More than a dozen correction officers involved in the fatal beating a 22-year-old from Harlem at a New York state prison earlier this year either didn’t wear their body cameras, turned away or shut them off so they wouldn’t document the violence, according to a new lawsuit.
The New York County public administrator is suing the correction officers, the superintendent of the prison and state Corrections Commissioner Daniel Martuscello III on behalf of the estate of Messiah Nantwi, who was incarcerated at Mid-State Correctional Facility outside of Utica. Each borough has a public administrator to handle the estates of New Yorkers who die without a will and don’t have anyone available to oversee their assets. The suit argues prison officials should have done more to prevent Nantwi’s death and should ensure correction officers follow the department’s body-camera policy.
“When you have a constant stream of information coming to you that excessive force is out of control and that people feel that they can kill people, officers feel they can kill incarcerated people with impunity, that’s an emergency,” Katie Rosenfeld, an attorney representing the public administrator on behalf of Nantwi’s estate, said in an interview. “A huge red flag is being waved, and the commissioner needed to take any action.”…