BREAKING: A federal judge will not hear arguments from attorneys representing detainees living in deadly conditions at Rikers Island that a federal receiver should be appointed to wrest control of the jails away from the city.
The request had been to hold the Department of Correction in contempt for failing to abide by provisions of a 2015 consent decree, which demanded steps be taken to prevent violence and decrease officers’ use of force. Since that time, a federal monitor — who does not have decision-making powers as robust as those of a receiver — presided over the jails, but by most measures the facilities have only gotten more dangerous for detainees and staff.
In a Manhattan courtroom on Thursday, U.S. District Court Judge Laura Taylor Swain denied the contempt motion and a corresponding request to file motions to argue for a receiver. She was swayed by arguments from city attorneys and Correction Commissioner Louis Molina that 28 new civilian leaders at the department are correcting problems decades in the making.have died in city custody or shortly after being released this year, which is the highest death rate in city jails in more than a decade.
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