A History of Rikers

Summary

Podcast Summary: All Of It – "A History of Rikers"

Host: Alison Stewart (WNYC)
Guests: Graham Raymond (New York Daily News reporter), Reuven Blau (Senior Reporter, The City)
Air Date: December 27, 2023

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Episode Overview

This episode of "All Of It" dives into the storied and troubled history of Rikers Island, New York City’s primary jail complex. Host Alison Stewart speaks with journalists Graham Raymond and Reuven Blau, co-authors of "Rikers: An Oral History," to explore the lived experiences of detainees, corrections officers, and reformers. They discuss the systemic issues, the conditions inside, challenges around reform, and why Rikers remains a focal point in the city's justice system.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

The Population at Rikers: Who’s Incarcerated, Who Guards

• Types of Offenses Leading to Rikers
  • Many are arrested for misdemeanors (up to a year in jail), but a large share are facing felonies potentially leading to longer sentences. (03:35)
    • Graham Raymond: “You can be arrested on a misdemeanor ... there's also a much larger percentage of people who are there on felonies which could result in state prison time of more than a year.” (03:35)
• Demographics of Inmates
  • Population is about 6,000 and rising—mostly Black and Latino men, with the target for shutdown-era reforms being far lower. (03:57)
    • Reuven Blau: “It's really fluid. It's about 6,000 right now ... as part of the shutdown plan, they wanted to kind of reach a target population about 3,300.” (03:57)
• Correction Officers
  • Near one-to-one ratio of staff to inmates; most officers are Black and Latino, and nearly half are women. (04:27)
    • Graham Raymond: “Almost half are women correction officers.” (04:44)

Why Write an Oral History?

• Raymond and Blau chose oral history for intimacy and authenticity, letting the people closest to the story speak for themselves.
  • Graham Raymond: “We thought that putting the voices of the people who actually worked there, who actually were incarcerated there, first and foremost was a lot more effective way of telling the story.” (04:58)

Isolation and Indifference

• Rikers’ remote location deepens its invisibility and allows abuse and neglect to continue.
  • Graham Raymond: “Out of sight, out of mind ... it made it easier to pretend that that population wasn't there.” (06:10)
• Many held pretrial, spending months or even years without conviction—often longer than their eventual sentence.
  • Graham Raymond: “The average length of stay pretrial is over 100 days ... some people are there one year, two years, three years, four years.” (06:10)

The Evolution of Gang Culture

• Historic shifts from borough-based gangs to highly organized crews like the Latin Kings and the Bloods.
  • Graham Raymond: “The Latin Kings became so big that the Bloods emerged as mainly a black gang ... it can follow you all the way upstate, too.” (07:12)
• Challenges in classification—attempts to segregate or mix gang members haven’t solved violence.
  • Reuven Blau: In 2022, there were over 500 stabbings/slashings, up from just 40 in 2007. (09:29)
    • “There's to 500 stabbings and slashings last year on Rikers and in the city Department of Correction. ... it was 40 in 2007.” (09:29)

Rikers as a De Facto Mental Health Facility

• Massive failures in mental health care have resulted in Rikers absorbing thousands who need treatment, not incarceration.
  • Reuven Blau: “It's a broader reflection of society and of New York especially, where over the years there's been ... a move to deinstitutionalize ... the number of beds has shrunk. ... the NYPD doesn't really know how to handle [mental illness] other than to arrest them.” (10:21)
• Solitary confinement is overused, especially for those unable to comply due to mental illness.

Lived Experience: LGBTQ+ and Vulnerable Populations

• Caller: Michael from Queens speaks of the insecurity and harassment he faced as a gay detainee:
  • “When you're gay and you're constantly harassed ... the correction officers were just as homophobic ... If you ask to be put into [protective custody], they put you in the same section ... as people that are being punished.” (11:42)
  • Michael describes protection measures as punitive—leading to further victimization.
  • “It was like going back to the 50s about people's idea about being gay.” (12:55)
• Reuven Blau highlights the “false narrative” that Rikers was ever a safe or effective institution, referencing past NYPD leaders’ claims.
  • “Every single one of these callers has highlighted ... that is just completely a false narrative.” (13:57)

Systemic Failures: Accountability and Leadership

• Management failures, rather than policy alone, underpin many problems.
  • Graham Raymond: Tells a story about fire safety: “There's a story ... about a group of lawyers went to investigate ... and there's a tree growing through the fire escape, blocking the egress ... So that's a management accountability issue.” (14:32)
• A cycle of reformist leaders, but little real change, especially without structural overhaul.
  • Reuven Blau: “There's been years and years of commissioners who come in ... they all want to make it better, but they've all failed ... supporters of the federal monitor coming in ... argue that's what's needed.” (15:35)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “You could put Mother Teresa in there and in a month she'd be shanking people.” (Alison Stewart quoting a detainee from the book) (02:56)
• Graham Raymond: “We wanted the field to be as intimate as possible, as close to the ground as you could be.” (04:58)
• Caller Michael: “It was a surreal experience ... I can't even begin to tell you the mindset of the people, not just the inmates, the correction officers ... I mean, it was really, really hard. And I'm just blessed that I got through it.” (12:55)
• Graham Raymond (on reform): “That may be among the more serious issues that the Correction Department has to deal with.” (15:13)

