My story is everybody’s story. Gay Christian Texan, 1st job Build-A-Bear, current job dismantling torture of jails/prisons @LegalAidNYC. She/her. Views my own.
Brooklyn, NY
Joined February 2010
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Can’t describe how rare it has become for courts to actually hold DOC accountable for the most fundamental failures. Today, a court told our clients that their suffering matters—when the law says DOC can’t deny them access to medical care, the jails can’t just keep doing that.
#BREAKING: Along with @BklynDefender and @MilbankLaw, we just secured a ruling which holds @CorrectionNYC in contempt of court for failing to ensure incarcerated New Yorkers' access to medical care.
Order: tinyurl.com/u5cesf99
Press release: tinyurl.com/4mkdtne2
Come on!
The Legal Aid Society Prisoners' Rights Project (NYC) is hiring a supervising attorney. Come be my supervisor! recruiting.adp.com/srccar/pu…
“The department is attempting to shroud the jails in impenetrable darkness. Their preference for looking good over doing good is patently dangerous to all who are held or work in the jails.”
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Kayla Simpson retweeted
Our mayor says he has no patience for transparency & accountability & at a time when #Rikers is at its deadliest in years. No patience for oversight. Got it.
And won’t proactively offer transparency & accountability unless & until he is bound to by law. Got that too. 👀
Kayla Simpson retweeted
FRIDAY NEWS DUMP - Rikers monitor releases a damning report on several incidents that occurred in the last 2 weeks on Rikers. They include two compassionate releases, an inmate sustaining life altering injuries in intake, an incident of self harm and subsequent death and more.
Kayla Simpson retweeted
Damning special report issued tonite by federal monitor in charge of oversight at Rikers Island jails, with assertion that @NYCMayor's @CorrectionNYC is hiding info about deadly incidents, downplaying officers' lethal use of force & failing to investigate possible illegalities 1/
Kayla Simpson retweeted
It is with profound sadness that we share that our beloved Director of Organizing, Marvin Mayfield, has passed away. Marvin was a brilliant and buoyant warrior for freedom and justice. His love for the people and his family guided all he did. He taught us how to fight - and love.
And what, pray tell, makes it “reckless”? His 1/13/23 letter makes his motivations clear—he lists concerns about what makes DOC look bad, not the horrifying conditions the videos show or any legitimate reason to hide them from public view. And FOIL isn’t “leaking,” my goodness.
.@DOCCommish tells council he restricted access to video footage from Rikers Island because Board of Correction engaged in "significant numbers of reckless leaking of videos.”
@NYCSpeakerAdams doesn't follow up: "I'll leave that there for now."
So what "leaking" is this?? 1/2
Some courageous silence from BOC members today. Not even one person willing to move these proposals to a vote. The Mayor may abuse executive authority to establish them anyway, but the Board has ensured that such a power grab would be a naked one. Good for them.
Kayla Simpson retweeted
There are a number of new rules either being implemented or under consideration at the Board of Correction today. One limits public comment to six people per topic. Another reduces the number of public meetings per year from 9 to 6. A lot of resistance to all of it today
Kayla Simpson retweeted
My union. My colleagues. My boundaries. Max out vacations. Turn off phones and email. Love your clients, but live for you, not the work. Judges and the law are entirely fake. You will not see justice in your lifetime, no one does. Make it better for the next wave. Eat lunch.
Kayla Simpson retweeted
Day in and day out, @StefenRShort is a tireless, fearless advocate, and this is just the latest example - in response to the Mayor's proposal to sweep unhoused people with mental illness out of sight and into institutions:
New #OpEd from @StefenRShort in today's @NYDailyNews: What Adams’ mental illness push gets badly wrong
"We implore the mayor to rethink his plan and reevaluate his disproven assumptions about what unhoused people with mental illness need."
nydailynews.com/opinion/ny-o…
Kayla Simpson retweeted
New #OpEd from @StefenRShort in today's @NYDailyNews: What Adams’ mental illness push gets badly wrong
"We implore the mayor to rethink his plan and reevaluate his disproven assumptions about what unhoused people with mental illness need."
nydailynews.com/opinion/ny-o…
Kayla Simpson retweeted
Receivership is necessary. #receivershipnow #closerikers
***LAS Informs Federal Court that City has Failed to Comply w/ Court Orders to Protect Incarcerated People on Rikers Island***
***Receivership is Necessary to Protect of Thousands of Incarcerated NYers***
Letter: tinyurl.com/fje44skz
Press Release: tinyurl.com/24dyee4j
Kayla Simpson retweeted
"Years of plans, revised protocols, and recommendations have not corrected the City’s intractable failures — subjecting incarcerated New Yorkers to extraordinary suffering, and in far too many instances, death," - @KSimpsonHere.
subscriber.politicopro.com/a…
Over seven years of plans, promises, and pleas for more time. No more time. People are suffering and dying at extraordinary rates, and the City still won’t take the steps it must take to protect them. We cannot keep walking this path, it’s time for a new one.
Over 7 years, NYC has failed to comply with the core of a consent judgment & 4 remedial orders. Our clients face more harm today than they did in 2016. We have informed the Court that we intend to file for contempt & the appointment of a receiver over DOC.
nytimes.com/2022/11/14/nyreg…
“He told me on the phone this morning, 'This is crazy, I'm still here, I'm still in the same cell.' Every time he closes his eyes, what do you think he's seeing?"
"I'm worried for him, I'm scared for him. He just lost his brother. He's the one who found him deceased. I know he wants to see his family, hug someone, not be alone in his cell."
hellgatenyc.com/garcia-broth…
Call me crazy, but doesn’t it seem like a Molina email in that alternate universe might have read “so he can be with his family in peace” rather than literally articulating “make sure he’s off our count”? It seems like his concern there might have been…the count, not the person.
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Kayla Simpson retweeted
“At first we were happy he died with dignity, & we knew he wouldn’t die a prisoner,” said Aquandra Morris, 43, one of Mr. Pondexter’s three children. “But, then I thought about it — something is not right. They are trying to relinquish their responsibility.”
Hours before Elmore Robert Pondexter died after being held on Rikers Island, just two days after a man jumped from a jail barge + died, the jails commissioner wrote in an email to his staff to ensure that he is “off the Department’s count.”
A THREAD 🧵: nytimes.com/2022/09/27/nyreg…
