Guards in Fatal Prison Assault Were Accused of Beating Inmates Before
The New York Times
Three of the 13 guards implicated in the savage beating of Robert Brooks had been accused in lawsuits of earlier attacks in New York prisons.
At least three of the New York prison guards implicated in the savage beating death of a handcuffed man had been accused of participating in similar attacks on prisoners across the state.
Two of the corrections officers and a sergeant accused in the death of Robert Brooks, an inmate at the Marcy Correctional Facility in central New York, were previously named in federal lawsuits filed by prisoners accusing them of brutal attacks that left one man disfigured and another in a wheelchair.
A lawyer for one of the injured men drew a line from the earlier accusations of violence to the attack this month.
“The fact that they failed to rein in these officers that they knew had beaten someone else is a direct contributor to Mr. Brooks’s death,” said Katie Rosenfeld, the lawyer. She criticized the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision for fighting her client’s lawsuit for four years.
Letitia James, the state attorney general, on Friday released video footage of guards beating Mr. Brooks in a prison infirmary on Dec. 9. The footage, captured on body cameras worn by four of the officers, showed the guards punching, kicking and choking Mr. Brooks over roughly 20 minutes.
In a swift and rare rebuke of the guards’ actions, Daniel F. Martuscello III, the state’s corrections commissioner, vowed to address a culture of brutality that has long permeated the state’s prison system.
