Hochul Orders Release of 191 Detainees as Rikers Crisis Deepens

The New York governor signed a bill on Friday that authorized the release of the detainees, but the population of the city’s notorious jail will remain far higher than it was last spring.

​Responding to an escalating crisis inside New York City’s notorious Rikers Island jail complex, Gov. Kathy Hochul on Friday signed a measure that will lead to the release of about 200 detainees, many of them being held for parole violations.

The law, known as the Less is More Act, is intended to ease crowding in the jail at a time when severe staffing shortages at the city’s Department of Correction have led to unsafe and unsanitary conditions for detainees and guards. Ten people have died at Rikers since December, several by suicide.

Even though the law does not go into effect until next March, Ms. Hochul said she was directing the board of parole to immediately release 191 people who qualify from Rikers Island. They were expected to be released on Friday.