Rikers will be taken over by an independent receiver, judge rules

A federal judge on Tuesday said she would soon appoint an independent authority to manage major elements of Rikers Island. Eagle file photo by Ryan Schwach

By Jacob Kaye

A federal judge took the extraordinary step of stripping the city of its control over Rikers Island on Tuesday, ruling that City Hall could no longer be trusted to tamp down the violence that has plagued the dangerous jail complex for decades.

In a long-anticipated, 77-page ruling, federal Judge Laura Swain said that she would begin to take the steps to appoint a receiver to assume a package of powers that would put them in charge of making major decisions about how Rikers Island is managed.

The receiver, who will be given the title of “remedial manager,” will answer only to the judge and, in a number of instances, supplant the power of the Department of Correction’s commissioner and the mayor of New York City.

Swain’s decision comes over a decade after the city was put under the watch of a federal monitor as part of a settlement stemming from a detainee rights lawsuit known as Nunez v. the City of New York. In that time, correction officers have continued to inappropriately use violent force against detainees, an abuse that was at the heart of the original class action lawsuit. Slashings and stabbings committed by detainees have also risen at times, and over 100 people have died while in the DOC’s custody in the past decade.

Violence on Rikers, generally speaking, has gotten “demonstrably worse” since 2015, the first year of the settlement, Swain said.

The judge said in her Tuesday ruling, which comes around half a year after she initially found the city in contempt of the Nunez court orders, that she turned to receivership after finding that “less extreme remediation measures have failed.”

“[The city has] demonstrated — in virtually every core area the court and the monitor have identified as related to the persistence of excessive and unnecessary force — that neither court orders nor the monitor’s interventions are sufficient to push the DOC toward compliance,” Swain wrote. “The myriad examples of non-compliance described in the contempt order illustrate the fundamental inability of court orders in this matter, standing alone, to compel reform.”

The ruling is a major victory for the Legal Aid Society, federal prosecutors, attorneys at the private law firm Emery Celli Brinckerhoff Abady Ward & Maazel LLP and the detainees the trio represents, who together first asked for the judge to appoint a receiver over Rikers Island in 2022. Though their initial request was denied by Swain, they again asked for the court to take over the jails in 2023.

That second request was litigated for over a year and half and answered on Tuesday.

“We commend the court’s historic decision to appoint an independent receiver to end the culture of brutality in the city’s jails,” Mary Lynne Werlwas, the director of the Prisoners’ Rights Project at The Legal Aid Society, and Debra Greenberger, a partner at Emery Celli Brinckerhoff Abady Ward & Maazel LLP, said in a joint statement. “This appointment marks a critical turning point — an overdue acknowledgment that city leadership has proven unable to protect the safety and constitutional rights of incarcerated individuals.”

Swain’s ruling is a blow to the city, which has vehemently opposed receivership. In a court filing earlier this year, attorneys with the city asked Swain to name current DOC Commissioner Lynelle Maginley-Liddie as the receiver, should she feel one is necessary. Swain rejected the city’s proposal on Tuesday, noting that “transformational change is unlikely under the [the city’s plan]” because the commissioner would continue to be pressured by “political influence.”

“Given [the city’s] long history of noncompliance and contemptuous conduct, the court concludes that the appointment of a fully independent individual — free from agency capture of any kind — is required,” Swain wrote.

Mayor Eric Adams, who began his weekly “off-topic” press conference just as the ruling was issued on Tuesday, bashed Swain’s decision but said he would “follow whatever rules she puts in place, because she has the authority to do so.”

“We have this oversight, that oversight, that oversight – I mean, how much oversight are you going to do before you realize that there's some systemic problems that we have turned around?” the mayor said. “So, the federal judge made a determination that they want to do something else and they don't like what we're doing. It's a federal judge. We're going to follow the rules.”

Mayor Eric Adams railed against a ruling by a federal judge on Tuesday who ordered Rikers Island be put in the control of a federal receiver. Photo by Ed Reed/Mayoral Photography Office

Adams, who is running for reelection this year on an independent party line as nearly a dozen candidates battle it out for the Democratic nomination, was not the only mayor to have a hand in the mismanagement of Rikers, Swain said in her ruling. The judge instead pointed to the constant change over of leadership in both City Hall and the DOC that has made lasting reform nearly impossible to achieve. There have been two DOC commissioners under Adams – Louis Molina, who the judge skewered in her ruling on Tuesday, and Maginley-Liddie, who the judge praised.

