A federal judge found New York City in contempt for its failure to stem violence at its notorious Rikers Island prison complex, as abysmal conditions have continued at the facility nearly a decade after a settlement meant to end them.
“The current rates of use of force, stabbings and slashings, fights, assaults on staff, and in-custody deaths remain extraordinarily high, and there has been no substantial reduction in the risk of harm currently facing those who live and work in the Rikers Island jails,” Judge Laura Taylor Swain wrote in her scathing ruling.
