He led a hunger strike at Rikers Island. Now he's being held on The Boat.
(Photo Credit: Stephen Speranza, The New York Times)
A recent hunger strike on Rikers Island sought to raise the alarm about deteriorating conditions within the island prison complex. The only reason it ended, lawyers say, was due to retaliation from corrections staff.
The strike, which included around 200 people incarcerated in the Robert N. Davoren Complex (RDNC) on Rikers Island, began on Jan. 8, lasting at least ten days before an intervention by prison staff to isolate protest organizers.
That allegation was confirmed by Lupe Todd-Medina at the NYCDS, who blames the Department of Corrections for retaliating against their clients.
“They still are not able to get to court,” she said. “They haven't been able to get their medications on a regular basis.”
In an interview with The Blueprint, Todd-Medina said co-organizer Ervin Bowins was moved to the Vernon C. Bain Center, a jail barge known as “The Boat” on the island prison complex as punishment for leading the strike. A Jan. 26 report in the New York Daily News noted he’s been at Rikers since April 2021, awaiting trial on an assault charge.
She confirmed that public defenders are still working to get Bowins released on emergency relief, similar to the client the NYCDS defended during the “Fight Club” case in 2020, who faced retaliation from the same Department of Corrections as Bowins.
(Photo credit: Andrew Lichtenstein, Getty Images)
Carl Dix, a central figure in the fight to end Stop and Frisk practices—the ability for police to detain and pat down individuals, even if they aren’t suspected of committing a crime—has been a vocal supporter of the Rikers strikers.
In a Jan. 13 press release, Dix described the conditions that those on Rikers Island are protesting:
Freezing temperatures inside the facility
Mail being withheld
No visits from family members
Cancellation of hearings in their cases
Being denied video conferences with attorneys
“The RNDC complex contains unhygienic metallic dormitories with beds crammed close to each other, COVID spreading, and fights and violence escalating,” Dix said.
Inmates no longer on lockdown, allowed in law library
Located between the Bronx and Queens, Rikers Island has become known as one of America’s most brutal prisons. In 2021 alone, ten people died behind bars on Rikers Island, at least five of them by suicide.
The overwhelming population of incarcerated people on Rikers Island are still awaiting their day in court. The island prison complex recently gained notoriety after the story of 16-year-old Khalief Browder came to light. Browder, who spent three years in solitary confinement on the island without being convicted of a crime, died by suicide in 2015, two years after being released.
While state and city officials announced a plan to close the island prison complex by 2026, it appears conditions facing those suffering in silence are worse than ever.
Dix noted that over 1,500 people have been incarcerated on the island for over a year while awaiting trial. 87 per cent of those jailed at Rikers are Black and Latino.
He added that inmates have suffered beatings by prison guards and other inmates, while those held in solitary confinement at Rikers experience “conditions that amount to torture.”
“I have called this a slow genocide targeting Black and Brown people, a genocide that could easily become a fast one,” he wrote.
Christopher Boyle, Director of Data Research and Policy at New York County Defender Services (NYCDS), represents many Rikers residents who are awaiting their day in court. According to Dix, Boyle was told “that his phone number is blocked by the authorities at Rikers.”
“This means news of retaliation against the hunger strikers may not be getting out of the prison.”
He pointed out that newly-elected New York City Mayor Eric Adams is already working to reinstate stop-and-frisk practices, as well as bringing back plainclothes police task forces and bringing back the use of solitary confinement.
Todd-Medina says the hunger strike was successful, as it brought public attention to the injustices facing those suffering in silence without a platform of their own. It also led to some meaningful change; inmates are no longer on lockdown, and access to the law library has been restored—that is, unless you’re Ervin Bowins, who remains on a boat with no access to books or phone calls.