Debate Highlights Contrasting Views On Rikers’ Future — And On Justice Reform

By David Brand

Council Member Rory Lancman faced off against Queens Assistant District Attorney James Quinn in a heated debate about the future of Rikers Island at the Young Israel of Kew Gardens Hills Wednesday night.

Of the many accusations, complicated budget scenarios and impassioned declarations volleyed back and forth between the two men and audience members, one exchange seemed to crystallize the fundamental difference of opinion on the future of the massive jail complex — and on broader criminal justice reform.

During his opening statement, Quinn, speaking for Queens Defense Attorney Richard Brown and the D.A.’s office, critiqued efforts to close Rikers as a “movement.”

“A movement doesn’t look at details,” Quinn said, before outlining budget underestimations and hammering what he considered impracticalities, like where the city would house inmates during the development of four proposed “borough-based” jails.

An hour later, Lancman addressed the specific statement in his closing remarks.  

“The effort to close Rikers Island is a movement,” Lancman said. “It’s part of a larger movement to reform a criminal justice system that is dysfunctional, broken and overwhelmingly falls on the backs of poor people.”

The contrasting comments on the Close Rikers movement reflect two sides of the debate evident in the audience and throughout Queens.

Quinn, the Queens D.A.’s office and representatives from local civic associations say closing Rikers is too impractical and costly. The status quo works, they say.

“In my opinion, it would be wiser for the city to refurbish the existing facilities on RIkers Island rather than to spend billions of dollars in demolition and construction costs building new jails,” Brown said in a prepared statement. “These new jails would create havoc in our neighborhoods and disruption in the court system for years to come.

Lancman, however, said that closing Rikers would be cost-effective for the city and his constituents. But he focused most of his attention on the importance of reducing the jail population and moving detainees off the island.

Lancman and criminal justice reform advocates — like the team of Legal Aid Society defense attorneys seated in the third row of the auditorium — say closing Rikers is an inseparable component of a mission to reduce the number of low-income people of color in jail and prison. In Queens and nationwide, people of color make up a vastly disproportionate number of prison inmates and jail detainees.

Many sit in jail simply because they cannot afford to make bail, Lancman said.

“I cannot think of anything that is more worthwhile than building a criminal justice system that is fair,” Lancman said. “The criminal justice system I aspire to is one where no one is sitting in jail because they don’t have the resources to buy their way out.”

Lancman brought up the experience of Kalief Browder, a 16-year-old from the Bronx who was arrested for stealing a backpack and held on Rikers for three years — including two in solitary confinement — before his nonviolent C Felony charges were dismissed. Browder could not afford his bail. Two years later, he killed himself.

Quinn took issue with what he called the Browder “narrative” that has informed much of the debate about closing Rikers.

“Kalief Browder committed suicide two years after leaving Rikers,” Quinn said.

Several audience members applauded.

“For the life of me, I can’t understand what people are clapping about,” Lancman said, before encouraging people to “search their consciences.”

Lancman, who is reportedly considering a run for D.A. in 2019, criticized the district attorney’s office for continuing to prosecute low-level marijuana offenses and fare evasion and pointed out that the D.A.s in Brooklyn, Manhattan and the Bronx have all come out in favor of closing Rikers.

In August, Mayor Bill de Blasio officially announced the city’s proposal to close Rikers and establish a “borough-based” jail in every borough except Staten Island. The Queens jail would be located at the site of the vacant Queens House of Detention near the criminal courthouse in Kew Gardens.

Before the Department of Corrections stopped detaining inmates at the House of Detention in 2002, the jail had capacity for about 500 inmates.

“It’s not going in Juniper Park, Glen Oaks, Queens College or College Point,” Lancman said. “It’s going where the jail has been.”

The plan depends on the city’s ability to reduce the Rikers population to 5,000. On Aug. 13, the jails held 8,210 people, according to Lancman’s data. That number was 8,258 on Aug. 27, according to Quinn’s data

Lancman said revising the bail system would enable low-income defendants to get off the island.

“Using the bail system to impose judgement on people is an abuse of the criminal justice system,” Lancman said. “These people are not too dangerous to be among us. They’re just too poor.”

Quinn, however, condemned the notion that Rikers detainees are in jail simply because they cannot afford bail.

“People in Rikers belong in Rikers [and] I stand by that,” he said. “They’re remanded because they are dangerous people and because when they are out on the street, they commit more crimes.”

“These are not nice people,” Quinn said later.

Quinn specifically pointed to a statistic that bailable Rikers detainees from Queens County with D Felony, E Felony, and A Misdemeanor charges have, on average, more than 6 previous felony arrests.

“What do you have to do to have six previous felony arrests?” he asked.

“Be black,” one audience member shouted.

The project description posted on the city’s website states that each of the proposed facilities will contain about 1,510 beds in addition to “support space for correctional programming” and therapeutic services, community space and parking.

The support space will feature a “public entrance and lobby, visitation space, space for detainee programs and services, health services, infirmary and therapeutic units, and administrative space,” the description states.

The plan also calls for redeveloping an existing parking lot and adding about 676 new public parking spaces. The public parking structure would be located on the northwestern portion of the project site with an entrance from the Union Turnpike service road, according to the proposal.

