Rikers Island stands as one of the globe’s most infamous jail complexes. Located in the East River between the Bronx and Queens in New York City, the century-old facility contains 10 city jails and has been synonymous with violence, inhumane conditions and fatalities. City comptroller Brad Lander’s office has previously described it as a “moral stain on the city”.
Shocking images released in 2024 exposed appalling conditions within Rikers Island’s Otis Bantum Correctional Center. During the peak of the Covid pandemic, as many as 26 men were allegedly packed into temporary cells, using plastic sheets as blankets, cardboard as beds, and plastic bags as toilets.
The city announced in 2019 that the complex would ultimately be shuttered, with four new facilities planned to replace it, including a so-called “jailscraper”. It comes after America’s longest-serving prisoner died at the age of 101 after spending more than seven decades behind bars…