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Important Segments & Timestamps

• Introduction and Rikers Context – 01:36
• Why an Oral History – 04:51
• Isolation’s Impact – 06:00
• Gang Culture and Violence – 07:12
• Mental Health Crisis – 10:03
• LGBTQ+ Experience (Caller Michael) – 11:38
• Management and Accountability – 14:24
• Leadership and Systemic Reform – 15:31

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Tone and Style

The conversation is candid, raw, and unsparing but also concerned and hopeful that by surfacing these real stories, change might be possible. Stewart, Raymond, and Blau consistently prioritize the voices of people who have direct contact with Rikers, underscoring the complexity—not just policy, but lived experience and daily neglect.

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Summary

This episode powerfully demystifies Rikers Island and the New York jail system, situating individuals’ stories within systemic patterns of neglect, violence, and failed reform. Through oral history and first-person accounts, listeners are given a sobering glimpse into the realities of incarceration and the urgent need for structural accountability in the city’s justice system.

Transcript

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[Graham Raymond]

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[Reuven Blau]

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[Graham Raymond]

Listener Supported WNYC Studios.

[Alison Stewart]

This is all of it from wnyc. I'm Alison Stewart, and we close out our hour about the justice system in New York City with a look at its jails and one particularly harrowing facility, Rikers Island. 2020 was the deadliest year for people in city custody since 1995, according to WNYC Gothamist reporter Matt Katz. That year, 19 incarcerated people died at Rikers jail facilities or at local hospitals when they were treated. Six were death by suicide and at least four were drug overdoses. So far in 2023, nine detainees have died. Despite efforts by some city officials to close Rikers, the jail's population has increased. A city issued that, quote, department of Correction leadership has indicated that they expect the jail population to continue growing. That information is not surprising. If you've heard reporting on any of the conditions of violence and dysfunction that pervade Rikers island, where, by the way, the vast majority of people, 87%, are still awaiting trial. A book that came out earlier this year goes beyond all those numbers and into the stories of people who know firsthand what happens on Rikers Island. As one detainee says in the book. You could put Mother Teresa in there and in a month she'd be shanking people. The book is called An Oral History from New York Daily News reporter Graham Raymond and senior reporter at the news organization the City, Reuven Blau. It features interview excerpts from former detainees, retired corrections officers, lawyers, reformers and family members who tell an intimate and realistic portrait of Rikers. You're going to hear an encore presentation, and since it's not live, we won't be taking calls. Today, though you'll hear callers on the air. Blau and Raymond joined me on the show when the book came out. I started by asking Graham Raymond to explain the kind of offenses that lead to one being incarcerated at Rikers.

[Graham Raymond]

Well, you could you can be arrested on a misdemeanor which, where the sentence is up to a year in jail. And there's also a larger percentage, much larger percentage of people who are there on felonies, which could result in state prison time of more than a year.

[Alison Stewart]

Revain what does the current population look like in terms of age, race, gender?

[Reuven Blau]

It's a great question. It's really fluid. It's about 6,000 right now, which is, you know, it's creeping up. The correction commissioner testified last year, late last year, that they expect their population to go up to about 7,000. And as part of the shutdown plan, they wanted to kind of reached a target population about 3,300, which, you know, during COVID it was this amazing opportunity they had. They were releasing a lot of people and it actually did dip for the first time in decades below 4,000.

[Alison Stewart]

What about corrections officers? Who are the corrections officers?

[Reuven Blau]

Yeah, so the correction officers. There's incredible ratio compared to kind of other places in the state. It's almost one to one. It's a little more, a little less than that. But largely it is a kind of a very large kind of minority workforce, a lot of black and Latino people.

[Graham Raymond]

Who are who are working there, and almost half are women. Almost half of the corrections staff are women correction officers, women.

[Alison Stewart]

Graham, how did you decide that an oral history would be the best way to approach this rather than a straightforward narrative nonfiction?

[Graham Raymond]

When we were both working at the Daily News a few years ago, we had talked about a conventional history, but we thought that putting the voices of the people who actually worked there, who actually were incarcerated there, first and foremost was a lot more effective way of telling the story rather than, you know, Graham and ravane's take from 5000ft up just and, you know, we wanted to be the stories to be as, you know, we wanted the field to be as intimate as possible, as close to the ground as you. As you could be.