The debate often strayed from nuts-and-bolts issues, like the cost and timeframe, which frustrated some attendees.

Audience member Zina Zimmerman told Lancman she attended the event for a conversation on the community impact of jailhouse and parking structure development.

“This is not about race,” Zimmerman said. “It’s about putting a 30-story prison in the [neighborhood].”

But Lancman disagreed.

“It is about race. And I know that’s painful for my fellow white people to hear,” he said. “But the criminal justice system almost exclusively on people color.”

“You cannot separate the close Rikers conversation into the [new] building and then the other stuff,” he continued.

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Council Member Rory Lancman debated Assistant District Attorney James Quinn on the future of Rikers Island Wednesday. // Eagle photo by David Brand 

Moya, Workers’ Rights Advocates Demand End to Tip Credit

By David Brand

Workers’ rights advocates and labor unions joined Council Member Francisco Moya at City Hall Tuesday to demand an end to the “tip credit” system, which enables employers in various industries to pay less than minimum wage.

“The livelihoods of restaurant servers, car wash workers, nail salon employees or any tipped worker should not be dependent on tolerating sexual harassment and discrimination but our two-tiered minimum wage system incentivizes silently suffering these indignities,” Moya said. “It’s time for New York to join the seven other states that have eliminated the tipped credit and provide tipped workers with the stability that comes from being guaranteed a living wage.”

A tip credit is the amount of tips earned by an employee that the law allows his or her employer to count as a credit against the minimum wage requirements for that industry, according to the New York State Department of Labor.

The tip credit enables employers in certain industries to pay less than hourly minimum wage to their workers. Minimum wage is $13 per hour at companies that employ 11 or more workers.

Because of the tip credit, a “large employer” with 11 or more food service workers can pay employees $8.65 per hour because the state takes into account a $4.35 tip credit.  “Small employers” with ten or fewer food service workers can pay $8 per hour. Minimum wage for small employers is $12.

The tip credit does not affect workers at fast food restaurants, who advocated for and achieved a higher minimum wage. Fast food workers currently earn at least $13.50 per hour until 2019, when their wage will increase to $15 per hour.

In addition to restaurant workers, the state tip laws include workers in various “miscellaneous industries,” including car wash attendants, hairdressers or aestheticians not employed by hotels, golf or tennis instructors, valet parking attendants and doorpersons.

Between April and June, the Department of Labor hosted seven hearings to engage residents and consider ending the tip credit.

Moya said he will introduce resolution at City Hall on Sept. 12 to demand that the Department of Labor end the tip credit.

Workers affected by the tip credit often do not earn enough in tips to justify their subminimum wage.

The tip system also disproportionately affects women, who are exposed to abuse and sexual harassment as a precondition for receiving a tip, said Susan Zimet, chair of the Women’s Equality Party.

“Too many women work in jobs that depend on tips, keeping them in poverty,” Zimet said. “Too many women are forced to deal with sexual harassment from their bosses and the customers they serve but are afraid to speak up for fear of losing their jobs. All workers deserve to get paid a living wage for the work they provide. All workers deserve to be in a safe environment where your wage is not dependent on a low cut neckline and a short hem skirt.”

Catherine Barnett, Director of Restaurant Opportunities Center of New York, said the tip system “fuels poverty, harassment, discrimination and wage theft.”

“Forcing restaurant, car wash and nail salon workers to rely almost entirely on tips to survive is simply wrong. Fortunately, there is a better way,” Barnett said. “New York must be a leader in the fight for One Fair Wage and join the seven states that have already phased out the tipped subminimum wage – resulting in gains for workers across the board.

Tips can be a big source of income for bartenders and servers at expensive restaurants who can earn hundreds of dollars a night from customers .

Thus, not all workers are on board with the call to end the tip credit.

For example, the organization Restaurant Workers of America describes itself as a “an employee advocacy organization dedicated to the preservation of tip income and to the well-being of employees in the full-service restaurant industry.”

The New York State Restaurant Association, a trade group representing the interests of restaurant owners, said the industry favors the tip credit because it shifts the wage burden from employers to customers.

“The tip credit is an economic tool. It was put in place to give restaurant owners a bit of a break when it came to labor costs, which helps them turn a profit,” NYSRA spokesperson Kevin Dugan told Metro New York.

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Assembly Member Ari Espinal (left), Council Member Francisco Moya (center) and car wash worker Ernesto Salazar called on the Department of Labor to end the tip credit. // Photo courtesy of Francisco Moya

Queens Sex Trafficker Faces Sentencing

By David Brand

Raul Granados-Rendon, a leader of the Granados family sex trafficking ring based in Mexico, pleaded guilty to sex trafficking conspiracy and faces sentencing today in Brooklyn federal court.

U.S. District Judge Kiyo A. Matsumoto presides over sentencing in Courtroom 6C South.

Granados-Rendon was indicted in 2011 for operating a family-run sex trafficking organization based in Tenancingo, Mexico.

