New York Post

Any Solutions, Mr. Mayor?

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Even Mayor de Blasio is shocked that Justin Murrell was walking the streets despite “such a clear pattern of criminalit­y.” But will the mayor do anything to change the system that let him loose? Police Officer Dalsh Veve was responding to a report of gunshots when he confronted the driver of a stolen car, who then hit the gas, dragging the officer for blocks.

The veteran cop, married with a 2-yearold daughter, was left in critical condition with serious head trauma.

Arrested for the crime was Murrell, 15, whose rap sheet is so stunning that de Blasio said, “It is hard to imagine having him back on the street.” The mayor’s takeaway: “There’s something missing from us as a society that we have to fix.”

Fixing society is a tall order. How about taking a look at New York’s justice system?

Officer Veve “represents the American dream,” said the mayor: an immigrant child who became “an exemplary officer.”

Murrell, by contrast, belongs to Brooklyn’s Eight Trey Crips gang, police say. He has 11 prior arrests and faces several felony charges, including car theft, robbery and burglary. But he’s always been prosecuted as a juvenile in Family Court.

New York is famous for lenient judges, short sentences for violent felons and “diversion” programs that let thugs skip prison altogether. Can that picture improve?

Oops: De Blasio backed the recent Raise the Age law, which is designed to send more 16- and 17-year-olds to Family Court.

Is the mayor at least willing to support antigang reforms, like the bill the state Senate passed last month in a bipartisan 48-13 vote?

It has both carrots (funding for school and community anti-gang programs) and sticks (criminal laws modeled on the RICO statutes that broke the back of the Mafia).

For the first time, it defines street gangs in the state penal code. But Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie won’t even bring it up for a vote.

If de Blasio won’t come out for that bill, he can at least offer his own ideas for getting other Justin Murrells off the street.

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