BOC denounces spike in Rikers suicides
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The Board of Correction called on the city Wednesday to take action to reduce the increasing number of suicides in Rikers Island. Photo courtesy of Freedom Agenda
By Jacob Kaye
The New York City Board of Correction took an unusual step Wednesday in issuing a public condemnation of the conditions on Rikers Island.
The BOC, the body tasked with overseeing the city’s correctional facilities, specifically called out the increase in detainee suicides in the past year and demanded the city take immediate action. The rebuke comes several days after Segundo Guallpa, a man sent to Rikers Island a week earlier, was found dead in his cell of suspected suicide, according to the Department of Correction.
“The Board of Correction calls on the City of New York to move with urgency to create a safer
environment for persons in custody and staff,” the BOC said in its letter.
Since December 2020, at least five people have committed suicide from behind bars in the city’s notorius jail complex, according to the BOC. There were no reported suicides from 2018 through the end of 2020.
“Five suicides in nine months along with an alarming increase in attempted self-harm signals a
crisis for persons in custody and for the New York City Department of Correction,” the BOC said. “The already difficult conditions in the New York City jails have only been made worse by the extreme challenges presented by the COVID-19 pandemic.”
The BOC declined to comment on any specific actions they recommend to solve the issue when contacted by the Eagle.
The BOC pointed to several potential causes behind the increase in suicides, including the DOC’s correctional officer shortage.
Though the DOC employs around 8,800 uniformed officers, around 1,600 were on sick leave at the end of last July, another 1,400 were being medically monitored and unable to work with incarcerated people and 2,200 went AWOL, according to the agency.
The BOC said the shortage created “unsafe conditions for both staff and detained persons.” The staffing shortage has coincided with a rise in the number of incarcerated people, according to the board.
The BOC also pointed to lags in the intake process, something the federal monitor appointed to oversee Rikers Island also recently pointed out in a recent letter filed in federal court.
“Given that several incidents have occurred in intake, the Department must ensure an orderly intake process that quickly provides appropriate housing and medical care for persons in custody, and better identifies and monitors persons in custody who may commit self-harm or harm to others,” the board wrote. “Until then, we believe the situation will only worsen and result in unacceptably unsafe conditions for persons in custody, for correction officers and for other Departmental staff.”
Steve J. Martin, the federal monitor, said in a recent letter to Federal Judge Laura Swain that the intake process has seen detainees waiting for over 24 hours until they are processed into the jail.
Calling it a “disturbing pattern,” Martin said that the delay has resulted in people not being served food and not being given medical attention when they need it.
Guallpa, who died on Monday, was being held in the North Infirmary Command on Rikers Island, a building designated for incarcerated people with medical issues.
Though they are the most recent to do so, the BOC is far from the only group to call on the city to take action to reduce the number of suicides in the city’s jails.
Public defenders from the Queens Defenders, Brooklyn Defender Services, the Bronx Defenders, the Legal Aid Society, and others called on the DOC to reduce the number of people detained on Rikers on Monday.
“We demand that our elected leaders address this crisis; ask prosecutors and judges to use their discretion to reduce the number of people sent to jail and release people currently held in the city jails; and urge the DOC to use its power to release people currently held in city jails and to treat those who remain in custody with basic human dignity,” the attorneys wrote.
The view was also expressed by the BOC in its letter Wednesday.
“The Board will work with criminal justice stakeholders to expeditiously decarcerate,” the BOC wrote. “As long as the population steadily rises and the staffing crisis continues, persons in custody and those who protect and work with them are in an impossible position and these troubling conditions will persist. It is time for all stakeholders to come together to address this crisis.”
The DOC declined a request for comment for this story. The agency said it would be holding a press conference on Thursday to address some of the issues raised by the BOC.
In a statement issued Monday, DOC Commissioner Vincent Schiraldi called Guallpa’s death “a terrible tragedy.”
