The fallout from the fatal beating by guards in December of handcuffed prisoner Robert Brooks in an upstate New York correctional facility and long-rising resentment over prison conditions among inmates and officers has caused a level of turbulence not seen in the sprawling system in many years.
In the two months since Brooks’ death at Marcy Correctional Facility near upstate Rome, calls have erupted for systemwide investigations — and prisoners in another lockup near Buffalo took control of two dorms. On Monday and Tuesday, corrections officers walked off the job in at least 30 state facilities.
On Thursday, an Oneida County grand jury is expected to unseal criminal charges against up to nine officers for choking and beating Brooks to death, almost all of it caught on high-definition video that was shocking for its violence and the apparent indifference shown by staff.
The video — particularly the seemingly practiced manner of the guards — has spawned calls for a broad review of staff use of excessive force across the state prison system.
“There are hundreds if not thousands of incidents like this; many are just dismissed,” said Stephen Schwarz, a upstatr Rochester lawyer representing Brooks’ family.
“I think this is a real turning point for reform. It isn’t an isolated incident, and the family is focused on making sure it can’t happen again.”
The death so angered advocates and former prisoners that a series of protests erupted around the state.
John Ramsey, who served 31 years in prison for a 1981 homicide in Brooklyn and is now a private investigator, got himself arrested at one such protest on Jan. 22 at the Atlantic Ave.-Barclays Center subway station in Brooklyn.
Ramsey shared photos with the Daily News of a severe beating he received from guards while handcuffed on Nov. 21, 1996, at the Attica Correctional Facility. No officer faced discipline after the incident, he said.
“This has been happening for decades, there just wasn’t video of it,” said Ramsey, who, after his protest arrest, spent two hours in a police holding cell and was given a summons. “So there’s a lot of anger about it. The point was to get attention, and we were willing to sacrifice being arrested to get it.”
Bryant Bell, 52, another formerly incarcerated man and now a paralegal, said he suffered beatings over two days at the Cocksackie Correctional Facility in 1995. Bryant said he was punched in the face, then taken to an isolated area and worked over some more.
He said he sneaked out a letter about it to officials and family, but nothing ever happened to the officers involved.
“This is a longstanding thing that happens in [Corrections} and it changed me forever,” he said.
On Feb. 12, prisoners at the Collins Correction Facility near Buffalo took over dorm areas, injuring staff and causing a facilitywide lockdown.
Right around then, state Corrections and Community Supervision Commissioner Daniel Martuscello appeared to indicate more prison staff cuts were coming, as much as 30%.
That seems to have triggered the wildcat strike by corrections officers, which started Monday at two prisons and continued to spread to up to 30 by Wednesday, even as Gov. Hochul said she was calling in the National Guard.
Many officers have refused to enter prisons for their shifts. The central complaint in the job action, according to current and former officers, is lack of promised staffing necessitated by the HALT Solitary law that limited the use of solitary confinement in the prisons.
“This has nothing to do with Brooks,” said a retired prison lieutenant. “This goes back five to six years and HALT and bail reform. They never included the unions. They promised extra staff and never gave it to us.”
The state Correctional Officers and Police Benevolent Association reiterated Wednesday the strike is unsanctioned, and talks with Hochul’s office are continuing.
“Negotiations with the state have continued throughout today between [the state Correctional Officers and Police Benevolent Association] and the governor’s office towards a resolution,” spokesman James Miller said.
On Dec. 9, Brooks, 43, was nine years into a 12-year sentence for assault when was attacked by other inmates at Mohawk Correctional Facility. According to one corrections source, he was struck in the head at least once with a padlock hidden in a sock.
Prison officials opted to transfer him to Marcy Correctional Facility, 12 miles from Mohawk.
“When he arrived at Marcy the abuse started virtually immediately after he was taken out of the van and continued in the infirmary as the video begins,” Schwarz said.
The video shows the handcuffed Brooks being punched, kicked and choked by several officers on an exam table in the medical clinic. He died the following day in a hospital.
Discrepancies between the medical records and reports filed by staff triggered the investigation that led to suspensions of 18 guards and medical staffers and now the looming criminal charges, Schwarz said.
The Onandaga County medical examiner classified the case as a homicide, ruling he died of asphyxiation and blunt trauma.
Brooks’ family filed a lawsuit in January.
On Thursday afternoon, the charges will be unsealed in the courtroom of Oneida County Judge Robert Bauer. Meanwhile, another protest is planned outside Hochul’s office on Third Ave. in Manhattan.
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