Court documents revealed that between October 1998 and June 2011, Granados-Rendon, and other members of his sex trafficking organization smuggled dozens of young women into the United States from Mexico and forced them into sex work in Queens. From there, the women were transported to other parts of the northeast.

Prosecutors said that victims were beaten or sexually assaulted by members of the organization if they refused to perform sex work. Victims said that Granados-Rendon and other traffickers threatened to harm their families in Mexico if they resisted sex work.

In 2015, USA Today reported that members of the sex trafficking ring handed out pamphlets in Spanish called “Chica cards” to passersby along Roosevelt Avenue, one of Queens’ busiest thoroughfares. The pamphlets advertised a phone number to call for cheap sex.

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The Eastern District of New York courthouse // Eagle file photo

Kushner Cos. Fined $210K For False Docs

By Bernard Condon

Associated Press

The Kushner family real estate company was fined $210,000 by New York City regulators on Monday following an Associated Press investigation earlier this year that showed it routinely filed false documents with the city claiming it had no rent-regulated tenants in its buildings —including three sites in Queens — when, in fact, it had hundreds.

Separately, a watchdog group said Monday that former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen has engaged in the same practice, perhaps in a more brazen way, by telling the city that buildings he owned were empty, though tax records showed they were filled with tenants, many rent-regulated.

The city’s buildings department fined the Kushner Cos. for filing 42 false applications for construction work on more than a dozen buildings when presidential adviser Jared Kushner ran the business. The AP report showed that the false paperwork allowed the Kushners to escape extra scrutiny designed to stop landlords from using construction to make living conditions for low-paying, rent-regulated tenants unbearable and get them to leave.

For three buildings in Astoria, the Kushner Cos. checked a box on construction permit applications in 2015 that indicated the buildings had zero rent-regulated tenants. Tax records filed a few months later showed the company inherited as many as 94 rent-regulated units from the previous owner, the AP reported in March.

The Kushner Cos. said it relied on “third party consultants” to prepare its applications for construction permits and the errors “have been corrected or will be.”

“In no case did the company act in disregard of the safety of our tenants,” said company spokesperson Christine Taylor. “We look forward to presenting the facts before an administrative law judge and until then no amount is due.”

After the AP report in March, the New York City Council and the New York state attorney general said they would look into the issue. Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn issued a subpoena to the company for documents.

The AP found that in three Kushner buildings in Queens for which false construction applications were filed, tenants believed the banging, drilling, dust and leaking water during construction were part of a targeted campaign to get them to leave. Many tenants did just that, and the number of protected rent-regulated units fell sharply in a little over a year, clearing the way for higher paying renters and making the buildings far more valuable.

The Kushners sold the Queens buildings in 2017 for $60 million, nearly 50 percent more than they had paid for them two years earlier.

In March, the Queens Chronicle reported that that the city’s Tenant Harassment Task Force had been investigating two of the Kushners’ Astoria properties located at 23-05 30th Ave. and 23-15 30th Ave. since 2016. The third former Kushner property to come under investigation was located at 21-80 38 St. in Astoria.

In a letter, State Sen. Michael Gianaris urged the DOB to issue stop-work orders for all Kushner Cos. properties.

“Bad actors should not benefit at the expense of their tenants when they flout rules designed to protect residents,” Gianaris said in a statement.

In Monday’s report about Cohen, the watchdog Housing Rights Initiative said the former Trump lawyer and his partners submitted more than 20 false applications for construction at three buildings claiming they were unoccupied and there were no rent-regulated tenants when, in fact, there were dozens. Housing Rights Initiative said tenants were posting complaints to the city about living conditions during construction, proof that there were indeed people living there.

“In order for Cohen to substantiate these claims, he would need to prove that ghosts exist,” said Aaron Carr, executive director of Housing Rights Initiative, which also compiled the false filings by the Kushners earlier this year that led to the AP report.

Carr said that Cohen eventually sold the three buildings for $27 million, nearly triple what he had paid for them a few years earlier.

“Cohen commenced a deliberate campaign to systematically harass tenants out of their apartments using destructive, hazardous and illegal construction practices, so he could dramatically raise rents,” he said.

Cohen’s lawyer, Lanny Davis, declined to comment.

In one building at 237 Henry Street in Manhattan, tenants filed complaints about excessive noise and dust and construction beyond the scope of what was permitted by the city, according to the Housing Rights Initiative report. All 20 units in the building were protected by special rent regulations limiting rent increases and preventing tenants from getting pushed out, the report said, but once construction was done that number fell to five, which made it much more attractive to potential buyers.

In December 2014, about a year and a half after buying the building, Cohen sold it for $9 million, nearly triple what he and his partners had paid for it. That is gross profits, however, without subtracting for construction costs.

The other Cohen buildings in the report were at 172 Rivington Street and 235 East 27th Street, both in Manhattan.

Department of Buildings spokesman Joseph Soldevere said the agency “aggressively investigates” all complaints of improper construction.

Soldevere said nearly all of the permit applications for the Cohen properties include “tenant protection plans” designed to safeguard residents during construction.

He added that the agency issued a “stop-work” order at the Henry Street building and imposed fines of $16,090. He said six complaints at the other two buildings were investigated but no violations of city construction rules found.