Elected officials found Rikers library for moms

State Assemblywoman Naomi Rivera (l.) and City Councilwoman Julissa Ferreras show off books to be given to Rikers Island so incarcerated women can read to their children.

By Rebecca Henely

TimesLedger Newspapers

 

 

City Councilwoman Julissa Ferreras (D-East Elmhurst) and state Assemblywoman Naomi Rivera (D-Bronx) announced last week that they are collecting children’s books for female prisoners in Rikers Island and women’s facilities upstate to read to their children.
“We cannot wait until they are released to reintegrate them with their children,” Ferreras said.
The drive, which is still ongoing, was the brainchild of both lawmakers. Rivera said she and Ferreras were at a mutual friend’s house for a barbecue and began discussing the subject of mothers in prison.
Their talk lasted two hours, and by Oct. 26 they had hundreds of books to donate to Rikers as well as three women’s prisons upstate.
“We have women who are mothers who are not being given the additional support they need to be reunited with their child,” Rivera said.
Ferreras and Rivera visited Rikers after the announcement.
A fact sheet from the Correctional Association of New York, a Manhattan nonprofit with authority from the state Legislature to monitor prison conditions, said about 73 percent of New York’s incarcerated women are mothers, compared to 58 percent of men in prison who are fathers.
The association also said 83 percent of women were sent to prison in 2008 for non-violent offenses and 35 percent of women in prison read at an eighth-grade level or below.
“We just learned that Rikers does not have a library for these women,” Rivera said.
The assemblywoman said children’s books at the prison would encourage bonding activity and promote adult literacy.
“This is the one opportunity that a mother may have, even though she’s being detained, to be taken somewhere else,” Ferreras said.
In addition to the Correctional Association, Ferreras said she and Rivera have been working on this project with other nonprofits, such as the Osborne Association and the Jewish Board of Family & Children Services.
“Books are a powerful way to strengthen the parent-child relationship while nurturing a child’s love of learning,” Tanya Krupta, of the Osborne Association, said in a statement. “No matter what the literacy level or language of the mother, she can animate, narrate, cuddle and laugh with her child through a book.”
Rivera has also introduced legislation calling for female inmates to be placed in correctional facilities closest to their homes.
Ferreras said she is still collecting children’s books to be donated to Rikers Island. Books to be donated must be softcover for easier storage. They can be dropped off at the councilwoman’s district office at 32-33 Junction Blvd. in East Elmhurst.

City Must Stand Trial for Discrimination at Rikers

By ADAM KLASFELD

 Five female prison guards who say that male supervisors at Rikers Island demand sexual favors for better shifts, hurl racist abuse at roll call and litter their posts with urine-filled bottles will have their day in court against New York City, a federal judge ruled.
In a phone interview, plaintiff attorney Susan Egan said that top prison officials helped create the "man's world" at Rikers Island, including Deputy Chief Carmine LaBruzzo and disgraced former Correction Chief Peter Curcio, who stepped down from his post following revelations that he signed off on a bar mitzvah inside the Manhattan Detention Center (a.k.a. the "Tombs").
In December 2004, Deputy Warden Raphael Olivo allegedly gave plaintiff M.M. a basket of skin lotions, and then visited her post nearly "every morning" to talk about putting them on her. She says he pinned her to the wall, tried to kiss her, undressed in front of her, and made her sit on his lap while removing his pants.
Another plaintiff, E.M., says that Deputy Warden Jose Matos told her to enter his office, while he was naked down to the waist and his zipper was lowered. Even though inmates corroborated her story, Matos was not disciplined and later retired, court documents state.
The plaintiffs say that Equal Employment Opportunity office does not investigate complaints about incidents that have no witnesses, which allows most bias claims to get swept under the rug.
In 2006, an Equal Employment Opportunity report revealed that 112 race discrimination, retaliation and sexual harassment claims were filed that year, and only five were substantiated.
According to court documents, an unnamed Deputy Director of the EEO acknowledged that legitimate discrimination complaints were being dismissed.
"[T]here could have been something that was-we thought was so horrific or something that was so specific that it probably did happen, but because the standard was you had to have [corroboration]... we could not substantiate the complaint," the director said. "And that's generally what would happen."
The June 8, 2007 lawsuit catalogues "general allegations of [a] racist and sexist environment" at Rikers Island, which never resulted in discipline.
During one roll call, Curcio and Deputy Warden Robert Cripps allegedly announced that corrections officers should refer to them as "daddy" and "uncle" and should "dance to the drum beat of their masters."
Egan said that former chief Curcio was oblivious about the offensiveness of his announcement.
"The room was filled when he said it, and there were a couple of complaints," Egan told Courthouse News. "He simply did not understand why what he said was troublesome."
At a black guard's funeral, unnamed white officers allegedly joked that the deceased officer should be buried "like slaves were."
Captain Matthew Boyd allegedly told one black, female guard to "kiss his lily white ass."
Even the bathroom policy at Rikers Island discriminated against women, the plaintiffs say.
Officially, a guard cannot leave a post until another corrections officer steps in for relief, and the city insists that the wait time did not last longer than 15 minutes.
In her deposition, though, plaintiff Beatrice Adams said that the wait time depended on "if the relieving officer likes you," and men avoided the wait time by urinating into bottles that they left littered around their posts.
Although the lawsuit involves alleged discrimination between 2001 and 2007, Adams said that - about a year after she filed the complaint - she developed a medical condition, and guards left her waiting for the bathroom so long that she urinated herself.
On Thursday, Senior U.S. District Judge Frederic Block ruled that the guards' hostile work environment claims are ready for a jury.
"There are issues of fact regarding whether derogatory comments by supervisors and the bathroom policy at Rikers were so severe as to create a pervasive hostile work environment and whether Olivo's treatment of Monche was so severe and pervasive that it resulted in a hostile work environment that interfered with her conditions of employment," Block wrote.
In addition, M.M. can pursue her sexual harassment claim; four plaintiffs can press retaliation charges; and the city must defend itself against "Monell" claims, named after a 1978 case that first established local government accountability for unconstitutional acts.
These claims will hinge on "whether the EEO corroboration policy caused those violations because supervisors believed they could harass subordinates with impunity" and "whether the City was deliberately indifferent to the need," the ruling states.
An attorney for the guards' blasted the "miserable" work environment of female guards in a statement.
"Judge Block got it. DOC is a miserable place for women to work," Egan wrote. "My clients are looking forward to demonstrating to a jury just how miserable male supervisors can make the life of women at DOC who have the temerity to stand up for their rights."
Lawyers for New York City declined to comment

