MANHATTAN GOUN SQUAD SCANDAL
NYC Prosecutor’s “Silver Bullet” Divorce Plot Blows Up in Alvin Bragg’s Face
NOTE: This piece was first published on NYNewsPress.com.
By Richard Luthmann with Michael Volpe
THE SILVER BULLET HITS HOME
A bombshell federal lawsuit has exposed a disturbing abuse of power at the heart of Manhattan’s District Attorney’s Office. Assistant District Attorney Amanda Goun is accused of masterminding a conspiracy to falsely arrest her estranged husband, New York Times reporter Joseph Goldstein, on bogus domestic violence and child abuse charges to gain leverage in a divorce and custody battle.
This wasn’t just a bitter family feud. This was a calculated legal ambush.
Goun allegedly formed a rogue unit—dubbed the “Goun Squad”—including Manhattan prosecutors Kelly Keating and Lawrence Newman, NYPD Detective Rachel Lutz, and Officer Carmen Fabian.
Together, the group is accused of turning a routine domestic dispute into a full-blown felony prosecution.
The goal? Strip Goldstein of custody, destroy his reputation, and cut him off from his kids.
Goldstein’s federal complaint, filed May 16, outlines how Goun allegedly “coached the couple’s two children, aged four and six, to lie about their father’s behavior.”
The complaint says the kids “initially denied any abuse, but later, under pressure, repeated what Goun had allegedly told them to say.”
The term for this tactic is well known in custody battles: the Silver Bullet—a false abuse claim designed to end a custody fight before it begins, and in some cases, bully the target to death.
This case is set apart because the person firing the bullet was a sitting prosecutor.
MANHATTAN GOUN SQUAD SCANDAL: USING THE DA’S OFFICE AS A WEAPON
According to the lawsuit, it all started when Goun filed for divorce in September 2022. On October 8, she called 911, claiming Goldstein had slammed a door on her arm. Responding, NYPD officers found no crime had been committed. That should have been the end.
It wasn’t.
Instead, Goun made a call—captured on police body-worn camera—to fellow ADA Lawrence Newman. According to the complaint, the two conspired in real-time to fabricate a felony-level assault.
Goun soon revised her story, now claiming she’d been knocked to the ground.
This phone call is central to Goldstein’s claim of constitutional violations, malicious prosecution, and abuse of office. The lawsuit accuses Newman of instructing Goun to escalate the complaint and pressuring the NYPD to override the original assessment.
But it didn’t stop there. Goun later alleged Goldstein had physically abused their children, and the complaint claims she orchestrated police interviews designed to coerce incriminating statements from them, despite their initial denials.
According to Goldstein, he was then hit with a barrage of charges—assault, harassment, and endangering the welfare of a child—resulting in an eight-month order of protection that barred him from seeing his kids.
“This was not just a divorce. It was a coordinated attack,” the complaint states.
Journalist Michael Volpe, who prolifically covers family court corruption, said: “The Goun Squad case is a new level of corruption. It’s the silver bullet combined with institutional fraud—where the prosecutor isn’t just gaming the system, she is the system.”
Volpe has long defined the “silver bullet” strategy as “using a bogus protective order to get leverage in child custody or divorce.”
A ROTTEN OFFICE FROM THE TOP DOWN
That this plot was carried out under District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s watch is damning. Bragg, already under fire for soft-on-crime policies and an imploding conviction rate, now faces his biggest scandal.
Former Manhattan ADA Diana Florence, who is challenging Bragg in the upcoming election, called the DA’s office “a place where politics rule and justice is dead.”
This case proves her point.
“The law is a command, not a suggestion,” Florence said. “This office is lawless.”
The rot runs deep. Keating, Newman, and Goun are all named defendants. Newman now works for the Brooklyn DA’s Office, which has declined to comment.
The NYPD, too, has gone silent.
“The conspiracy extended across two prosecutorial offices, at least two NYPD commands, and multiple city agencies,” the lawsuit asserts.
David Weigel, founder of the watchdog Family Court Fraud Warrior Project and a top Wall Street fiduciary, did not hold back.
“Public servants take an oath to uphold justice, not to weaponize it. What happened in the Goun Squad case isn’t just unethical—it’s criminal. We need more from our prosecutors, not less. This kind of misconduct shatters lives and cannot be tolerated.”
Weigel speaks from personal experience. He was the repeated target of “silver bullet” attacks—false abuse claims—engineered by what he calls “scumbag Manhattan divorce lawyer Daniel Nottes,” who allegedly orchestrated a smear campaign during Weigel’s own high-stakes custody battle.
“Daniel Nottes used lies and lawfare to try and destroy me. He’s everything wrong with family court—a parasite in a power suit,” Weigel said. “The fact that the fox is in the henhouse with the Goun Squad case is unconscionable.”
MANHATTAN GOUN SQUAD SCANDAL: NO ONE IS SAFE FROM THIS OFFICE
This case destroyed any remaining credibility the Manhattan DA’s Office had left. If prosecutors are willing to rig felony charges in a family court fight, what can the public expect in real criminal prosecutions?
This isn’t just a case of one bad apple. This is institutional rot in the Big Apple.
Under Bragg, convictions have plummeted, downgrades have skyrocketed, and crime is out of control. The Goun Squad scandal is the final straw.
No conviction coming out of this office can be trusted.
Under New York’s Public Officers Law § 34, Governor Hochul can order an investigation and remove a DA who abuses their office. But that is unlikely.
“[Kathy Hochul] is already facing a [Democratic] party primary from Lieutenant Governor Antonio Delgado. The usual suspects are circling the wagons, and she still has support. But she’s not going to do anything drastic to alienate the base,” said a well-known Manhattan Democratic Consultant speaking anonymously. “Her concern, as it rightly should be, has to be next November and Elise Stefanik or Mike Lawler.”
The feds need to intervene. This case meets every condition.
A prosecutor used her badge to destroy her husband. She recruited her friends in the DA’s office. She leaned on NYPD detectives. She manipulated her children. All to win a divorce.
And Bragg let it happen.
MANHATTAN GOUN SQUAD SCANDAL: A CALL FOR ACTION
Goldstein’s suit seeks justice. But this must go further.
The Department of Justice should launch a full-scale probe into the Manhattan DA’s Office. The Office of Court Administration should audit every custody case involving Goun, Newman, and Keating.
And Governor Hochul must invoke her power to remove Bragg. His office has become a tool for vendetta and corruption.
If a prosecutor can jail her husband on lies, who’s safe?
The answer is no one.
Not until the Goun Squad is broken, and the Bragg era ends.
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Happens every day in those corrupt walls of Family Court. Welcome to CT. Family Corrupticourt.