There may be no better way to gauge the value and effectiveness of an organization than by its enemies, and the enemies of Bronx Defenders all wear blue.  After publishing this post on the controversy around their involvement in a music video, it became clear how badly the police hate Bronx Defenders.

And that would be reason enough to stand firmly with Robin Steinberg.

Almost immediately, a comment was posted here by a first-timer which included the full text of a New York Post article critical of the video and condemning Bronx Defenders for having anything to do with it.  The exact same comment was posted to WindyPundit’s blog, since trashed, who also wrote about the video, except under a different name.

This was the cops’ modus operandi after the killing of Garner and during their disrespect to the citizens of New York when they went on pseudo-strike.  And they’ve cranked up the smear machine to create the appearance of public opinion against Bronx Defenders in order to influence politicians. If nothing else, the PBA knows how to mobilize and manipulate public opinion to gets its way.

The city’s largest police union wants public funding stripped from a legal-aid organization in The Bronx after two of its lawyers appeared in a rap video that encourages African-Americans to kill NYPD officers.

“Not a single additional cent of [public] money should support the parties who played a role in this video,” Lynch wrote in letters addressed Mayor de Blasio and US Attorney General Eric Holder.

“They do not only ‘suggest violence,’ but bluntly direct the viewer to murder a police officer.”

Good old Pat Lynch, whose tenure as boss of the PBA is in severe doubt after his mishandling of the cop slow-down and the public’s decidedly negative reaction, is back on his soapbox trying to deflect public attention from police malfeasance and the dead bodies of Eric Garner and Akai Gurley.  The biggest question for Lynch is how much hype can he stuff into a sound bite?

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, already under pressure to find a way to appease a police department that hates him, has called for punishment.

“If we do not see a plan, we will take further action, and one of those options is to defund the organization,” de Blasio told reporters on Friday, a day after the city Department of Investigation said two attorneys at the nonprofit legal services group knew about song lyrics advocating killing police officers in “Hands Up” when proposing the organization participate in the music video.

“I think it would be very unfortunate in terms of the good work that most of the employees do,” de Blasio continued, “But these are some very bad apples who did something absolutely horrid.”

This is political scapegoat time, and it appears that de Blasio is all too happy to seize the opportunity to gain some goodwill with the cops at the expense of Bronx Defenders and one of its founders and Executive Director, Robin Steinberg.

No one is arguing that the one line in the music video giving rise to this opportunity to rid the police of one of the most effective, best-run indigent defense organizations in the nation was inappropriate.  Though, the suggestion that Bronx Defenders somehow endorsed the controversial line and image seems a mighty stretch.  The role played by two Bronx Defender lawyers in the video was tiny, and has been blown grossly out of proportion.

Its opening verses, referring to two unarmed black men who were killed by officers, advocate reprisals against the police: “For Mike Brown and Sean Bell, a cop got to get killed.” It continues, “Time to start killing these coppers.”

A lawyer for the Bronx Defenders is shown comforting a grieving woman in the organization’s office on 161st Street and later conferring with a colleague. According to the Investigation Department, credits at the end of the video, which have since been removed, listed the Bronx Defenders as a sponsor.

Nobody, including and especially Robin Steinberg and Bronx Defenders, endorses harm to police officers.  They similarly don’t endorse harm to others at the hands of police officers, the flip side of this that the cops pray no one remembers. Still, it was a poor decision to be involved with this video, regardless of everything else.

But defunding (if that’s even possible) the Bronx Defenders and castigating and blaming one of the most forceful advocates for indigent defense, Robin Steinberg, over this cop-hyped nonsense is absurd.  Well, perhaps not absurd from the police perspective, where strong and competent indigent representation makes their job harder. What better way to improve their numbers than to rid themselves of strong advocates for the defense?

Thirty-three New York area law professors have written a letter to the editor of the New York Times and a letter to LIz Glazer, Mayor de Blasio’s criminal justice coordinator, supporting the excellent work of Bronx Defenders and highlighting the absurd over-reaction of its enemies:

Now some are calling for the city to defund the Bronx Defenders. That would be a terrible mistake. For nineteen years the Bronx Defenders has served tens of thousands of indigent Bronx residents facing criminal charges, while assisting community members with housing, family, child-custody, immigration, and school-related issues. The office supports and empowers Bronx residents to help themselves, working tirelessly to restore dignity to those most affected by the often-dire consequences of life in the Bronx’s poorest neighborhoods. Bronx Defenders is a shining model of how New York can lead the way in addressing the national problem of access to justice.

Yes, a mistake was made – an isolated one.

But calls for defunding are an overreaction that would end up hurting those most in need – the poor and underserved in the Bronx.

Expect the cops to pound the crap out of one line of a music video, smear the Bronx Defenders and Robin Steinberg as much as they can, and pressure the mayor to defund their nemesis.  This isn’t about a music video, but about the cops getting rid of effective lawyers for the poor who made their job in Bronx more difficult and were the first to stand behind the citizens harmed by police abuse and violence.

And this is a mayor’s chance to either curry favor with the cops, who hated him before and will hate him no matter what, or to show the citizens of New York that he won’t cave in to Pat Lynch’s shrieking for a few minutes of quiet.

As Windy entitled his post, Je Suis Bronx Defenders. For all the facile support for indigent defense, this is the time when criminal defense lawyers and those who support Gideon to stand up in support of Bronx Defenders and Robin Steinberg.  The law professors should be applauded for their support. The bar associations have yet to be heard, no doubt wringing their hands over the possibility that someone might call them mean names.

But now is the time to stand up for Bronx Defenders. That the cops desperately want to blow this out of proportion, and blow up the most effective voice for indigent defense in the Bronx, tells us how badly Bronx Defenders is needed and deserves our full support.

And here’s the one thing the PBA doesn’t want you to hear.  The actual video at the root of this controversy, so you can see for yourself how they’ve made a mountain out of a molehill.  Je suis Bronx Defenders.

Edit:  The New York Times published the lawprof’s letter here.