Family members and friends of men who died in New York State prisons in recent years denounced a system in turmoil and longstanding tolerance of brutality by guards on Wednesday at a joint legislative committee hearing.
One who testified was a mentor of a 22-year-old man who the authorities said was beaten to death by corrections officers at the Mid-State Correctional Facility in Central New York in March.
Another was the father of a man who officials said was fatally beaten by guards at the prison across the street, Marcy Correctional Facility. He demanded to know why officers who had repeatedly been accused of abuse were allowed to remain on the job.
A third was the daughter of man who died in late 2023 after he was beaten by corrections officers at Green Haven Correctional Facility and then denied medical care, she said.
Their stories were aired during the public hearing held by State Senator Julia Salazar and Assemblyman Erik M. Dilan, both Brooklyn Democrats, during a period of particular strife across New York’s 42 prisons.
Earlier this year, thousands of prison guards walked off their assigned posts in a series of unsanctioned strikes that they said were in protest of hazardous working conditions. The wildcat strikes prompted deployment of 7,000 National Guard members and, eventually, mass firings of guards.
Last month, in the midst of the strikes, 10 corrections officers were charged in connection with the beating death of the 22-year-old man, Messiah Nantwi, with two accused of murder.
That death followed the December killing of the inmate at Marcy, 43-year-old Robert L. Brooks. Ten officers were charged in that case as well, with six facing murder charges. The guards were captured on body-worn cameras beating and choking Mr. Brooks in the prison infirmary, officials said.
“New York’s prison system is fraught with abuse, and it is deeply flawed,” Ms. Salazar said at a news conference before the hearing. “There is a rampant culture in our state prisons of incarcerated individuals being subjected to torture, and there is little to no accountability for the violence committed.”
Ms. Salazar has been pushing for the passage of several bills that would strengthen the state’s hand in disciplining guards, expand oversight and address camera blind spots.
Gov. Kathy Hochul and her state corrections commissioner, Daniel F. Martuscello III, had promised to reform New York’s prison system, Ms. Salazar said, but, she added, “we have not seen substantial legislative action to address this problem.”
“Violence and dehumanization have been normalized in New York’s prisons, but that is a policy choice,” said Thomas Gant, a community organizer for the nonprofit Center for Community Alternatives, who also spoke before the hearing. “We can choose differently.”
At the hearing on Wednesday, Mr. Martuscello said that since the deaths of Mr. Brooks and Mr. Nantwi, he has increased management rotations in prisons in the evening and beefed up the presence of internal investigators. The corrections department, he said, has also improved its whistle-blower policy and hired a law firm to review the department’s policies, culture and practices.
Correction officers have now been required to activate their body-worn cameras anytime they interact with prisoners, and the agency has received $18.4 million to fully deploy the body cameras in facilities across the state, he said.
The commissioner said he is also reviewing the selection process for specialized teams of officers that are often called in to respond to disruptive incidents in prisons. Members of the teams, which inmates and prisoner advocates say have a reputation for brutality, were involved in the deaths of Mr. Nantwi and Mr. Brooks.
Even so, the prison system remains at a critical point.
Three thousand National Guard members are still in the prisons to replace corrections officers who were fired or have otherwise not returned to work.
Violent incidents remain on the rise, as do prisoner deaths. Forty-seven people have died in the first five months of the year, compared with 143 in all of last year and 107 in 2023.
At the hearing Wednesday, Robert Ricks, Mr. Brooks’s father, condemned the inability of state officials to stem violence and disorder behind the walls of the New York’s prisons.
“You say the system is broken and it’s complicated, but it’s not complicated,” he said. “We can send rockets to the moon — we can’t stop people from beating people to death?”
Grace Ashford contributed reporting.
Jan Ransom is an investigative reporter for The Times focusing on the criminal justice system, law enforcement and incarceration in New York.
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