At the time, it was a momentous announcement: New York City officials said they would eliminate solitary confinement at Rikers Island for all inmates under age 22.
The declaration, made in January 2015, put the city’s long-troubled Correction Department in the vanguard of national jail reform efforts.
But a year and a half later, the administration of Mayor Bill de Blasio is still struggling to pull it off. The city missed another deadline last week, and it is now requesting a second six-month extension. City officials had originally promised to end the use of the punishment for young adults by January 2016.
Most of the 78 young adults who were in isolation at the beginning of the year have been moved out. But while the city has now eliminated segregation for the 16- to 18-year-olds, there are some older, more difficult inmates remaining who cause such serious disciplinary problems, according to the correction commissioner, Joseph Ponte, that at least for now segregation is still needed.
As solitary confinement has been emptied, the violence in the jail for young adults has significantly increased, Mr. Ponte wrote in a letter to the city jail watchdog agency last week. The correction officers’ union has long argued that ending the use of segregation would endanger guards and lead to greater violence.
Eliminating solitary confinement is an expensive, labor-intensive proposition. To replace it, the city has created enhanced supervision units, with two officers and one counselor for every 12 inmates. Not long ago, a typical cellblock was overseen by one guard for every 50 inmates.
A few weeks ago, The New York Times interviewed several of the nine remaining inmates under age 22 still in isolation at the part of the jail complex known as 3 South Segregation Unit. A correction officer and a member of the commissioner’s press office were present for the interviews; the inmates were shackled to a wall. [MORE]