[Alison Stewart]

Yeah, the word intimate is what came to me while I was reading the book. And also very raw.

[Graham Raymond]

Yeah, these are, these are very tough stories. You know, they're certainly. There's funny stories in the book, there's moving stories in the book. There's stories of kindness and humanity. But yeah, these are tough stories. And it took a lot. One of the people we interviewed said that he told a story about how he couldn't get to his mother's funeral because there was a bureaucratic screw up in the jail, his grandmother's funeral. And after he told that story, he said, I know I'm going to have to talk to someone after we have this conversation.

[Alison Stewart]

Yeah, Graham, I got a sense that, and this may sound incredibly obvious, but that the isolation has allowed the problems to fester and it's also allowed people to ignore Rikers.

[Graham Raymond]

Sure. Out of sight, out of mind. I mean, it's one of the reasons why 100 years ago they decided to put the first large jail, the city's first large jail on Rikers. They, you know, just put it, keep it away from, keep it away from site. Just made it easier to pretend that that population wasn't there. I mean, it's far more than half of the people are there pretrial. It's much closer to 90%. Right. And you know, the average length of stay pretrial is over 100 days. And some people are there one year, two years, three years, four years. That's a huge. And often their pretrial period that they are incarcerated is much longer than the ultimate sentence that they're going to get.

[Alison Stewart]

So, yeah, I wanted to follow up on the gangs. Graham, how has gang culture evolved at Rikers over the past 40, 50 years?

[Graham Raymond]

Very quickly, in the 70s and early 80s, it was usually borough based, you know, Manhattan versus Queens, or it was based around the very large drug gangs that evolved. And then in late we started seeing Latin Kings, which is largely Puerto Rican based gang. And in response to that, the Bloods emerged. The Latin Kings became so big that the Bloods emerged as mainly a black gang. And it spawned and they spread throughout Rikers and then spread outside of Rikers into neighborhoods all over the city. And they become the dominant gang in New York City in various definitions of, you know, different sets in different neighborhoods, sometimes different sets in the same few block area. And in the book, there's a story by Colin Absalom. He goes into Rikers in Christmas, Christmas Eve 1994, and he intervenes in a fight between some gang members and another guy. And what happens after that is that gang labels him, and the fact that he fought against them follows him from unit to unit over the next two years. And every time he gets to a new unit, he either has to fight his way in, fight his way out, or he. At a certain point, he just starts refusing. He looks inside and he goes, oh, there's some of the members of that gang. And that's real. And that can follow you all the way upstate, too. So it's something that the system has struggled over, whether to house gang members together or house them separately. And currently they're housing them separately. They're trying to redo the classifications to house them separately. And kind of the jury's still out to see how that's going to work.

[Alison Stewart]

One thing I thought was interesting, a person in the book named Michael Love described the Latin Kings as being incredibly disciplined and having meetings and incredibly organized in that way. How do the CEOs react? Because clearly they see this happening.

[Reuven Blau]

You know, there's a lot of frustration just from on the. On the ground level, because, you know, they feel that, like, when there is the gangs as one and one gang, kind of one unit there, like it, it makes their job much more difficult because there's sort of kind of us versus them. And that's why there's kind of this process, as Graham was talking about, to sort of co. Mingle. But, you know, it's been a. It's been a bit of a disaster so far. There's to 500 stabbings and slashings last year on Rikers and in the city Department of Correction. Just to put that member in context, it was 40 in 2007, and I think about 17 or 19 the year before. So it's really gone kind of exploded.

[Alison Stewart]

Ed Rosario told you he was a person who was detained there in 1990. Rikers is one of the largest penal colonies in the world and also the city's de facto mental health facility. Why do so many people with mental illness, especially those who need specialized care, end up in Rikers instead of a medical facility?

[Reuven Blau]

Yeah, it's a great question. I think, you know, it's a kind of a broader reflection of society and of New York especially, where over the years there's been kind of a move to deinstitutionalize, you know, people with serious mental illness and to move them into sort of smaller group homes. You know, that was the sort of plan the federal government has not come through with funding for that. And as you know, as the years have gone on, the number of beds has shrunk. And on the streets, a lot of times, people with these issues will act out in ways that the NYPD doesn't really know how to handle other than to arrest them. I mean, there was somebody who recently took his own life in Rikers last year. He ended up in Rikers because he was in a hospital ER waiting room, and he had kind of a mental breakdown. And instead of going to the doctor, instead of being seen by a doctor, the hospital police staff arrested him, sent him to Rikers. And, you know, of course, that's just not the place anyone is gonna succeed when they just struggle to kind of understand basic orders. And, you know, solitary confinement comes up in a big. In a big role in that way. Many people who struggle with mental illness just can't understand just, you know, how to participate in just a regular headcount there. And, you know, by the jail staff for many years just has used that, you know, the punishment of solitary confinement to sort of react in that way, to punish them.

