Two New York City correction officers have been accused of pepper-spraying people in custody at Rikers Island without justification and then filing false reports to cover it up, prosecutors said Wednesday.<\/p>\n
In one report, the officers claimed a detainee tried to headbutt them, which was later contradicted by surveillance video, according to the Bronx district attorney\u2019s office.<\/p>\n
Adrian Houlder, 32, and Tarik Hawkins, 33, were arraigned Wednesday on charges including falsifying business records and official misconduct. Both pleaded not guilty and were released without bail. The officers are due back in court on July 1.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese defendants are accused of using pepper spray on inmates in violation of department guidelines,\u201d Bronx DA Darcel Clark said in a statement. \u201cTo cover up these alleged violations, the officers allegedly filed reports found to be inconsistent with the facts.\u201d<\/p>\n
The indictment alleges that three incidents took place between June 15 and Oct. 21, 2024 at the Otis Bantum Correctional Center on Rikers Island. Prosecutors say a review of surveillance video shows the officers used pepper spray without proper cause or provocation under Department of Correction guidelines.<\/p>\n
Clark\u2019s office did not say how many people were sprayed. A spokesperson for the DA said the officers were not charged with assault because there was no evidence of injury.<\/p>\n
The Department of Correction referred the case to the city\u2019s Department of Investigation, which worked on the inquiry alongside the DA\u2019s Public Integrity Bureau.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese correction officers betrayed their positions of trust,\u201d Department of Investigations Commissioner Nadia Shihata said in a statement, accusing them of misusing pepper spray and falsifying official reports.<\/p>\n
An attorney for the men, as well as spokespeople for the Department of Correction and the Correction Officers\u2019 Benevolent Association, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two New York City correction officers have been accused of pepper-spraying people in custody at Rikers Island without…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":214578,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[128,9,24,63,129,131,130],"class_list":["post-214577","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-the-bronx","tag-bronx","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-the-bronx","tag-the-bronx-headlines","tag-the-bronx-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214577","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=214577"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214577\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/214578"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=214577"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=214577"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=214577"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}