Commentary: Yet another hearing about sexual violence on Rikers Island

Editor’s note: The following commentary contains descriptions of alleged sexual violence.

The New York City Council on Thusday held its seventh hearing in nine years that discussed the topic of the epidemic of sexual violence in city jails. Past council hearings on the same subject have previously considered some of the legislation and fixes reviewed by the Council’s Criminal Justice Committee, now chaired by Council Member Sandy Nurse. One piece of legislation, Int 0792-2024, requires the Department of Correction build an electronic case management system to track complaints of sexual violence. The DOC promised to implement a similar tracking system in 2018, but has yet to take it across the finish line.  Another bill mandating the DOC develop a comprehensive training program for investigations, Int 0830-2024, mirrors the language already enshrined in rules added to the department’s charter regarding the Prison Rape Elimination Act which passed in 2016, but is still not yet fully implemented. 

The Board of Correction is mandated with ensuring the DOC is in full compliance with its rules including implementation of PREA. However, the board has not followed up with a full audit, required under its mandate, nor replaced an analyst whose job was to monitor progress toward the act’s implementation. The most the board has done was a partial audit in 2018. No one from the board attended Thursday’s hearing to testify.  

Some of the same survivors of sexual violence in city jails who have previously testified at prior hearings did appear. 

“Here we are in 2024 having another hearing after the one we had in 2018 and nothing has been done,” Donna Hylton testified. “When will we be believed?”

Hylton pointed to a former Rikers detainee who had testified before her, recounting how she was sexually assaulted by a Correction officer. “Forty years ago this happened to me, and today I have to sit here and listen to this young woman say the same thing just happened to her.  When will this change?” Hylton fired back at Council members.

DOC brass were questioned about data, reporting and statistics at the hearing. Nurse requested to know how many correction officers were fired or resigned over allegations of sexual misconduct in 2024. “We don't have that number but will get to you,”  DOC Deputy Director of Investigations for the unit that operates under the act, Ingris Martinez, replied. 

Nurse wouldn’t have it.

“This is some basic foundational shit right now,” Nurse said. “I want to note young people are here at this hearing and this is a reflection of how our government runs.  I need that number today before you leave the hearing” Nurse shot back. “We continue to not get definitive answers and a definitive timeline which makes us think no one knows what the hell is going on over there.”

The department’s investigative procedures were questioned: “Are you aware that the legal standard is that individual testimony alone is enough to reach a level of proof?” Council Member Tiffany Caban asked DOC Deputy Commissioner James Conroy.  “I am looking at your substantiation rates versus the national averages and what I am hearing is that an individual’s testimony alone is not given the weight it should be. So to me it sounds like this is powerful evidence that is not being weighted the way it should be and that disparity itself could explain why DOC’s substantiations rates aren’t on par with the national average.”

Over 700 cases against the Department of Correction and the City of New York filed under the Adult Survivor’s Act claiming sexual abuse in our city lockups prompted this hearing. DOC officers with nicknames like Officer "Dick Em Down Brown,' Officer “Big Blood,” Officer “Champagne,” Officer “Booty Bandit,” and Officer “Doo Doo” among others are named in the court filings as the alleged perpetrators of the sexual abuse. 

A City & State analysis of the lawsuits found over 70 complaints were filed in New York state Supreme Court accusing a correction officer who went by the nickname "Dick Em Down Brown,” who worked at the Rose M. Singer Center. One of his victims claimed in her lawsuit, filed in Bronx Supreme Court, that Brown had impregnated her and sneaked her off Rikers for an abortion in 1993. Brown continued to work for the DOC through at least 2018 city records show. Attorney Konstantin Yelisavetskiy from Slater Slater & Schulman testified that in some cases his clients gave birth to children fathered by Correction officers and that the names even appear on the children' s birth certificates. 

The DOC is still very slow to react to allegations of sexual violence. “What is even more troubling is that these correction officers remained in the jails even after the lawsuits were filed.  Despite what was said here today there has been ample notice of these lawsuits” testified Anna Kull who represents hundreds of plaintiffs in Adult Survivor Act cases.  “This inaction resulted in one alleged abuser repeating a rape that could have been prevented.”    

All eyes are on the mayor now as the Department of Investigation is under-funded and without enough staff.

 “We are not just focused on the individual acts we are looking at the bigger picture…we have to address our staffing limitations but, absolutely, what we are seeing is a broader approach is needed, but the question is how do we do this with the resources we have,” Jocelyn Strauber, the DOI’s Commissioner testified.

“The mayor when asked about these things was like, ‘oh those happened a long time ago,’  But really this comes down from the executive of the city to put resources toward this,” opined Nurse. “I don’t know if the mayor is making this a priority… This is a mayor who openly talks about women as ‘eye candy.’ So I don’t know…but this is a council of women so we are taking this seriously.”