The Manhattan DA’s Office let a man who was thought to be in a gang off the hook for multiple felonies. The Post has learned that the man used his second chance to rob a 14-year-old boy and pack a gun on a playground.
Charles Lindsay, who is accused of robbing a bank with a gun, is finally in jail on the new charges, but it’s not because of the smart Manhattan office. In fact, the office wouldn’t even say on Friday if it will try to get rid of the good deal it made with the suspect before.
Lindsay, age 22, was accused of being a member of the “Rich Fam” gang, which was linked to several high-end heists. In December, she was charged with four felony counts of grand larceny for helping to steal $25,000 worth of handbags and other luxury items from Madison Avenue boutiques in a series of robberies.
But instead of prosecuting the case, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg agreed to let the suspect go if he went to five sessions with Manhattan Justice Opportunities, a program for people who have broken the law.
A law enforcement source said that the DA’s office told the police that it came up with the crazy idea because it needed to clear its busy schedule.
Lindsay had been arrested at least eight times before, including for theft.
A little over a month later, Lindsay and three other people walked up to a 14-year-old boy on Fulton Street in Bedford-Stuyvesant on Jan. 24, punched him in the face, and stole his cash and iPhone, according to a criminal complaint. This was not how Lindsay paid back the slide.
Lindsay was named as a suspect in the mugging, and when he was seen in St. Andrew’s Park on Feb. 15, law enforcement sources and the complaint said that sharp-eyed cops recognized him from a photo the department had put out of him in the case.
The police tried to stop Lindsay, but he ran away and, according to police and the complaint, dropped a loaded gun as he jumped the park’s fence.
The suspect ran into the subway station at Kingston and Fulton, jumped onto the tracks, and then ran into the tunnel on foot. Police sources said that when he got off at the next stop, Utica and Fulton, police were waiting for him and handcuffed him.
Lindsay was charged with having weapons on Thursday night. The Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office asked that she be held on $100,000 bail.
A representative for the Manhattan DA refused to answer questions about Lindsay’s earlier plea deal and whether the new charges would bring back the grand-larceny cases against him.
Sources in law enforcement say Lindsay hasn’t been to a single session of his diversion program.
“We can’t say anything because it’s an open case,” a spokesman for the Manhattan DA’s office said.
Jake Salinas, 27, works at Zadig & Voltaire, which was one of Lindsay’s alleged grand-theft-from-business targets. When he heard about the suspect’s deal to not go to jail, he was shocked.
“He isn’t really paying for what he did, and that’s a lot of money… Salinas said of the plea deal, “It’s just a slap on the wrist.” “It shows that nothing should be done when someone else hears his story.”
Salinas, who was working at the time of the robbery, told The Post that while the others waited outside, two people with ski masks looked around the place.
“When they got to the back of the store, four more men came to the front. One guy didn’t go in. The worker said, “There were about seven of them.”
Salinas said that the thieves took high-end items from the front of the store and ran away. He also said that one of the thieves yelled, “Don’t touch me!” before running away.
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Michael Discioarro, a criminal lawyer and former assistant district attorney in the Bronx, criticized Bragg’s office to The Post, asking, “What is he working on?”
“When will he follow New York’s laws? Who should be charged at this point?” asked the ex-prosecutor.
“The Manhattan DA’s office is not a social worker. He has 300 lawyers who are supposed to keep the law, but he hasn’t done it.
