Play fare, Cy

Commish: DA too easy on scofflaws

THE CITY’S top cop called out Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance Jr. Tuesday, saying the DA is going too soft on some fare evaders.

Vance has moved to not prosecute some fare-beaters, or allow them to avoid a criminal conviction, if they stay clean for six months.

“We are still working with Cy’s office, but there’s a distance and a gap on what his office considers a public safety threat and what we feel is a public safety threat,” Police Commissioner James O’Neill told reporters at NYPD headquarters in lower Manhattan.

“It’s important to control access to the subway.”

O’Neill said there were two cases in which the DA declined to prosecute over the weekend — one involving Joshua Brown, who has been arrested 52 previous times, including 30 times in transit — plus a transit robbery and a transit grand larceny.

The NYPD later disclosed three other decisions to decline prosecutions from the weekend, including Christopher Allen, 55, who has 37 prior arrests, including four for robbery and an open warrant in a drug possession case.

A police official said the NYPD would prefer that transit recidivists

be put through the system as well as offenders with significant prior criminal records.

Mayor de Blasio also railed against fare evaders. “We are not in full agreement with the DA,” de Blasio said at the conference.

“We think his underlying vision has some merit, but people have to pay to get on the subway. We cannot create a situation where people think it’s acceptable (to not pay their fare). We are not going to allow constant recidivism and fare evasion.”

Vance’s position is that cops should be giving most offenders civil or criminal summonses rather than arresting them for “theft of services,” which is a misdemeanor and also one of the most often charged offenses in the city.

In 2017, cops arrested more than 52 people a day for the offense. The vast majority, he said, result in cases being dismissed.

In a statement to The News, Vance spokesman Danny Frost defended the new policy under which the five fare evaders weren’t prosecuted.

“The two people who had warrants were immediately brought to court on their warrants,” he said. “In other words, the policy worked. Officers are encouraged to stop anyone they observe farebeating, and our policy will ensure … that those individuals who should be arrested for possessing a weapon or having an open warrant continue to be brought to court.”