Among those running for mayor this year, Adams appeared to be in the minority when it came to his opinion about Swain’s receivership ruling.

City Comptroller Brad Lander, City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams and former Comptroller Scott Stringer all described the ruling as a difficult but necessary step the city needs to take to make the city’s jails safer.

Adams’ mayoral opponents also had no issue pointing the finger at the mayor, who has seen nearly 40 detainees die, including five this year, since taking office.

“Appointing an independent remediation manager is a serious indictment of the decades of mismanagement at Rikers,” Lander said in a statement. “Today, Judge Laura Swain made the necessary decision to appoint a manager with their own substantial discretion to turn around the deplorable conditions for those detained and those who work at Rikers.”

Speaker Adams, who also cast blame on the mayor, called on the city to continue its efforts to shut Rikers Island, a process that’s already running years behind and may only be complicated by the appointment of a receiver.

“While this intervention presents a crucial opportunity to bring lasting change to our jail system, the next steps must advance the closure of Rikers and transition to more effective borough-based jails as the solutions for a safer jail system and city,” the speaker said.

The sentiment was echoed by Zachary Katznelson, the executive director of the Independent Rikers Commission, which has been tasked twice by the city to map out the blueprint for Rikers’ closure. Earlier this year, the commission issued a landmark report claiming that the original plan to close the jails had been effectively ignored since Adams took office. As a result, the commission found the city would more than likely be unable to hit the legally-mandated 2027 deadline to shutter the jail complex.

“Judge Swain’s decision to appoint an outside official to reform the operation and culture of the NYC Department of Correction is pivotal,” Katznelson said in a statement. “The remediation manager must do everything possible to hasten the day we shift to more humane, more efficient borough-based jails and secure hospital beds. That's how we can truly deliver safety and dignity for correctional staff, incarcerated people, and crime victims.”

Public Advocate Jumaane Williams said that the decision brought the city to a “critical moment, but a cautious one.”

“Outside management will only be successful if it is informed by people with real experience within the system and in oversight of it,” Williams said. “The goals must simultaneously be to reverse the decades of unnecessary harm and suffering on Rikers Island and to move toward finally closing this monument to pain and failure.”

What is a receiver?

Swain’s receiver will have sweeping powers over the management of Rikers Island.

They will be able to make changes to DOC policies, procedures, protocols and systems related to the Nunez court orders; review, investigate and discipline officers who violate use of force rules; hire, promote and deploy staff throughout the jails; renegotiate contracts the city has with the correctional officers’ union, which has long opposed receivership; and ask Swain to “waive any legal or contractual requirements that impede [the receiver] from carrying out their duties.”

The remedial manager, whose powers will remain until the judge finds the city is in compliance with the court orders, will also be allowed to direct the DOC commissioner and any other DOC executive in regards to the Nunez orders.

Swain didn’t name a receiver on Tuesday and instead ordered the city and the attorneys representing the city’s detainees to meet and name four people who could potentially serve as the remedial manager by Aug. 29.

Swain said the candidates should have “substantial management and correctional expertise developed outside of the [city’s] DOC.” She also said a receiver should have the ability to collaborate, build trust with staff and have excellent oral and written communication skills.

The judge also put out a bid for applications, calling on all interested candidates to send a cover letter, references and resumes to the court.

Once a receiver is selected, they will be charged with building an action plan, which will “identify the specific and concrete steps that are necessary to achieve substantial compliance with [the Nunez court orders]” within three years of the receiver’s start date.

The action plan will include a number of metrics that will be used by the receiver and their team to assess whether or not the city is compliant with the court’s orders.

Each time the city comes into compliance with any of the items listed in the yet-to-be written action plan, they will create a transition plan alongside the remedial manager that will end with the city regaining some aspect of control over the jails.

There was no specific timeframe put on the life of the remedial manager, nor a price.

Swain said the receiver will set the rate for them and their staff and bill the city monthly.

The judge also said the receiver will continue to retain their powers over the jails until the city comes into “substantial compliance" with the Nunez court orders and is able to sustain its progress for a one-year span.

Even after the receivership is dissolved, the city will continue to have to operate under the court orders for another two years.

This story was updated with additional details at 4:48 p.m. on Tuesday, May 13, 2025.