[Alison Stewart]

Talk to Michael from Queens. Hi, Michael. Thank you so much for calling, all of it.

[Michael (Caller)]

Oh, thank you for having this conversation. So I was at rikers from late 2012 to early 2014. And I'll be brief, two issues. One thing was, because it's a jail and it's transient, and you're there to either be charged or to go to court or to be released or various things, you didn't know if someone was there for jumping the turnstile or they were a murderer because nobody spoke about what they were charged with. It was like a secret. The other thing is, I'm a gay man, and I was harassed and threatened, and, you know, I just never knew from day to day what was going to happen. And again, I was there for two years. A lot of people aren't there because again, they get charged or they go to court or they go to prison. You know, I was fighting my case, so I was there a long time, so I have a lot to tell. The thing about when you're gay and you're constantly harassed is the correction officers were just as homophobic. They never protected you. They never. They just kind of allowed it to happen. And if you ask to be put into, like, it's a section where you're protected, they put you in the same section that. Where they put people that are being punished. So you're put into this tiny little cell with people that had just maybe stabbed someone. So it was better to just stay in the. In the general area than ask to be protected and to be put where you're actually being punished. I mean, it was a surreal experience. You know, I went there. Not knowing you was like going back to the 50s about people's idea about being gay. I mean, I was just. It's another world. I can't even begin to tell you the mindset set of the people, not just the inmates, the correction officers. I mean, it was just about being gay. I mean, it was really, really hard. And I'm just blessed that I got through it.

[Alison Stewart]

Michael, thank you so much for being so candid in sharing your experience. We are talking about the book An Oral History with Graham Raymond and Ruvane.

[Michael (Caller)]

Wow.

[Alison Stewart]

Before I go to my next question, did you want to respond to anything you heard from our callers?

[Reuven Blau]

I just wanted to say, like, I just find it fascinating that, you know, the Brian Laird had on Bill Bratton and he was, he talked about Rikers and he said, I don't understand why the problem is. You know, back in the 90s, this is great. You know, everything was, you know, then the population was 20,000. And then, you know, we corrected. They spent time in Rikers and, you know, the murders, the number of murders went down. And I just think that every single one of these callers has highlighted how that is just completely a false narrative. And, you know, talking about their struggles really shows that.

[Alison Stewart]

Yeah, we had somebody saying the problem that's not being addressed, it's not policy, it's a management issue. Does that ring true for what you heard, Graham?

[Graham Raymond]

Oh, yes, yes. There is a management accountability issue. I'll give you an example. There's a story in the book about a group of lawyers went to investigate the fire safety system in a given jail and they get to the fire safety door through which 300 people are going to have to run if there's a big fire and where's the key? And one of the lawyer, John Boston, retired legal aid lawyer, says, can we get the key and can we get it sometime today? So they finally find the key. After an hour of searching, they get through the door and they get to the fire escape. And there's a tree growing through the fire escape, blocking the egress for this hypothetical 300 people are going to go through this, through this door. That tree had been growing. It was about three or four years old. So nobody had checked that fire escape. So that's a management accountability issue that the system has. And, you know, and that may be. That may be among the more serious issues that the Correction Department has to deal with.

[Alison Stewart]

Reuvain, who've been some of the leaders on reform with Rikers.

[Reuven Blau]

Yeah, that's a great question. You know, de Blasio, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced, you know, the supporting of the closed Rikers plan arguably was sort of almost pushed into it by the advocates, but, you know, did support it and has kind of, before leaving office, started kind of in motion to demolish the jails in Brooklyn and Queens, you know, to make room for the new jails. You know, six months before he left office, he appointed Vinny Schiraldi, who is kind of universally known as a reformer, and, you know, had a lot of intentions to kind of change things up, you know, but it was only six months because when Eric Adams took over, he's pointed. Louis Molina, who's also, you know, says, like, look, I want to, you know, make things better. He's testifying right now in front of the city council about, you know, issues that we're having with the LGBTQ unit and a bunch of other things, you know, but it's been a tough. There's been a lot of talk about trying to get a federal receiver to come in and take over. And one of the things that people say in favor of that is, you know, there's been years and years of commissioners who come in, and they all have great intentions to change things. And, you know, nobody comes in and says, like, oh, I want this to be status quo. They all want to make it better, but they've all failed. And for various reasons. And the supporters of the federal monitor coming in, who would kind of be able to start off from scratch and ultimately kind of change whatever rules exist currently. They argue that that's what's needed because they don't think that the system currently is set up in a way that can lead to positive change.

[Alison Stewart]

That was my conversation with New York Daily News reporter Graham Raymond and senior reporter at the news organization the City, Reuven Blau, about their book Rikers and oral history. And that is all of it for today. I'm Alison Stewart. I appreciate you listening, and I appreciate you. I will meet you back here next time.

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