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A man who was being held in a New York City jail died on Wednesday, becoming the 12th person in the city to die this year.
The man, whom authorities have not yet identified because his family has not been notified, died Wednesday morning after being held at the Vernon C. Bain center, a floating prison barge moored just north of the complex Rikers Island Penitentiary, where on 11 other people who died in custody were held.
After appearing to be suffering from a medical problem, he was rushed to Lincoln Hospital and was pronounced dead around 10:50 a.m., according to a statement from the Corrections Department.
“I am devastated that we have yet another death in custody and determined to stop this heartbreaking trend,” said Vincent Schiraldi, the Commissioner of the Corrections Department, in a statement. “We are doing everything we can to remedy the unprecedented crisis we are experiencing in our prisons. My thoughts and prayers are with those close to the person.
State and city leaders, lawyers and advocates for incarcerated people have widely recognized that the city’s prisons are suffering from a staffing crisis. This has led to a severe decline in basic services for those detained, including food, water, medical and mental health care, and has led to an upsurge in violence. Almost 2,000 Correctional Department officers are absent from work every day, representing nearly a third of the department’s uniformed staff.
Mitchell C. Elman, the lawyer for the deceased man, was stunned to learn that a client he had just spoken to a few weeks ago had passed away.
“It’s really outrageous what’s going on there,” Elman said in a telephone interview on Tuesday. “The conditions are appalling. New York City needs to look at itself in the mirror instead of complaining and blaming everyone else. “
Mr Elman said his client had been in prison since 2019.
The man was charged with nine other people that year by the Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office with conspiracy to commit second degree murder, assault, robbery and related offenses, according to a report. criminal complaint. Such cases typically take years to resolve in the criminal justice system.
More attention was paid to Rikers Island than to Vernon C. Bain, a floating barge that was intended to serve as a temporary solution to overcrowding when it opened in 1992 and has since become a permanent facility used to house those incarcerated in the city. There are 661 people detained at the barge, just over a tenth of the total number held in the city’s prisons.
Lawyers said Vernon C. Bain suffered from issues similar to those plaguing the Rikers, including understaffing, which made it difficult for those detained there to meet their lawyers and appear in court.
In a press conference on Wednesday, Mayor Bill de Blasio, who has not been to Rikers Island since June 2017, lambasted correctional officers who failed to show up for work and said a union had left them representative had been “fundamental to this problem”. He accused the union, the Correction Officers Benevolent Association, of discouraging people from doing their jobs.
Mr de Blasio’s comments echoed allegations of a lawsuit brought by the city against the union earlier this week, accusing the union of supporting an illegal strike.
In argument on Wednesday morning, city attorney Eric Eichenholtz argued that the union had not done enough to signal its disapproval of officers failing to show up for work.
The city withdrew its lawsuit on Wednesday afternoon after a lawyer representing the union, John Burns, made a statement on the record that the union did not tolerate anyone not showing up for work without permission.
“Officers who are fit for duty must report for duty as required by law,” said Mr. Burns. “COBA has never asked anyone to report to work, leave a shift, make themselves sick or claim a personal emergency – yet this correctional officer is not actually sick or facing an emergency. personal. “
In a statement, the city called the statement “a step forward in meeting the challenges of Rikers.” Shortly after the hearing, the union again attacked Mr. de Blasio in a statement and invited him to visit Rikers.
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