Latest news with #DepartmentOfCorrection
Le Figaro
04-07-2025
- Le Figaro
'It's a Pressure Cooker': Inside Rikers Island, New York's Notorious Jail Plagued by Drugs and Violence
Réservé aux abonnés Various problems have reached such a critical point that federal authorities have stripped New York City of control over the notorious Rikers Island jail complex — once slated for closure but still holding nearly 7,000 detainees. "New York's Boldest" reads a faded mural in the parking lot of Rikers Island, echoing the Department of Correction's (D.O.C.) motto. The peeling paint blends into the backdrop of armored vans, barbed wire and overgrown weeds. To the east, a narrow waterway separates the jail from LaGuardia Airport, its runway ending just a hundred meters from the prison fence. Further west, the sleek skyline of Manhattan seems to look away from its troubled counterpart. The four nights Dominique Strauss-Kahn spent in Rikers' West Facility — reserved for high-profile inmates — seared the place into French public consciousness. During his stay, the former International Monetary Fund managing director received special treatment: a private cell, walks outside and solo showers. Harvey Weinstein now enjoys similar accommodations. An old three-lane bridge from Queens is the jail's only link to New York City. Of the 6,800 inmates currently held, nearly 6,000 are awaiting trial. But chronic gridlock in the criminal…
Al Arabiya
03-07-2025
- Al Arabiya
Tennessee Death Row Inmate Makes Last-Ditch Effort to Prevent Aug. 5 Execution
Attorneys for a Tennessee death row inmate have launched a last-ditch effort to prevent his August 5 execution. In Nashville's Chancery Court, they are asking a judge to require the Tennessee Department of Correction to deactivate an implanted defibrillation device similar to a pacemaker in the moments before Byron Black's execution. If the judge rules in their favor, such an order could potentially delay the execution until the state finds someone willing to do the deactivation. Meanwhile, at the state Supreme Court level, they want judges to order a lower court to consider their claim that Black is incompetent to be executed. The attorneys also have filed a general challenge to the state's new execution protocol, but with a trial scheduled for 2026, any ruling there will come too late for Black. Black was convicted in the 1988 shooting deaths of girlfriend Angela Clay, 29, and her two daughters, Latoya, 9, and Lakeisha, 6. Prosecutors said Black was in a jealous rage when he shot the three at their home. At the time, Black was on work-release while serving time for shooting and wounding Clay's estranged husband. Black has already seen three execution dates come and go, thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic and a pause on all executions from Gov. Bill Lee after the Department of Correction was found to not be testing the execution drugs for potency and purity as required. Black's attorneys have previously tried and failed to show that he should not be executed because he is intellectually disabled and that would violate the state's Constitution. In a new twist on the same theme, his attorneys now argue that the court should consider Black's competence to be executed under older English common law standards. The state counters that Black does not meet the criteria for incompetency because he understands his conviction, his pending execution, and the relation between the two. Separately, Black's attorneys are asking a different court to rule that his implanted cardioverter-defibrillator must be deactivated just before the execution. They suggest that otherwise the device will continually try to restart his heart, prolonging the execution and causing Black to suffer unnecessarily. Because most medical professionals are unwilling to participate in executions–considering it a violation of medical ethics–it could potentially be time-consuming and difficult to find someone willing to deactivate the device in order to kill Black more easily. A hearing on the motion is set for July 14.
Yahoo
13-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Readers sound off on a vision for Rikers Island, N.Y. climate laws and conclave criticism
Ossining, N.Y.: Re 'City Hall considers abandoning plan to replace Rikers with borough jails' (May 3): Mayor Adams' purported attempt to abandon the plan to close the jail on Rikers Island would be a step backward for all New Yorkers. In addition to ending the history of violence and mistreatment of incarcerated people and improving conditions for Department of Correction staff, the jail's closure — which is mandated by law — will open the door for the single most transformative project of the 21st century for New York City's air and water. When Rikers closes, the island's 413 acres could house enough solar power and battery storage to shut down asthma-causing fracked gas power plants in Hunts Point in the Bronx and Astoria. Alongside the energy infrastructure, a new state-of-the-art wastewater treatment plant would save New Yorkers $10 billion and form the cornerstone for sewage pollution reductions that will restore waters across the city for fishing and swimming. On top of these benefits, compost processing on the island could provide much-needed capacity for the city and move trucks out of communities of Black, Indigenous and other people of color and low-income neighborhoods. Each of these measures would provide well-paying jobs for local residents. This Renewable Rikers vision is the consensus among those whose lives have been impacted by the jail along with leading environmental experts for how to best utilize the island to benefit all New Yorkers. It's time to turn the page on Rikers from a place once described as 'an affront to humanity and decency' to one that sustains life and health for generations to come. Mike Dulong, legal program director, Riverkeeper Milford, Pa.: I am a retiree who left the city. We still get NYC news channels where we live. On a daily basis, we see shootings, stabbings and other heinous crimes and I say to myself, 'Good job, Eric, way to