City jail officials opened a unit for people suspected of setting fires while detained on Rikers Island, but closed the next day after a federal monitor found it was unauthorized, and lacked required fire prevention equipment.
The misstep was revealed in a special report filed in a New York federal court on Thursday by federal monitor Steve Martin. Martin and his team are charged with overseeing conditions at Rikers Island under a 2015 court agreement to reduce violence in the jails.
Fire suppression systems are necessary for all housing units, Martin said, but the need is “particularly acute for a unit attempting to re-house known fire-setters and thereby reduce arson.”
Frank Dwyer, a spokesman for the city Department of Correction, said the unit has enough sprinklers to meet city building codes, but not one in every cell.
Martin said in court papers that his office learned from an anonymous source that the Department of Correction had opened an Arson Reduction Housing Unit on Rikers Island on Nov. 13. Martin is not permitted to speak to reporters, according to a court order.
The department shouldn’t have opened a new unit without consulting the federal monitor, and it had previously assured them it would not, Martin said. He immediately filed a complaint to the court and the city, and the unit was closed the next day.
However, on Thursday, the monitor told the court he had new and “concerning” information on the short-lived arson prevention unit: It didn’t have a working fire suppression system when it opened. The official who opened the unit later claimed it had been a miscommunication.
The department was the brainchild of Charles Daniels, principal adviser to Department of Correction Commissioner Louis Molina. Daniels said he designed the unit as part of a new “Violence Reduction Plan” according to a legal filing.
It’s not the first time Daniels has been accused of overstepping his authority in a job. Gothamist previously reported that in his last…
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