Newly released video of a fatal beating at a New York prison shows correctional officers repeatedly punching a handcuffed man, hitting him in the chest with a shoe, lifting him by the neck and dropping him.
Body camera footage of the Dec. 9 assault on Robert Brooks was released Friday by the state attorney general, who is investigating the officers’ use of force.
Brooks, 43, was pronounced dead at a hospital the morning after the assault at Marcy Correctional Center, a state prison where he was incarcerated in Oneida County.
Thirteen correctional officers and a nurse involved in the attack will be fired, according to New York Governor Kathy Hochul, who said she was “outraged and horrified” by videos of the “senseless murder.”
Footage released Friday shows correctional officers punching Brooks repeatedly in the face and groin as he sits handcuffed on a medical examination table.
As one of the officers uses a shoe to hit Brooks in the stomach, another pulls him by the neck and drops him onto the table. The officers then remove the man’s shirt and pants as he lies motionless and bloodied on his back.
“These videos are shocking and disturbing and I advise everyone to exercise caution before choosing to watch them,” said New York Attorney General Letitia James.
Final results from Brooks’ autopsy are still pending.
Preliminary results of a medical examination indicate “concern that asphyxia due to neck compression was the cause of death, as well as that the death was due to the actions of others,” according to documents filed with the court.
The videos do not include audio because the body cameras were not activated by the officers wearing them. Following Brooks’ death, the state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision issued a directive requiring staff to use body cameras during every interaction with incarcerated people.
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James said his office was investigating the use of force that led to Brooks’ death, but did not say whether any of the officers would be charged with crimes.
With the release of the videos, “members of the public can now see for themselves the horrific and extreme nature of the deadly attack on Robert L. Brooks,” said his family’s attorney, Elizabeth Mazur.
“As viewers can see, Mr. Brooks was fatally and violently beaten by a group of officers whose job it was to keep him safe,” Mazur said. “He deserved to live, and everyone else at Marcy Correctional Facility deserves to know that they do not have to live in fear of violence from prison staff. »
The state prison officers’ union, which viewed footage of the assault before its public release, said in a statement: “What we witnessed is incomprehensible to say the least and certainly does not reflect the excellent work carried out by the vast majority of our members. every day.”
“This incident not only endangers all of our members, but also undermines the integrity of our profession. We cannot and will not tolerate this behavior,” said the union, the New York State Correctional Officers and Police Benevolent Association.
Brooks had been serving a 12-year prison sentence for first-degree assault since 2017. He had arrived at Marcy Correctional Center just hours before the beating, after being transferred from another nearby state prison, officials said.
Marcy is located approximately 200 miles (323 kilometers) northwest of New York, between the cities of Rome and Utica.
The Correctional Association of New York, a prison watchdog group, said it documented reports of pervasive brutality and racism inside Marcy Correctional Facility during an oversight visit ago two years.
The organization’s executive director, Jennifer Scaife, said the footage showing Brooks being beaten “is sickening and appalling, but not surprising” given its previous findings. She called on the state’s prison system to “address the systemic problems that allow such brutality to flourish.”
Tina Luongo, chief counsel for the Legal Aid Society of New York, called for “full transparency” about the use of force by state corrections personnel and “a full accounting of this tragedy.”
“Like everyone who has seen this video, we are horrified, angry and deeply saddened,” Luongo said, calling the assault on Brooks “a grotesque display of absolutely appalling inhumanity.”
“Too often, the violence that occurs behind prison walls remains hidden or becomes normalized in the public eye once the headlines fade,” said Luongo, whose organization provides public defender services and has clients in state prisons.
David Condliffe, executive director of the nonprofit Center for Community Alternatives promoting alternatives to incarceration, said, “We don’t need to look at these images to know what they reveal: generations of cruelty and encouraged and calculated abuse of power that fester and metastasize behind the blue wall of silence.
“For every case caught on camera, countless other acts of prison violence and murder are ignored, justified or covered up,” Condliffe said in a statement. “Accountability must include, but cannot stop at, the dismissal of a few individuals. Their violence is not an anomaly; it is the product of a system steeped in impunity.
© 2024 The Canadian Press