Incarceration News

Gov. Kathy Hochul speaks at Nomad clothing retailer Noir et Blanc alongside district attorneys about her efforts to reform the state’s discovery law, April 16, 2025.

Albany Push for Prison Reforms Left Out of State Budget

May 15, 2025, 5:00 a.m.May 15, 2025, 9:49 a.m.

The father of fatally beaten inmate Robert Brooks was among those pleading for more oversight and comion in the state prison system.

Mayor Eric Adams talks with people in custody on Rikers Island on Thursday, July 7, 2022.

Jails

Federal Judge Orders Appointment of Rikers Island ‘Remediation Manager’

May 13, 2025, 12:44 p.m.May 14, 2025, 10:16 a.m.

Fourteen years after the filing of a landmark class-action lawsuit over brutality in city jails, a judge has ruled that a third-party should manage the Department of Correction.

Rikers Island

Advocates Call on City to Protect Transgender People Behind Bars in the Trump Era

April 25, 2025, 5:00 a.m.April 28, 2025, 1:01 p.m.

As the White House and Department of Justice attack funding for trans issues and their very rights, local leaders want state and city lock ups to act proactively.

Lawyers for former prisoner Matthew Raymond filed a lawsuit after he says he was waterboarded by a guard at Auburn Correctional Facility.

Courts

Nearly Decade After Brutal Beating by Prison Guards, Man Gets $1.2 Million Settlement

April 7, 2025, 4:55 a.m.April 6, 2025, 11:32 a.m.

“I know what it's like to be on a f-ing table, chained up, immobilized and to be beaten nonstop,” Matthew Raymond told THE CITY. “It’s not OK. It ruined my life.”

The Anna M. Kross Center on Rikers Island.

Jails

Rikers Island Forced to Reopen Closed Jail as Understaffed State Prisons Refuse Transfers

April 3, 2025, 5:47 p.m.April 3, 2025, 5:47 p.m.

Some 500 people waiting to be sent to upstate prisons won’t be moved until at least late April, THE CITY has learned.

Alex Rotar speaks in a Rikers Island meeting room about his mental health struggles.

Courts

One Man’s Year on Rikers Exposes Limits of Mental Health Reforms

April 3, 2025, 5:00 a.m.April 6, 2025, 11:05 a.m.

Prosecutors won’t let Alex Rotar into a special court designed to help steer people with mental illness away from incarceration. A proposed law could make that path easier to access.

Rikers Island

City Jail Population Sures 7,000, Headed in Wrong Direction for Close-Rikers Plan

March 20, 2025, 5:00 a.m.April 4, 2025, 3:27 p.m.

By law, the city will be legally barred from using Rikers jails after 2027, but the move-out can happen only if there are less than 5,000 people behind bars.

Department of Correction Commissioner Lynelle Maginley Liddie testifies at a City Council budget hearing.

Jails

Rikers Now Looks to Bring Back Nonprofits After Kicking Them Off Island

March 7, 2025, 5:22 p.m.March 7, 2025, 5:25 p.m.

Two years ago, Department of Correction officials said they could cut costs by in-sourcing social and educational programs for detainees. It did not work out.

Corrections officers hold a picket line outside Green Haven prison.

Labor

Tentative Agreement to End State Prison Strike Rolls Back Solitary Reform

Feb. 28, 2025, 1:50 p.m.Feb. 28, 2025, 2:02 p.m.

Gov. Kathy Hochul agreed to temporarily suspend a rule limiting the use of solitary confinement to 15-days and to pay officers extra money to work overtime on weekends.

People with family who died in state prison decry a corrections officers strike.

Prisons

Two Sing Sing Prisoners Die Hours Apart as Illegal Guard Strike Drags On

Feb. 27, 2025, 5:52 p.m.Feb. 28, 2025, 10:22 a.m.

Anthony Douglas, 67, and Franklyn Dominguez, 35, died on Wednesday afternoon within about four hours at a prison that has been on lockdown since correction officers launched a wildcat walkout in mid-February.

Incarceration

Albany Push for Prison Reforms Left Out of State Budget

Federal Judge Orders Appointment of Rikers Island ‘Remediation Manager’

Advocates Call on City to Protect Transgender People Behind Bars in the Trump Era

Nearly Decade After Brutal Beating by Prison Guards, Man Gets $1.2 Million Settlement

Rikers Island Forced to Reopen Closed Jail as Understaffed State Prisons Refuse Transfers

One Man’s Year on Rikers Exposes Limits of Mental Health Reforms

City Jail Population Sures 7,000, Headed in Wrong Direction for Close-Rikers Plan

Rikers Now Looks to Bring Back Nonprofits After Kicking Them Off Island

Tentative Agreement to End State Prison Strike Rolls Back Solitary Reform

Two Sing Sing Prisoners Die Hours Apart as Illegal Guard Strike Drags On

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