A young man came to me holding a Desk Appearance Ticket for a low-level charge and asked what happens next. His lawyer had told him to show up on the date printed on the ticket and take whatever the DA was offering. Nobody had mentioned Project Reset. He would have qualified. He never got the chance to ask, because nobody told him the question existed.
That's the pattern. Not a bad lawyer, usually. Just a program that has to be raised, by someone, before the court date arrives, and often isn't.
What a Desk Appearance Ticket actually is
A Desk Appearance Ticket, or DAT, is a written notice under New York Criminal Procedure Law § 150.10 directing someone to appear in local criminal court on a future date, instead of being held for arraignment right away. It's issued for lower-level offenses. The person walks out with a piece of paper and a date. What that paper doesn't say anywhere on it is that a diversion option might exist before that date ever needs to matter.
What Project Reset actually does
Project Reset is a pre-arraignment diversion program run by the Center for Justice Innovation, in partnership with the district attorney's office in each participating borough. It operates in the Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens, and Staten Island. If someone is eligible and completes a short community-based program, typically two to four hours of workshops, counseling, or restorative justice sessions, the local DA's office declines to prosecute the case entirely. No conviction. No trial. The arrest record is sealed. Some participants never have to set foot in a courtroom at all.
This isn't a marginal program. According to the Center for Justice Innovation, participants have a 96 percent attendance rate once scheduled, and more than 10,000 people have avoided a criminal record through it since the program began.
This is a New York City program, not a statewide law
Project Reset runs through DA's offices in the five boroughs, not through a New York State statute that applies everywhere. Eligibility, programming, and how a case gets screened all vary by which borough the arrest happened in. If the arrest happened outside NYC, ask directly whether the local county has an equivalent diversion track. It may go by a different name.
Who actually qualifies
Eligibility is decided case by case by the district attorney's office in the borough where the arrest happened, but the general shape, using Manhattan's published criteria as an example, is: the person is 18 or older, was arrested in that borough, and received a DAT for a non-violent misdemeanor. The final eligibility decision rests with the DA's office, not with the defendant or even with the program itself. That's exactly why this has to be raised early, not assumed.
The exact question to ask
Don't wait for a lawyer to bring it up. Ask directly: "I have a Desk Appearance Ticket. Am I eligible for Project Reset or an equivalent diversion program in this borough?" Ask it the same day the DAT is issued, not the week of the court date. Project Reset's own program page confirms that free legal advice on eligibility is available before anyone has to decide anything.
This sits alongside other diversion options, not instead of them
Project Reset applies before arraignment, for lower-level DAT cases. It's a different track from judicial diversion under CPL Article 216, which applies to certain felony drug cases after a case has already been charged, and from an Adjournment in Contemplation of Dismissal, which can resolve a case after arraignment. Ask about all of them in the same conversation. Which one applies depends entirely on the charge and the stage the case is at.
Know the full facts of your case and every program available before you make any decision with the DA or your attorney. Sit with your family and decide. Not in the lawyer's office, and not on the date printed on a ticket you were handed and never had explained to you.