It's the Brian Lairn Show on WNYC. I'm Tiffany Hansen filling in for Brian today.

When police commissioner Jessica Tish agreed to stay on to head the NYPD for the mayor elect,

they both acknowledged that they don't agree on everything when it comes to policing. One area of disagreement is changing New York

States raise the age law. That law put into effect in 2018 keeps 16 and 17-year-olds from being

tried and incarcerated as adults,

something only one of the other states besides New York still allowed.

Commissioner Tisch has spoken out about the need to change the law, as has Mayor Adams and Bronx Dia Darsal Clark.

Governor Hokel has stated her willingness to discuss the law in the next legislative term. Mayor-elect Mamdani has spoken in favor of the law,

though he did point to the fact that the funding to support it didn't materialize. We're joined now

by an advocate for the law, Vincent Cheraldi, the former commissioner

of probation under Mayor Bloomberg, and the Commissioner of Correction under Mayor de Blasio.

He's also run juvenile justice departments in Washington, D.C. and Maryland. He's now a visiting

fellow at the Pinkerton Foundation. Welcome back to the show, Vincent.

Thank you, Tiffany.

Thanks for having me on. You got it. All right, Vinny, let's just start by talking about what the law changed when it was put into effect, and then maybe we can get into some of the data about how

it's working now and why some folks are calling for it to be amended. So what was the goal originally of that raise the age law,

which folks refer to as RTA?

Was it to really bring justice to those young offenders

who were being tried as adults?

Was there a goal perhaps of having less crime overall

by separating young people in the criminal justice system from adults,

because we know there is a connection between trying children as adults and their likelihood

...