This story originally appeared in New York Focus, a nonprofit news publication investigating power in New York. Sign up for their newsletter here.
A sweeping report excoriates the Department of Corrections and Community Supervision for failing to protect prisoners and staff.
By Chris Gelardi , New York Focus
In February 2025, a team of consultants walked into Central New York’s Marcy Correctional Facility, responding to Governor Kathy Hochul’s call for an investigation into prison violence. Two months earlier, guards at the prison had beaten an incarcerated man, 43-year-old Robert Brooks, in the infirmary. Body cameras, which the officers thought were turned off, captured them taking turns punching and choking a bloody, handcuffed Brooks. He died hours later.
The visitors, from the law firm WilmerHale, found a prison system stuck in its brutal past. Incarcerated people and current and former officers complained of frequent violence at the hands of both prisoners and guards. Only weeks into their investigation, officers killed another incarcerated man, 22-year-old Messiah Nantwi, at a prison down the road from Marcy.
This month, the state prison agency released the consultants’ long-awaited findings and recommendations in a 277-page report with dozens of recommendations. Based on facility visits, hundreds of interviews, and internal prison documents, it offers scathing new insights into the Department of Corrections and Community Supervision — and a roadmap for reform.
While lawmakers and the prison agency commissioner preach rehabilitation, guards still see themselves as stewards of punishment, the report revealed. Many adhere to an “us versus them” mentality, and corrections officers perceived to be soft on prisoners are branded “inmate lovers” and ostracized, it said.
It found that officers are able to disregard rules around use of force — by obstructing the view of body cameras, for instance, and relying too heavily on pepper spray. And DOCCS does a poor job of tracking violent incidents: Guards mostly use pen and paper to submit use of force reports, which often exclude key data points, making it difficult to detect trends and hotspots.
There are plenty of noteworthy hotspots, former officers from Brooks’s and Nantwi’s prisons told the consultants. Nearly all of those interviewed for the report acknowledged that groups of “goon squads” would beat up incarcerated people they viewed as difficult.
Outdated training likely contributes to prison violence. DOCCS’s paramilitary-style training academy “can promote aggression,” the report said. It teaches guards self-defense and includes seminars on department policy, but doesn’t adequately teach officers how to communicate with the unstable and often highly traumatized populations that they oversee.
Do you or have you worked for DOCCS? New York Focus wants to hear from you. Reach reporter Chris Gelardi at chris@nysfocus.com or on Signal at cgelardi.42.
DOCCS is a sprawling system — 41 facilities hold 34,000 incarcerated people and employ more than 11,000 officers — and its central office can barely keep tabs on it, the report authors found. In an age of cheap, sophisticated data systems, DOCCS relies on antiquated methods to track important information. The consultants discovered a “completely inefficient” system that involved one deputy superintendent tracking prisoner programming over twice daily emails. Meanwhile, DOCCS hasn’t digitized medical records, and some facilities don’t store the paper records in a central location, contributing to treatment delays.
Watchdogs, advocates, and incarcerated people have long raised alarms about many issues mentioned in the report, which highlighted DOCCS’s bureaucratic inertia. “DOCCS is reactive,” one retired officer told the investigators. “They only do anything when something gets fucked up.”
The report, plus a shorter report from a prison reform organization, together contain 77 recommendations, including naming a “chief risk officer,” adding more fixed cameras to DOCCS facilities, and addressing mental health care issues among staff. Its authors acknowledged that change won’t come easily.
“Many of our recommendations will take years of dedicated effort, operational innovation, and financial commitment, along with potential legislative action and updates to collective bargaining agreements,” they wrote.
In a statement, DOCCS said it had already implemented several of the report’s recommendations and had plans to take up most of the others. Among other improvements, it said, excessive use of force allegations had dropped by 42 percent in 2025 versus 2024.
DOCCS released that statement at the beginning of a long holiday weekend — four days after the paper’s publication date — a common way for government agencies to limit public attention on important news.
No such luck. New York Focus will be keeping tabs on which reforms actually happen and whether they lead to meaningful change.
My friend was beaten and killed by these guards at the same prison 2 weeks before this but I guess because he was white it doesn’t matter
Not that color matters because I have alot of black friends but it’s the facts.
My son was beaten by guards in July 2024 in Midstate!! I heard from him everyday until the incident he didn’t call for days, I kept calling to see if he was okay or Why never got a clear answer but “I just saw him he’s fine” after almost 2 weeks I told them I was coming there he called the first words out of his mouth was “I can’t believe I’m still alive” they only let him call after most of the injuries were almost vanished! The things my son said happened was just in humane and very racist!!! Those guards at Midstate are awful…. No one ever should endure what he told me and the Nurses were in on it to they just sit and watch like it’s normal which probably is to them… the Governor needs to do something like the show 60 days in and see for herself just how these prisons are ran…. With NO ONE knowing not even the commissioner he’s just like them……
Investigated three prisons out of over forty, where were all the employees that you didn’t talk to that are in these facilities. Again hired by the state, for the state, independent my ass!Mentioned not one officer or civilian working inside these facilities, what a Joke!
I’ve worked in the prison system for 19yrs. This report is not an accurate portrayal of the truth.
What about the public that has been traumatized by the incarcerated individual who committed a crime.
I’ve served faithfully in my duties. You would never do the job because you’re weak in the mind and undereducated when it comes to the prison system and dealing with incarcerated people and the whole culture of living behind the walls.
What have you done other than complain about the system and write an inaccurate review.
I always laugh and think just a few more years and I’ll be out of dealing with this nonsense between NY state and DOCCS and liberal think tanks, who think they can make a prison kind and gentle with their ROSE COLORED GLASSES!
And, I think people that write these reports, they should have an incarcerated individual dropped at their front doors and let them take up residence in a spare room. Since after all it’s so bad for the incarcerated individual who committed a crime and you care so much about them and not the society that the prison system was set up to protect.
So all incarcerated individuals are animals, so that must include your buddy’s that went to prison for killing 2 inmates within 2 weeks and there is many more than that who have had no accountability because you tyrants are beat up squads while an inmate is handcuffed behind his back and shackled , they are not a danger to you animals when they are tied up like that and you come with 10 plus on 1 inmate who has no use of his hands or feet , pretty tough right, you think that’s fair to kill and use excessive force and abuse your power and racism, treat them all inhumane and they are not all in their for major things some have made a mistake and prison is the punishment, your not the judge or god but you all think you are , remember what you said about dropping an inmate off at your house because you better say the same for the buddies you have that just went to prison so they fit in the same category right, pure ignorance, you all did an illegal strike because you were so made the governor made it mandatory to have your body cam on and activated makes it harder to hide behind the blue wall of secrecy, lies, and falsifying documents and tampering with evidence, the biggest gangs where uniforms of blue and thats a fact !!! I wonder how your pals like Clinton and wherever else they put them, except the one they moved out of state for his protection which is bullshit he was a scared little boy because he didn’t have his gang in blue with him, would they do that for any New York State inmate …. Hell no they wouldn’t, your buddies are in the same class as ypu define all inmates !!!