Katz responds to lawmakers questions about Rikers

Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz responded to a group of Queens lawmakers who requested she answer several questions about the conditions on Rikers Island.  AP file photo by Mary Altaffer

By Jacob Kaye

In a response to several lawmakers looking for answers about Rikers Island, Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz said her office is taking steps to reduce the number of people being sent to the jail in crisis.

Katz’s response was sent Dec. 10 to Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Carolyn Maloney and Jamie Raskin, who sent their original letter in late November, and outlines some of the ways in which she’s directed assistant district attorneys not to seek bail on a number of cases her office prosecutes.

The DA, who has been in office for nearly two years, said that she “amended the practices of this office with regard to requesting bail, both to conform office policies to the new bail laws and to ensure that requests were being made consistent with the notion that a person's financial resources should not determine whether they remain in jail pending trial.”

“From the first day of my administration, and before the current crisis, we worked to reduce the Rikers population,” Katz said in the letter. “In this vein, I directed assistants not to request high bail amounts. Rather, where appropriate, such as in homicide, forcible rape and kidnapping cases, I directed ADAs to ask for remand instead of excessive amounts of cash bail. Only the wealthiest defendants would be likely to be able to post high amounts of bail and remand status is income neutral.”

The lawmaker’s original letter included 10 questions about bail practices and general conditions on Rikers Island that they requested the city’s DA’s respond to. The letter was part of a fact finding mission from the House of Representatives’ Oversight Committee, which Maloney chairs and Ocasio-Cortez and Raskin serve on as members.

The Department of Correction has seen more detainee deaths this year than it has any year dating back to 2013. While many of the compounding crises on Rikers existed prior to the pandemic, the effects of the virus have, in many cases, only made things worse.

With the recent wave of the Omicron variant, the DOC announced it would be suspending a handful of services for incarcerated people, including in-person visits. On Tuesday, the DOC reported that over 17 percent of its detainees had tested positive for COVID-19.

Katz said that her office has been reviewing cases throughout the past nearly two years of the pandemic to determine whether or not detention of a person was justified, given the circumstances.

As of the first week of December, around 550 of the 5,380 people detained on the island were prosecuted in Queens – Queens cases accounted for around 10 percent of the total population despite making up around 27 percent of the city’s population.

Of those prosecuted in Queens and being held on Rikers, the majority were being held pre-trial and were arrested for violent felony cases and determined by a judge to be a flight risk.

“The highest percentage of these individuals are awaiting trial for homicide, attempted murder, forcible sexual acts­including cases with child victims, domestic violence-related crimes, possession of loaded operable guns, assault causing life threatening or other permanent injury, and fugitives from another state,” Katz said.

In the original letter from Maloney, Ocasio-Cortez and Raskin, the congress members asked the DAs about the role of the courts in the crisis on Rikers.

In her response, Katz outlines the challenges the courts faced in relation to the pandemic. For a large portion of 2020, most court proceedings were halted.

“Eventually, virtual proceedings were specifically authorized by the Governor, but even the types of proceedings that could be held were limited, as they did not include grand or petit juries, and the courtrooms had to be outfitted to safely accomplish these goals,” Katz wrote. “During these initial phases of the pandemic, cases were routinely administratively adjourned for up to six months without our input or consent, slowing the resolution of cases to an effective halt. These court procedures, designed to cope with the pandemic, necessarily created a backlog of cases as the court system waited to be able to hear cases regularly and empanel grand juries once again.”

The DA also mentions the DOC’s staffing shortage, which often led to defendants missing court dates because officers were not available to transport them to the courthouses.

To end the letter, Katz asks the congressional representatives what funds from President Joe Biden’s Build Back Better Act, could be used to help improve the conditions at Rikers.

“A first-class city like New York, at its very minimum, should have humane conditions in which to house those incarcerated,” Katz said. “I look forward to hearing from you on the plan.”

Neither Ocasio-Cortez nor Maloney responded to request for comment.The DA, who has been in office for nearly two years, said that she “amended the practices of this office with regard to requesting bail, both to conform office policies to the new bail laws and to ensure that requests were being made consistent with the notion that a person's financial resources should not determine whether they remain in jail pending trial.”

“From the first day of my administration, and before the current crisis, we worked to reduce the Rikers population,” Katz said in the letter. “In this vein, I directed assistants not to request high bail amounts. Rather, where appropriate, such as in homicide, forcible rape and kidnapping cases, I directed ADAs to ask for remand instead of excessive amounts of cash bail.Only the wealthiest defendants would be likely to be able to post high amounts of bail and remand status is income neutral.”

The lawmaker’s original letter included 10 questions about bail practices and general conditions on Rikers Island that they requested the city’s DA’s respond to. The letter was part of a fact finding mission from the House of Representatives’ Oversight Committee, which Maloney chairs and Ocasio-Cortez and Raskin serve on as members.

The Department of Correction has seen more detainee deaths this year than it has any year dating back to 2013. While many of the compounding crises on Rikers existed prior to the pandemic, the effects of the virus have, in many cases, only made things worse.

With the recent wave of the Omicron variant, the DOC announced it would be suspending a handful of services for incarcerated people, including in-person visits. On Tuesday, the DOC reported that over 17 percent of its detainees had tested positive for COVID-19.

Katz said that her office has been reviewing cases throughout the past nearly two years of the pandemic to determine whether or not detention of a person was justified, given the circumstances.

As of the first week of December, around 550 of the 5,380 people detained on the island were prosecuted in Queens – Queens cases accounted for around 10 percent of the total population despite making up around 27 percent of the city’s population.

Of those prosecuted in Queens and being held on Rikers, the majority were being held pre-trial and were arrested for violent felony cases and determined by a judge to be a flight risk.

“The highest percentage of these individuals are awaiting trial for homicide, attempted murder, forcible sexual acts­ including cases with child victims, domestic violence-related crimes, possession of loaded operable guns, assault causing life threatening or other permanent injury, and fugitives from another state,” Katz said.

In the original letter from Maloney, Ocasio-Cortez and Raskin, the congress members asked the DAs about the role of the courts in the crisis on Rikers.

In her response, Katz outlines the challenges the courts faced in relation to the pandemic. For a large portion of 2020, most court proceedings were halted.

“Eventually, virtual proceedings were specifically authorized by the Governor, but even the types of proceedings that could be held were limited, as they did not include grand or petit juries, and the courtrooms had to be outfitted to safely accomplish these goals,” Katz wrote. “During these initial phases of the pandemic, cases were routinely administratively adjourned for up to six months without our input or consent, slowing the resolution of cases to an effective halt. These court procedures, designed to cope with the pandemic, necessarily created a backlog of cases as the court system waited to be able to hear cases regularly and empanel grand juries once again.”

The DA also mentions the DOC’s staffing shortage, which often led to defendants missing court dates because officers were not available to transport them to the courthouses.

To end the letter, Katz asks the congressional representatives what funds from President Joe Biden’s Build Back Better Act, could be used to help improve the conditions at Rikers.

“A first-class city like New York, at its very minimum, should have humane conditions in which to house those incarcerated,” Katz said. “I look forward to hearing from you on the plan.”

Neither Ocasio-Cortez nor Maloney responded to request for comment.