NEW YORK (1010 WINS) — Tracy McCarter will have to wait a few more days to find out if her murder charge will be dismissed after Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said he couldn't prosecute her for allegedly killing her estranged husband in apparent self-defense.
On Monday, Bragg appeared in court in Lower Manhattan to make his case for dismissal, telling Judge Diane Kiesel that there isn't enough evidence to support the second-degree charge.
McCarter, a New York City nurse, is accused of killing James Murray in her Upper West Side apartment in 2020, claiming self-defense and that she's a domestic abuse survivor.
Advocate Samah Sisay said she believes the delay is because the district attorney's motion "is not as strong as it could have been."
Bragg had previously sought to reduce McCarter's charge to manslaughter, but Kiesel denied it.
He made the request on Monday after telling Kiesel in a letter reviewed by the Daily News that a review of the evidence left him with reasonable doubt that McCarter fatally stabbed Murray with the requisite intent to support her conviction.
"[I] cannot in good conscious allow a prosecution to proceed to trial and ask a jury to reach a conclusion that I have not reached myself," Bragg said in the Nov. 18 letter.
Brooklyn Law School Professor Jocelyn Simonson, who has publicly supported McCarter, left court Monday disappointed but optimistic.
"I was also surprised that the judge didn't just dismiss the case today," she added. "She could have done that."
Simonson said if Kiesel dismisses Bragg's motion, then "there's nothing she can do to force him to prosecute," adding that it will only prolong the case.
Kiesel said she expects to have her decision in writing by the end of the week. Both parties are due back in court next Monday.
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