‘Insult on top of injury’: Attys claim DOC falsified records about Rikers detainee’s death

Gilson Garcia (left) and Gilberto Garcia (right) with members of their family. Gilberto Garcia died of an overdose on Rikers Island in 2022. An amended lawsuit claims Department of Correction staff forced his brother Gilson Garcia, who was being held in the cell next door, to provide life-saving care as he died and then later lied about it. Photo via Garcia family

By Jacob Kaye

A new filing in a wrongful death lawsuit claims that the city’s Department of Correction falsely claimed in records that they acted quickly to provide Narcan to a 26-year-old dying of an overdose on Rikers Island in 2022 when instead it was the man’s brother, coincidently being held in the cell next door, who attempted to revive his sibling just before he died.

Attorneys with Kaishian & Mortazavi LLC filed an amended lawsuit against the city and the DOC this week in the alleged wrongful death of Gilberto Garcia, who died from a fentanyl overdose inside the city’s notorious jail complex in October 2022.

The attorneys say that while they already believed the DOC failed in its obligation to provide care and protect Garcia while he was in their custody, they now believe they have evidence to prove not only that officers failed to respond quickly to Garcia’s cries for help, but that they forced the man’s brother, Gilson Garcia, to attempt to save Garcia’s life while they stood by and watched.

Then, they covered up their own inaction by falsifying their records detailing Garcia’s death, the lawsuit claims.

“The most offensive part about that to us and to the Garcia family is the way that that false account writes Gilson out of the entire story,” MK Kaishian, a founding partner at Kaishian & Mortazavi LLC, told the Eagle on Monday. “You have a younger brother who loved and idolized his older brother, who did everything with him and who felt responsible for his well being – and vice versa – who was forced into a position where he was the one, despite being untrained, who had to attempt to administer life-saving care.”

“Then you have a Department of Correction that, in order to save face for itself and for its staff, denies that he ever played that role in attempting to save his brother,” Kaishian added. “It's an insult on top of injury.”

According to the lawsuit, Garcia, who had a documented history of substance use disorder, was largely left without supervision, medical help or addiction services in the lead up to his death and throughout his time on Rikers Island.

Around noon on Oct. 31, 2022, Garcia allegedly gestured to officers that he needed help by waving his hands through a slot in his cell door, the lawsuit alleges. However, the officers who were supposed to be nearby were not standing at their posts, according to the suit.

A few minutes later, Garcia’s brother found him sitting up but hunched over and unable to speak, and called out for help.

Two officers, Sheda Robinson and Deborah Pickett, had to be told twice that someone was having a medical emergency in the housing area, the lawsuit claims.

Though Robinson and Picket eventually showed up, the lawsuit claims that they refused to enter Gilberto’s cell and instead employed Gilson Garcia to administer a dose of Narcan and provide CPR, a life-saving maneuver the man was not trained to perform.

They were also slow to call medical professionals to the scene, the lawsuit claims.

While the filing alleges that the officers called medical staff at 12:23 p.m., around five minutes after detainees detailed the severity of the situation, a DOC staffer wrote in a report that medical staff was called at 12:10 p.m.

The DOC’s staffer’s account is allegedly contradicted by video footage of the incident.

Even after Correctional Health Services staff arrived at the cell, Gilson Garcia was told to continue performing resuscitation on his brother for another 20 minutes. While one of the health workers conducted the chest compressions, Gilson Garcia continued to give his brother mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.

“We gave him CPR for what felt like a long time,” Gilson Garcia said in an affidavit filed alongside the amended suit. “I was in shock. It felt like a dream.”

Garcia was pronounced dead at 12:50 p.m., around 35 minutes after he first motioned for help.

Following his brother’s death, Gilson Garcia asked DOC staff to be moved to a different housing unit. However, his request was allegedly pushed aside. It wasn’t until four weeks later that he was moved, according to the filing.

“I was not comfortable passing his cell because I kept expecting him to be there,” his affidavit reads. “But I had to face the reality that it really happened — he was no longer alive. I was

eventually moved to another house…but it took a lot of work for me to get there.”

“Today, as I think about [my brother’s] death, I feel glad for the time we had together,” he added. “I know that sounds strange since we were incarcerated at the time, but I am glad I got to see him and spend that time together.”

Some of the discrepancies in the DOC’s account of Garcia’s death were first discovered by the Board of Correction, which investigated the incident. The oversight board found that jail staff falsified and omitted records regarding which posts were staffed in Garcia’s housing unit, how many wellness checks and tours were conducted, how many cells were obstructed and how long it took officers to call CHS for medical help.

The BOC also found that the DOC falsely stated in records that correctional staff administered Narcan to Garcia, rather than his brother.

Garcia’s attorneys list a slew of well-documented issues plaguing the DOC in their lawsuit and said many of those issues contributed to Garcia’s death.

Among them was the rise in fentanyl in the city’s jails in 2022, which came even as detainee visits from family and friends were severely limited as a result of the pandemic. The attorneys also cite the DOC’s issues with staff absenteeism, which reached a peak in 2021 and 2022.

They also blamed DOC staffers’ alleged history of denying medical care to detainees.

Earlier this month, the Legal Aid Society asked a judge to hold the DOC in contempt of a standing court order requiring them to provide medical care to those incarcerated on Rikers. According to the filing, the DOC has failed to take detainees to their scheduled medical appointments thousands of times per month this year, often falsely claiming that a detainee “refused care” when in fact the agency was to blame for the missed appointment.