Emptying jails is a risky fantasy

Groups of zealots have argued that the coronavirus pandemic should lead all New Yorkers to eagerly embrace a drastic re- duction in the jail and prison population. While it is unsurprising that these so-called advocates would seize on our current health crisis to advance their own agenda, it is the dangerous fantasy of their demands that should trouble us most.

The truth is that people are still committing serious crimes — acts harmful not only to individual victims but also to society. As long as this remains true, complete jail-emptying is a fiction of self-promoting politicians only looking to advance their own careers.

When the pandemic began, it created an unprecedented public health and law enforcement emergency. In response, the city’s prosecutors consented to the early release of defendants who were at high risk of contracting and spreading COVID-19 to other inmates or staff at Rikers Island. These defendants had been convicted of nonviolent offenses and had only a short time remaining on their sentences.

Despite our good-faith efforts, misguided and agenda-driven activists have used this as an opportunity to demand the total emptying of our jails. Yes, even of those convicted or pending trial on violent crimes including homicide, rape and sexual abuse of children. Almost daily, defense attorneys petition the courts for the release of defendants accused of committing these violent offenses or other serious crimes.

These requests for release not only put victims at risk, they are based on a falsehood: that the infection rate in the jails is significantly higher than the city’s general population, and that being held on Rikers Island is akin to a “death sentence.” We now know that at the start of this crisis, the population at Rikers had been tested at a rate that was 8.3 times higher than the testing rate of the city’s general population. At the same time, the rate of deaths in jails remains nine times lower than the fatality rate of the city’s general population. While three individuals had died of COVID-19 while in custody by the end of April, at least 15,000, likely far more, had died of coronavirus in the city at large.

In an egregious example, Legal Aid successfully petitioned the court for the release of a 77-year-old Staten Island defendant who had tested positive for COVID-19 while at Rikers after being charged with course of sexual conduct against a child for allegedly abusing a minor on multiple occasions. Over our objections, this COVID-positive defendant was released into a cityrun nursing complex on Roosevelt Island, where it was later reported that over 70 patients had become infected with coronavirus. It’s unfathomable that the city would place COVID-positive inmates in the same facilities as law-abiding and high-risk New Yorkers, but, sadly, this is the state of our current reality.

Moreover, inmates — some of whom might not have access to health-care or housing once released — could arguably receive better care while incarcerated. In a city with our resources, and a jail population lower than it has been in 70 years, the only solution to coronavirus at Rikers cannot be to release everyone. Instead, simple measures should have been taken from the start of this crisis to allow for social distancing and better quarantining of the sick to protect inmates and corrections staff, rather than releasing inmates en masse to account for earlier mistakes.

In recent weeks, we have seen several serious crimes committed on Staten Island, including the double homicide of a pregnant woman and her boyfriend, and multiple significant weapons-related arrests. At each arraignment, my ADAs successfully argued for bail or remand to be set, and these defendants currently remain incarcerated pending trial.

The delusional mission to empty all jails will make us all less safe in the end. As Justice Benjamin Cardozo said, “Justice, though due to the accused, is due the accuser also.” As we struggle every day to contain the coronavirus pandemic, our elected leaders need to serve all New Yorkers, not just the loudest and most extreme.

McMahon is Staten Island’s district attorney.