Remember that movie Escape From New York? That’s what we should do with that place, as they don’t have a real city government anyway. Retired NYPD inspector Paul Mauro tells us about another story of corrupt Marxist New Yawk.

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Mauro: Has America had enough of violent career criminals and the district attorneys who protect them? Growing public outrage over New York City’s “bodega case” may mean a tipping point over the lenient treatment of criminals and failure to protect the public is coming – or is already here.

The facts of that case as they’ve been reported: After an argument between 61-year-old bodega worker Jose Alba and a woman customer, the woman’s boyfriend, Austin Simon, entered the bodega and attacked Alba behind the counter. During the struggle, Alba grabbed a knife and stabbed Simon. At some point Simon’s girlfriend also joined the fight, stabbing Alba several times in the arm.  Simon died of his wounds.  Alba was arrested by police and charged with intentional murder by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office.

That the incident, and Alba’s apparent efforts at self-defense, were caught on video fueled instantaneous outrage over the arrest – which only grew as new facts emerged.

For one, Alba is by all accounts a longtime pillar of his community, a mild-mannered Dominican immigrant with no criminal record who works long hours. Simon, a 35-year-old violent career criminal with numerous felony arrests, was out on parole for assaulting a police officer.

Then there is Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s treatment of Alba. Charged with second-degree murder, the highest murder count available (first-degree murder is reserved for rare cases like killing a cop or a witness), Alba was sent to New York’s notorious Rikers Island jail after the DA requested $500,000 bail (which the judge knocked down to $250,000). Meanwhile, Simon’s girlfriend, who told Alba, “I’m gonna bring my n—– down here and he gonna f— you up,” faces no charges, and Alba’s untreated stab wounds became infected at Rikers.

Under New York law, Alba was entitled to employ deadly force if he believed he was confronted by the same. He was threatened by Simon’s girlfriend and then attacked by Simon, who appeared to reach threateningly for his pocket at points.  Alba, who told Simon, “Papa, I don’t want a problem, papa,” clearly had no means to retreat as the assault began. So a viable and more prudent option for Bragg would have been to defer prosecution while gathering facts for submission to the grand jury. Instead, Bragg’s office charged intentional murder and requested high bail, for an accused with no criminal record and significant community ties.

If the district attorney has other facts to counter what looks like a strong justification defense for Alba – which is always possible – those facts had better be game-changers…

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This New York case could be the final national tipping point on the issue of criminal justice – as has happened before. While the groundswell of support for Alba echoes the 1984 Bernhard Goetz “vigilante” shooting of four subway muggers, the last true “tipping point” case was in 1990. Brian Watkins, a Utah tourist, was killed while trying to protect his mother during a subway mugging. The city had had enough. The headlines blared, and the ensuing outrage led to the era of Mayor Giuliani and broken windows policing – measures that inspired a New York renaissance and became a model for policing internationally.