New York City\u2019s embattled jail system saw a whopping 76% spike in penalties handed out to inmates for fights and assaults, new data shows.<\/p>\n
Arrests in jail also soared as a federal court-appointed manager assumed control over Rikers Island.<\/p>\n
The Department of Correction dished out 15,035 fight and assault infractions in violence-plagued Rikers <\/a>and other city lockups during the fiscal year ending June 30, compared to 8,528 the previous 12 months, according to the annual Mayor\u2019s Management Report.<\/p>\n NYC\u2019s embattled jail system saw a whopping 76% spike in penalties handed out to detainees for fights and assaults \u2014 and jail-based arrests also soared \u2014 as a federal court-appointed manager assumed control over Rikers Island. Leonardo Munoz for NY Post<\/p>\n Although city jails saw overall improvement in reported serious violent incidents and serious injury to inmates, assaults on staff by detainees spiked by nearly 5%.<\/p>\n Jailbirds who receive infractions face being moved out of the general population and into restrictive housing and losing privileges like phone usage. <\/p>\n It\u2019s unclear how many of the infractions involved fellow inmates or jail staff.<\/p>\n Arrests in jail of individuals already in custody rose 8%, from 436 to 469.<\/p>\n The crackdown came as Manhattan federal Judge Laura Taylor Swain stripped operational oversight<\/a> of city jails from the DOC and turned control over to Nicholas Deml, the former head of the Vermont Department of Corrections<\/a>, as an independent remediation manager.<\/p>\n Swain made the move in January after determining the city failed to comply with court-ordered remedies aimed at ending decades of alleged civil-rights violations on Rikers, which include unsanitary living conditions and excessive use of force by guards.<\/p>\n A Department of Correction officer walking inside a cell block at Rikers Island. Gregory P. Mango for NY Post<\/p>\n In the Mayor\u2019s Management Report, the DOC didn\u2019t attribute the crackdown to Rikers\u2019 new leadership or being under federal oversight. <\/p>\n Instead, it only said that \u201cthe increase occurred during a period in which the department placed more emphasis on issuing infractions for misconduct and on pursuing appropriate jail-based arrests.\u201d<\/p>\n DOC spokesman Patrick Rocchio told The Post the agency \u201cis committed to working with the federal remediation manager and federal monitor to improve conditions in our city\u2019s jails for staff and people in custody.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe believe in holding accountable as appropriate people in custody who assault correctional staff or others in custody,\u201d added Rocchio.<\/p>\n Weapons made from plexiglass that were confiscated from inmates on Rikers Island. Gregory P. Mango<\/p>\n Benny Boscio, president of the Correction Officers\u2019 Benevolent Association, called the DOC issuing more infractions for misconduct and making more arrests \u201ca step in the right direction.\u201d<\/p>\n But Boscio said tougher enforcement alone won\u2019t fix what\u2019s driving the violence.<\/p>\n \u201cHowever, combating the root of these violent incidents must also be prioritized, which begins with immediately replacing the hundreds of inoperable cell doors that enable violent inmates to pop out of their cells and attack our correction officers\u00a0and other inmates with impunity,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cWe live in a city where bridges, skyscrapers, tunnels, and major infrastructure projects are completed in less time than it takes to ensure all\u00a0the cell doors at Rikers Island actually work. That is inexcusable!\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New York City\u2019s embattled jail system saw a whopping 76% spike in penalties handed out to inmates for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":357778,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[3283,357,23509,21470,7052,277,57,9,24,55,54,56,1083,58],"class_list":["post-357777","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-arrests","tag-assaults","tag-correction-officers-benevolent-association","tag-department-of-corrections","tag-fights","tag-manhattan-federal-court","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-city-headlines","tag-new-york-city-news","tag-ny","tag-rikers-island","tag-us-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357777","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=357777"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357777\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/357778"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=357777"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=357777"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=357777"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}