Black pickpocket arrested 26 times in subway given wrist slap as crimes gets free pass on long jail time

African-American Michael Virdree has been charged with committing crimes in the New York City subway 26 times over three decades, police said. Since 1986, Virdree has been sent to state prison on felony grand larceny convictions - he stole property from riders without force - five times. He also was imprisoned upstate for using a stolen credit card in a department store. In most of those cases, a judge sentenced Virdree to a maximum prison term of three or four years. He was regularly released on parole well before serving the max. Seven times, officials revoked Virdree's parole, usually after he'd again been arrested in the subway, a state parole spokeswoman said. A common charge was jostling, the spokeswoman said. Jostling - which is intentionally placing one's hand near another's pocket or handbag - is a misdemeanor. After his latest arrest on June 12, 2011 an assistant district attorney asked a Manhattan judge to impose $15,000 cash bail, a substantial sum that it is safe to say would have kept Virdree behind bars pending trial or a plea deal. The judge set it much lower - $3,000 cash or a $5,000 bond. It was posted five days later and Virdree again was freed.