Rikers Island prisoners left to face ‘Frankenstorm’ as surrounding areas zoned for evacuation
New York, NY – As the ‘Frankenstorm’ Hurricane Sandy approached New York City, Mayor Bloomberg announced plans for mandatory evacuations of the areas of the city most exposed to the incoming storm. But in a map of evacuation zones, the Rikers Island jail, which houses 12,000 people and sits in the water between Queens and the Bronx, directly in the line of the incoming hurricane, was conspicuously not color-coded in Zone A, B or C for possible evacuation. The areas all around Rikers Island are mostly labeled as Zone B, which means “moderate likelihood of evacuation.”
When asked by reporters on Oct. 28 whether the jail would be evacuated, Bloomberg didn’t respond with concern about the well-being of the people imprisoned there. Instead he replied tersely, “Jails are secure...don’t worry about anyone getting out.”
In response to Mayor Bloomberg’s statement, the Center for Constitutional Rights Executive Director Vincent Warren said, “It is unconscionable that the city has made no plans for the evacuation of Riker’s Island. The city has an obligation to help ensure the safety of all its residents. With Hurricane Sandy bearing down on the East Coast and indications that the storm’s impact could be far greater than Hurricane Irene’s (where the city also failed to include Riker’s in its evacuation plan), we urge Mayor Bloomberg to belatedly to show some concern for the lives of the 12,000 men, women and children whose ability to escape this storm is entirely at the city’s mercy. It is appalling that the lessons of Hurricane Katrina, where prisoners at Orleans Parish Prison were abandoned and left in locked cells, some standing in chest-high sewage-tainted water, remain stubbornly unlearned by the leadership of our city.”