A federal judge in New York has seized control of the city’s embattled Rikers Island jail complex, one of the nation’s largest jails, which currently holds around 7,000 inmates.
On Tuesday, Judge Laura Taylor Swain ordered the notorious jail and the city’s entire jail system be run by an independent officer reporting solely to the court, having found that conditions at the jail remained unconstitutionally dangerous.
“The unsafe and dangerous conditions in the jails… have become normalized despite the fact that they are clearly abnormal and unacceptable,” Swain wrote in her 77-page ruling.
The order stems from a 2011 case, Nunez v. City of New York, when a group of incarcerated individuals filed a federal lawsuit alleging a pattern of excessive and unnecessary force by staff in New York City jails. In 2015, the city agreed to a settlement known as the Nunez Consent Judgment, which laid out hundreds of required reforms to reduce violence and improve oversight.
“Nine years have passed since the parties first agreed that the perilous conditions in the Rikers Island jails were unconstitutional; that the level of unconstitutional danger has not improved… is both alarming and unacceptable,” Swain also wrote in the order.
In November, the NYC Department of Corrections (DOC) and the city were found in civil contempt for violating 18 provisions of court orders meant to reduce violence, abuse, and dysfunction in the jail system.
Swain ordered the jail system to be overseen by an independent official — a Nunez Remediation Manager — reporting solely to the court, with powers similar to a receiver but focused specifically on the city’s contempt violations.
The official will report directly to the court and will have full authority to change DOC policies related to the use of force, staffing, discipline, and security.
New York City Mayor Eric Adams had voiced his early opposition a federal takeover but said on Tuesday that he would comply with the federal judge’s decision.
“If the federal judge made a determination that they want to do something else and they don’t like what we’re doing, it’s a federal judgement,” Adams said at a press briefing Tuesday on a different issue. “We’re going to follow the rules.”
In 2017, former Mayor Bill de Blasio initiated a plan to close the prison within 10 years aimed at reducing the city’s jail population and replacing Rikers with four modern, borough-based jails located in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx.
The plan appears unlikely to come to fruition anytime soon due to significant delays, with the first of the replacement jails not scheduled to finish before 2029, according to the New York Post.
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Be kind to criminals week. Every week.
Really a shame that these poor prisoners don’t have a choice of caviar or meth with their meals!
better start building new jails asap as Rikers will be shut down. What does it take to build thick concrete walls with deep foundations and various digging detection probes. Put a concrete floor in place with drains to get water off the surface, then start building state of the art storage facilities for crimnals. Keeping guards safe but in control. No burnable materials or dangerous items built into the place. Even the beds can be slabs of concrete anchored to the walls. Then on top of it all, a 360 degree walk around the prison with overhead walk ways to connect to a central observation point to make sure no outside hankey pankey goes on.
On the surface this would appear noble and just when these conditions obviously have been the case for decades! This appears to be an attempt
to block Illegal Alien Criminals from being house in a secure prison! This also looks like a really old picture of a no longer used part of Rikers! Prove
me wrong, because as recent 2020, I’ve seen far more updated, shot on location, views of this prison on Blue Bloods and in movies! Come on!
Execute the worst 100 inmates every year till empty or trasfer to the new prisons when ready.