Rikers detainee becomes 13th person to die in DOC custody

A 38-year-old man died in Department of Correction custody on Rikers Island on Friday, Nov. 21. AP file photo by Ted Shaffrey

By Jacob Kaye

A 38-year-old man on Rikers Island became the 13th person this year to die in Department of Correction custody, agency officials announced on Friday.

Edwin Ramos was allegedly found experiencing a medical emergency inside a bathroom in the Otis Bantam Correctional Center on Rikers Island around midnight on Thursday. The detainee was taken to a clinic in the jail complex before being taken to a nearby hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

The DOC shared little about the circumstances leading up to Ramos’ death but his attorneys with the Legal Aid Society said he appeared healthy in the days leading up to his death.

Ramos is the 13th person to die either while in DOC custody or shortly after having been released from it this year, nearly matching the death toll seen on the dangerous jail complex in 2023 and 2024 combined.

Ramos, who was facing burglary charges in Brooklyn, had been detained on Rikers Island since August. He was next scheduled to appear in court on Friday, the day that he died. According to his attorneys, he was going to take a plea deal “that would have allowed him to begin rebuilding his life outside of jail.”

“Our hearts ache for Edwin Ramos, who was detained at Rikers Island and died earlier this morning in DOC custody,” the public defender firm said in a statement. “He is yet another New Yorker whose life has been taken by the city’s dysfunctional jail system, and an immediate, swift, and impartial investigation into the circumstances surrounding his death is essential.

As is customary, the DOC said it notified a number of agencies charged with investigating deaths in custody, including the state attorney general, the Department of Investigation, the Board of Correction and the State Commission on Correction.

Ramos’ death comes at an extraordinary moment for Rikers Island.

A federal judge is currently in the process of deciding who to appoint as her “remediation manager,” an independent figure that will be charged with severely tamping down the violence that has come to define the jail complex and the dysfunction deeply rooted in the agency that runs it. Stabbings and slashings have continued to occur at high numbers, as have instances where correctional officers use violent force against detainees.

And deaths have continued to mount.

Forty-six people have died in custody since Mayor Eric Adams, who has resisted implementing a number of reforms on the island, took office.

There’s also the deadline to close Rikers and open four new borough-based jails, which the city is unlikely to meet.

Though city law mandates that the jails shutter in 2027, the first of the borough-based facilities isn’t expected to be completed until 2029. The final jail isn’t expected to be completed until 2032.

Additionally, Rikers’ population is currently nearly two times as large as the population that will be able to fit in the borough-based facilities.

While there are 7,000 detainees on the island, the borough facilities are being built to house as many as 4,400 people.

The plan to shutter the jails has slowed to a crawl under Adams, who advocates blamed on Friday for the mounting death toll.

“As another family mourns the loss of a loved one to Rikers, thousands are continuing to suffer and the crisis has deepened,” Darren Mack, the co-director of advocacy group Freedom Agenda, said in a statement. “Mayor Adams is exiting office after doing everything in his power to delay the legally mandated closure of Rikers while filling up the jails there.”

“We will need urgent action to stop sending people to these deadly jails, close Rikers, and finally put an end to the cycle of suffering in this hellscape,” Mack added.

Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani will inherit the crisis-ridden Rikers come January with views on criminal justice reform that sharply vary from those held by Adams.

The Queens lawmaker, unlike the current mayor, has voiced his support for receivership and for closing the jails as soon as possible.

“What I would do from the very first day is make it my mission and my responsibility to comply with the law, to close Rikers and to decarcerate our jail population,” Mamdani told the Eagle in February. “That is something that the city has for years paid lip service to, while doing nothing to make it a reality.”

“We have not invested in alternatives to incarceration, our courts have taken that lack of investment as a cue to continue shuffling New Yorkers to Rikers, and dozens of people have died as a result,” he added.