Rikers Island forced to toss out $11,000 worth of rotten Jamaican beef patties

Red-faced Rikers Island jail honchos last week ordered city cooks to toss 14,000 rotten Jamaican beef patties into the trash, the Daily News has learned.The estimated $11,000 worth of rancid meat stuck to pans while emitting a nauseating smell once they were heated, several cooks and a top supervisor said.



"It was like the sewage. We didn't realize until we started cooking it," a jail chef said.
A city Correction Department spokeswoman insisted the lost meat was worth only $4,100.
But an internal document obtained by The News supported the account of multiple sources that it was worth more than double that amount.



The 1,450 cases of vile patties were bought two weeks ago from a new contractor, Robbins Sales, a wholesale canned food firm in Woodbury, L.I.
The department admitted some of the meat was tossed, but said other cases were returned.
"The meat was not spoiled, but as it could not be properly cooked, the patties could not be served to inmates," said spokeswoman SharmanStein.



She said that the city's purchasing department was immediately notified and is seeking a replacement for the rotten patties. Internal department documents show city inspectors notified Robbins Sales that the meat was sticking together and impossible to cook.



"I have no idea what you're talking about," Robbins Sales President Jeffery Zwecker told The News when asked about the meat, but Stein says the distributor has promised to reimburse the city in full.
Veteran jail kitchen staffers said they didn't understand how the meat wasn't checked before it was delivered.

BY Reuven Blau


DAILY NEWS CITY HALL BUREAU

Man held at Rikers Island Released after "real" crook spotted

By WILLIAM J. GORTA

A Brooklyn man being held on Rikers Island on a robbery charge caught a lucky break when the key eyewitness against him spotted the “real” robber on the street.
The robbery trial of Michael Taylor, 50, was about to begin yesterday when the man who picked him out of a lineup told a prosecutor that he was on his way to court to testify against Taylor when he saw the man who robbed him walking on Jay Street in Downtown Brooklyn.
But Taylor, who was accused of robbing a Bensonhurst Radio Shack in 2009, has been in jail for months, first serving out a petit larceny sentence and then cooling his heels while he was unable to make bail in the robbery case.

The prosecutor told the defense and the judge of the ID mix-up and Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Deborah Dowling dismissed the case, allowing Taylor to walk out of court a free man.

“It was beautiful,” said defense lawyer Renate Lunn. “There was no more perfect day to be released from Rikers.”
Lunn said case against Taylor, who served prison terms for robbery and grand larceny, hinged on the testimony of the erring eyewitness.
“There were no prints, no video – even though this was a Radio Shack,” she said. “This has been a learning process on the unreliability of eyewitnesses.”
Taylor said only, “I’m glad the nightmare is finally over.”


Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/man_held_at_rikers_released_after_O4y9uDLoi31r3nSTMDpj7K#ixzz1LxTC5qQM