Correx bigs get $275G in bias suit

Three former high-ranking members of the Department of Correction will receive a $275,000 settlement after alleging discrimination and manipulation of statistics on violence behind bars due to pressure from City Hall.

Former Senior Deputy Commissioner Charles Daniels, former Deputy Commissioner of Operations Errol Toulon and ex-Assistant Commissioner Keith Taylor said a glass ceiling at Correction Department resulted in black executive staff being treated differently than their white peers.

They said they were forced out in 2017 after refusing to “undertake in the falsification and manipulation of facts regarding violence within Rikers Island.”

The settlement, which includes legal fees, was revealed on Thursday and requires a judge’s approval.

It will be split among the three men, who remain prominent figures in the corrections world. Daniels now runs daily operations for men’s prisons in Alabama, Toulon was elected sheriff of Suffolk County, and Taylor is an adjunct professor at John Jay College in New York City.

The lawsuit filed in Manhattan Federal Court in December 2017 cast a harsh light on the tenure of former Commissioner Joseph Ponte, whom Mayor de Blasio hired in April 2014 to curb violence at city jails.

Daniels accused Ponte of berating him in a hallway at City Hall “for not covering up the violence” after a presentation about conditions at Rikers Island.

Then-Deputy Commissioner Cynthia Brann “intentionally tried to cover up the violence within Rikers Island and keep African-American supervisors in the dark,” according to the lawsuit.

“There is no room for discrimination of any kind at our agencies. While we dispute these claims and did not admit wrongdoing, it was in the best interest of all parties to settle this case,” a Law Department spokesman said.