go.' Yet, through all this, your illustrious mayor is still trying to take traditional Medicare from its most vulnerable population. I refer to retirees who, for the most part, kept the city running during various crises over the years. This is the thanks we get? Mayor Adams, you should be ashamed of yourself. Robert K. Greco Brooklyn: Re 'More jobs for the NYC green economy' (op-ed, May 9): Too bad that President Trump seems to hate any energy sector job that isn't drilling for oil or digging coal out of the ground. His halt to offshore wind is a big job killer for the workers who would have been receiving the turbines in Sunset Park and the folks who would have harvested wind energy coming ashore in Long Island City. He is killing our clean energy future as well as our jobs. Gov. Hochul is making the right move by suing Trump over his foolish and illegal halt to offshore wind. Laurel Tumarkin Manhattan: The Albany folks got the budget passed, and 1 billion in taxpayer dollars is devoted to climate programs. Sounds like enough, but is it? New York's nation-leading climate law passed six years ago, the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, looks to 2050 and beyond, but the budget offers little long-term community protection or climate leadership. Will Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie finally bring the transformative and widely popular NY HEAT Act to a vote? Will Hochul stop foot-dragging on the Cap and Invest program, which would make polluters pay for climate mitigation instead of us taxpayers? If our leaders don't act more boldly, our — and their — grandchildren will get whacked by climate assaults that we can't imagine. There is still time. Let's get it all done! Rachel Makleff Fresh Meadows: I'm a senior living in the same house for more than 50 years. In that time, I've been through many mayors and governors, and never has my January Con Edison bill hit $1,000. If we had Gov. Lee Zeldin and Mayor Curtis Sliwa, would I have the same bill? George Glowacky Manhattan: Bravo for your editorial 'Limiting eminent domain' (May 11). For too long, it has been overused to advance private developments with no real public purpose. Roberta Brandes Gratz Montebello, N.Y.: Re 'Rounding up campus speakers won't protect Jews' (column, March 30): The Trump administration's rounding up of speakers who support Hamas is doing more than protecting Jews. These protesters and their useful idiots are really working toward radical Islam's conquest and enslavement of the United States. Essentially, they are an invading force sent here by Tehran. If radical Islam and its Sharia law succeed, do you think you will still have freedom of speech and due process? Wallington Simpson Bronx: We've reached another low point in our country's history when the only truth coming out of the White House is contained in the president's oft-repeated answers to important questions that are posed to him: 'I don't know' or 'I don't know anything about it.' This is especially disturbing when he's asked about the Constitution. Just what we need, someone who took an oath to uphold the very document he admits he's unfamiliar with. Maria Bonsanti Port Orange, Fla.: Well, the president does have a unique idea to reopen 'The Rock.' Once they use our tax money to fix the place up and ready it for new boarders, we should celebrate. The greatest joy would be to see it open its cell doors to the whole Trump and Co. crew. All those billionaires and wannabe superstar minions of his could enjoy the fresh air for their one hour per day of recreation. Let's not forget those recently pardoned Jan. 6 rioters, either — plenty of room for the whole gang. Great idea, Donald, to bring Alcatraz back into circulation. Philip Farruggio Little Egg Harbor, N.J.: You will be getting a lot of mail regarding Pope Leo XIV by many who probably have not been to a Catholic church for years, are not even Catholic or who say they are Catholic but it was only someone in their family who observed the religion. Still, they have an opinion, such as Voicer Maria Suzanne Napoleone, who, to our misfortune, lives in New York. How dare she judge a decision made through two days of prayer by some of the holiest of the Church's representatives! What does she know about all the prayers and considerations that went into this decision? Why is she suddenly the know-it-all visionary of the Roman Catholic religion? This decision was made by 133 cardinals praying for God's direct message. We do not need anybody's opinion on how this man was chosen above all others. Rose S. Wilson Stratford, Conn.: My independent theory on the non-accidental choice of Pope Leo XIV would be that the 133 cardinals were collectively guided by the Holy Spirit to specifically elect him as an American counterweight/offset to #47's uber-strong executive branch/presidency in a way that no non-American pope would be able to achieve. He's been described as the most culturally non-American embodiment of all U.S. cardinals. Right now (at least in the eyes of Catholics), former Cardinal Robert Prevost indeed is the highest ranking U.S. citizen, as Vicar of Christ on Earth — with an open-ended tenure! James McHale Ramsey, N.J.: Dear Bob Raissman, I write in response to your comment about the absence of St. John's University basketball games from the radio ('No dancing on the radio,' column, March 23). I've been around for a while and have a vague recollection of listening to Marty Glickman doing play-by-play coverage of college basketball from Madison Square Garden a while back (he would describe a score as being 'good like Nedick's). I also recall a guy named Dave Halberstam (I believe) broadcasting St. John's games on WCBS 880 more recently, but still quite some time ago. He was succeeded by Gary Cohen, who did basketball play-by-play coverage as well as he does baseball. The school switched from Cohen to John Minko, perhaps as a cost-saving measure. This motivated Seton Hall University to bring Cohen to do their radio coverage. Good luck finding coverage of either schools' games on AM or FM radio today. Michael F. Reilly
