A Manhattan federal judge on Wednesday said she is “inclined” to appoint a federal receiver to oversee the use of force and safety on Rikers Island — moving the jail complex the closest it has ever been to federal control.
US District Court Judge Laura Taylor Swain’s statement was part of a Nov. 27 ruling in which she found the city Department of Correction to be in violation of multiple court orders to get rampant violence on Rikers under control.
“The court is inclined to impose a receivership: namely, a remedy that will make the management of the use of force and safety aspects of the Rikers Island jails ultimately answerable directly to the court,” Swain wrote.
The judge ordered all parties in the case to devise a plan for receivership by a Jan. 14 deadline.
In her decision, Swain sided with the Legal Aid Society in holding the city in contempt of the 2015 consent decree Nunez v. the City of New York, which ordered the city to make significant changes to curtail violence in the jail complex on Rikers Island. The Legal Aid Society, which represents detainees within the city’s jails, made the contempt motion late last year.
The judge also found the city Department of Correction to have violated three subsequent court orders over the past decade.
In fact, Swain wrote conditions the city was ordered to meaningfully stem over the past nine years, such as the use of force, stabbings, slashings, fights, assaults on staff, and deaths in custody, remain “extremely high.”
“There has been no substantial reduction in the risk of harm currently facing those who live and work in the Rikers Island jails,” she wrote. “Worse still, the unsafe and dangerous conditions in the jails, which are characterized by unprecedented rates of use of force and violence, have become normalized despite the fact that they are clearly abnormal and unacceptable.”
Numerous reports issued by Steven Martin—the federal monitor in the case—over the past several years supported much of the judge’s ruling.
Amaris Cockfield, a spokesperson for Mayor Eric Adams, did not directly address the contempt ruling in an emailed statement.
Instead, she said the administration has made “significant progress” in addressing the “decades-long neglect and issues” on Rikers — especially under the leadership of DOC Commissioner Lynelle Maginley-Liddie, whom Adams appointed late last year,
“Commissioner Maginley-Liddie has also proven herself to the court and the monitor as the necessary steady hand to continue protecting those in our care and who work for the DOC,” Cockfield said in a statement. “We are proud of our work, but recognize there is more to be done and look forward to working with the federal monitoring team on our shared goal of continuing to improve the safety of everyone in our jails.”
The mayor has publicly railed against a federal takeover of Rikers Island on many occasions, insisting the city is in the best position to improve conditions at the facility.
Meanwhile, Legal Aid commended Judge Swain, in its own statement, for issuing what it called a “historic ruling.”
“As the court found, the city has repeatedly demonstrated its inability to provide the oversight necessary to ensure the safety of all individuals housed in local jails,” the group said. “We laud this ruling, which will finally create a pathway for reform that can protect those who DOC’s leadership has failed by making leadership accountable to the court and not political authorities.”
