The dispute over the existence of “deadlocking,” or the practice of locking up detainees on Rikers Island for weeks or months at a time in violation of Department of Correction policy, cutting them off from health care, services and other people in custody, continued during a jail oversight meeting on Tuesday.
Read MoreJail watchdogs found that correctional officers and medical staff on Rikers Island abandoned their posts and failed to check in on suicidal detainees in the lead up to a number of deaths in the dangerous jail complex last year.
Read MoreMayor Zohran Mamdani late Monday renewed a long-running state of emergency on Rikers Island, signing an executive order he acknowledged would prolong a controversial legal workaround used by his predecessor for years to skirt rules dictating how the city should treat detainees.
Read MoreDetainees on Rikers Island have continued to struggle to get access to the jail complex’s law libraries, a new report from the Department of Correction’s oversight body found.
Read MoreThe city’s jail watchdog board bashed Department of Correction leadership Tuesday after the agency failed to tell them about a new punitive housing unit opened in alleged chaotic fashion last week.
Read MoreCorrectional officers on Rikers Island refused to allow nurses to check on a 23-year-old woman for two days while she suffered a medical emergency inside an isolated cell, according to a new report from the Department of Correction’s oversight board.
Read MoreThe head of the city’s Department of Correction had little to say when asked about allegations that officers regularly lock up detainees with mental health issues for days or weeks at a time in solitary confinement, blocking their access to medication and attention from doctors.
Read MoreOver one-third of all detainees on Rikers Island who requested a trip to the doctor last year were never taken to their scheduled appointment, a new report from the Department of Correction’s watchdog says.
Read MoreThe Board of Correction on Tuesday spent around an hour of its meeting engaged in an internal power struggle instead of discussing the top item on its agenda – the crisis regarding the city’s stalled plan to close Rikers Island by 2027.
Read MoreThe family of a Bayside man who died on Rikers Island last year is suing the city’s Department of Correction after the agency allegedly wrongly withheld information about the man’s death.
Read MoreThe city’s Board of Correction on Tuesday voted unanimously to approve its rules for the implementation of a new law banning solitary confinement in the city’s jails.
Read MoreAdvocates, lawmakers and public defenders on Monday urged the city’s jail watchdog to ensure that the City Council’s ban on solitary confinement be fully implemented before the end of next month, despite ongoing efforts from the city and Department of Correction to delay the law’s enactment.
Read MoreSome detainees on Rikers Island haven’t been allowed outside for recreational time for over a year, according to officials with the jail’s independent watchdog board.
Read MoreIn a single month last year, Department of Correction officers used pepper spray on eight different detainees attempting to hang themselves, highlighting a concerning pattern in violation of department policy, according to a new report from the department’s citizen watchdog board.
Read MoreNearly all of the four men who died on Rikers Island in the second half of last year entered the troubled jail complex with mental health and addiction issues, and failed to receive regular medical care or adequate supervision from the Department of Correction, a new report from the Board of Correction found.
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