expertise. The Sex Crimes Unit was the first unit in the nation to be devoted specifically to the investigation and prosecution of rape, sodomy and sexual abuse. More recently, the Family Violence and Child Abuse Bureau was formed to focus on the related problems of domestic violence and child abuse. Other specialized units in the Trial Division concentrate on career criminals, violent gangs, identity theft, and firearms trafficking. Some of the criminal prosecutions brought by the Trial Division are described elsewhere on this site.
Combined with improved prosecution strategies, these organizational changes boosted New York County's conviction rate and led to a dramatic decline in violent crime. The felony conviction rate, at 73% in 1974, rose to more than 80% by 1980 and has remained close to 90% since then. With more violent felons and repeat offenders being sentenced to state prison, crime in New York County has dropped markedly. For example, in 2004 there were 91 homicides, 84% fewer than in 1974, the year before Mr. Morgenthau took office. Mr. Morgenthau effectively reversed a trend that had seen homicides in Manhattan more than triple between 1959 and 1974. During Mr. Morgenthau's tenure, there has been an equally dramatic drop in other crimes throughout Manhattan: Robbery has decreased 83%, burglary 89%, and forcible rape 79%. In conjunction with the New York City Police Department, the Office continues to work to decrease the homicide rate.
As he did earlier in his career as United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Mr. Morgenthau, as District Attorney, has tirelessly pursued organized crime, white-collar crime and public corruption cases. Mr. Morgenthau formed an Investigation Division to coordinate the Office's consumer fraud, white-collar crime and organized crime efforts, creating, as needed, specialized units such as the Labor Racketeering Unit and the Official Corruption Unit to focus on areas of particular concern. The Investigation Division has exposed and prosecuted systemic corruption and fraud in the construction trades, the garment industry, foreign and domestic banking, the securities business, municipal unions and city government. In a prosecution of major figures in the private trade-waste business in the mid-to-late 1990s, the Office used the state's Organized Crime Control Act to help rid an important sector of the city's economy of mob domination and anti-competitive practices, leading to administrative reform in the licensing and regulation of waste carters. You can read about this and some of the criminal prosecutions brought by the Investigation Division on this site.
The many cases prosecuted by the Trial Division and Investigation Division generate appeals in the Appellate Division, First Department, and the New York Court of Appeals, as well as related civil litigation in both state and federal courts. To handle all of the appellate and civil matters in the Office, Mr. Morgenthau maintains an Appeals Bureau. The Appeals Bureau has been involved in innumerable precedent-setting appeals in state and federal courts. Also, because of its expertise in the law, the bureau provides assistance and advice to the other bureaus in the Office. You can learn more about the work of the Appeals Bureau on this site.
In addition to prosecuting those responsible for crime, the District Attorney's Office under Mr. Morgenthau has developed many programs to provide assistance to neighborhoods and individuals victimized by criminal behavior. For example, the Witness Aid and Services Unit addresses the needs and special concerns of those who are witnesses or victims of crime; this unit won a prestigious National Crime Victim Services Award in 2000. The Community Affairs Unit works with concerned groups throughout New York County doing outreach work and acting as a liaison to the community at large. The Narcotics Eviction and Landlord Responsibility programs seek to force landlords to rid buildings of drug dealers and other criminals whose presence is a threat to law-abiding tenants.
Robert M. Morgenthau began his eighth consecutive four-year term as District Attorney of New York County in January 2006.