Gotham Gazette
"Now my son is considering taking a plea. It’s really tempting – he wants to be home, and he especially wants to get out of Rikers. But it’s not fair. My son, like so many others, was harassed by the police for being homeless, held for ransom by a judge, and denied due process by guards who don’t care about doing their jobs. Where’s the justice in that?" - Freedom Agenda Member, P. MassDeaths at New York's Rikers: A Mother's Pain
"It's a horror story in there and it's heartbreaking," the 58-year-old [UJC Freedom Agenda member Brian Carmichael] told AFP, citing gang violence, crumbling buildings and dirty toilets that flood.Manhattan Times
"The absentee voting process at the jail is unorganized, charged [UJC Freedom Agenda member Gregory] Williams, and causes many detained at Rikers to miss deadlines."NY Daily News
“Greg Williams, 57, who was detained at Rikers in 2020 on a parole violation, said the absentee system was confusing. ‘It just didn’t work the way they had it set up,’ said Williams, an activist with the advocacy group Freedom Agenda...“‘People didn’t know how to get absentee ballots in a timely fashion, who they were supposed to turn to, and there was no one to really advise them."NY Daily News
"'Anybody who says that’s not enough [beds] has an investment in incarceration,” [Darren Mack, of UJC's Freedom Agenda] said. “To backpedal against what is now the law, it would be subject to lawsuits.'”Democracy Now!
"In response, [Freedom Agenda] community organizer and Rikers survivor Edwin Santana said in a statement, “This tragedy should show every judge, prosecutor, and elected official who has ignored this truth before — Rikers is a death sentence."Gotham Gazette
"History shows that we cannot arrest and incarcerate our way to public safety. We can no longer tolerate a city budget that reflects this false notion. With the release of the mayor’s executive budget proposal, it is clear that we have work to do before this year’s budget deadline to move in the right direction." [Op-Ed by Darren Mack of Freedom Agenda and Rev. Wendy Brown]AM NY
“A receiver may be able to cut through some of the dysfunction accumulated from decades of political cowardice, appeasement of COBA, and disregard for incarcerated people, but Rikers cannot be fixed,” said Darren Mack, Co-Director of Freedom Agenda [at UJC]. “It must be closed, and the Mayor should be taking every opportunity to expedite those plans.”NY Daily News
"To propose yet another increase in headcount to solve the same (though considerably worsened) problem without evidence of success is both brazen and irresponsible."Join us for our monthly member meetings, from 7-9pm on the second Tuesday of each month. Contact Darren at dmack@urbanjustice.org for details on how to join.
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