Letitia James’ Times Square shooting probe draws GOP criticism over New York’s mental health crisis
New York Attorney General Letitia James is facing scrutiny after opening up a legally required investigation into the police shooting of a woman who fatally stabbed Erin Piacenti, Bank of America executive and a new mother in her first week back to work from maternity leave, in Times Square.
James' office announced on Wednesday that it will be investigating Pamela Cisneros' death, who was wielding two large knives in each hand when officers confronted her following the fatal stabbing. She was ordered to drop the weapons but did not comply and was shot when she moved toward the officers.
Under state law, the Attorney General's Office of Special Investigation is mandated to investigate all deaths that were caused by police officers. However, Attorney General Republican candidate Saritha Komatireddy is pushing that the Attorney General's office take more concrete steps to ensure that another tragic killing or attack caused by a mentally unstable person doesn't happen again. She argued that an investigation into police conduct fails to address the real problem at hand.
"The problem is that we have people who are known dangerous individuals, people with documented mental illness," Komatireddy told Fox News Digital. "They've been in the courts before, or they've been to the hospitals before. The police know exactly who they are, but we have no ability to take care of them."
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A campaign spokesperson for James accused Komatireddy of seeking to "score cheap political points off of a tragedy."
"Saritha Komatireddy wants to be Attorney General but doesn’t understand the law," a spokesperson said in an email to Fox News Digital. "Under New York’s Executive Law, the Office of the Attorney General’s Office of Special Investigation is required to investigate any incident where a police officer’s actions may have caused a death, including this one."
However, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who has a history of anti-police rhetoric, applauded the officers who stopped Cisneros.
"I want to thank the NYPD officers who stepped in and prevented a horrific attack from becoming even worse," Mamdani said at a news conference.
New York City Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch shared that while Cisneros, who lived in Queens, didn't have an arrest record in the city, there were two times police responded to calls concerning her suffering a mental health crisis.
In March 2019, Cisneros attempted suicide by jumping onto the tracks of the E train and was removed and later hospitalized. In March 2018, police found her in Midtown, where she was screaming, acting belligerent and intoxicated.
If you or someone you know is having thoughts of suicide, please contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255).
Under the state's Mental Hygiene Law, police and doctors can take a person to the hospital for a psychological hold if they are deemed to be a risk to themselves or others, or they can not meet their basic needs — but often times those with severe mental illnesses are released by the hospital back onto the streets hours after being brought in.
"I was there in Times Square — just a couple of days after this fatal stabbing — and I was walking around and saw severely mentally ill people on the street," Komatireddy told Fox News Digital. "It's still happening every day, and we need someone who's actually going to propose a real solution and way forward."
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The New York State Office of Mental Health is tasked with overseeing the state's mental health system, which includes 23 psychiatric centers and 6,500 programs overseen by local governments and nonprofits, but Komatireddy said, if elected, she'd create a new office known as the Office of Civil Commitment which would target and keep tabs on people who are at most risk.
"The Office of Civil Commitment that I'm going to launch will be staffed with both law enforcement personnel and also physicians, and you need both because, under state law, the law requires that physicians certify that someone has the mental state required for involuntary civil commitment," Komatireddy told Fox News Digital. "So there's nothing like that right now in New York State. There's no office that has both law enforcement and physicians who can work together to get these people off the streets."
Greene County Sheriff Peter Kusminsky told Fox News Digital that his deputies are not trained to handle psychiatric crises — and that the county has nowhere to send people who need real care. Deputies are constantly pulled off patrol for mental-health calls, he said, then left to put those in crisis in hotels because there aren't enough hospital beds available.
"Additionally, we really struggle when we have people in custody who we aren't equipped to handle, and secure beds are even harder to find," Kusminsky said. "It sometimes takes weeks or months to locate once and when we do, they are maybe on the other side of the state and at an exorbitant cost."
"Hotels and motels don’t have doctors, don’t have medicine, don’t have therapy," Komatireddy said. "The state needs to step in."