Bodycam video shows officers beating handcuffed man before his death at N.Y. prison

Warning: This story and video comprise particulars of violence.

Newly launched video of a deadly New York jail beating exhibits correctional officers repeatedly pummelling a handcuffed man, putting him within the chest with a shoe, and lifting him by the neck and dropping him.

Physique digicam footage of the Dec. 9 assault on Robert Brooks was made public Friday by the state’s legal professional common, who’s investigating the officers’ use of power.

Brooks, 43, was pronounced lifeless at a hospital the morning after the assault on the Marcy Correctional Facility, a state jail the place was incarcerated in Oneida County.

13 correctional officers and a nurse implicated within the assault will face termination, in response to New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, who stated she was “outraged and horrified” by movies of the “mindless killing.”

The footage made public Friday exhibits correctional officers repeatedly punching Brooks within the face and groin as he sits handcuffed on a medical examination desk.

As one of many officers makes use of a shoe to strike Brooks within the abdomen, one other yanks him up by his neck and drops him again on the desk. The officers then take away the person’s shirt and pants as he lies on his again, immobile and bloodied.

“These movies are stunning and disturbing and I counsel all to take acceptable care earlier than selecting to observe them,” New York Lawyer Basic Letitia James stated.

The ultimate outcomes of Brooks’s post-mortem are nonetheless pending.

Preliminary findings from a medical examination point out “concern for asphyxia as a result of compression of the neck as the reason for loss of life, in addition to the loss of life being as a result of actions of one other,” in response to court docket filings.

WATCH | Bodycam video exhibits guards beating handcuffed prisoner: 

Handcuffed prisoner crushed by New York guards earlier than loss of life, bodycam video exhibits

Newly launched bodycam footage exhibits correctional officers at a jail in Upstate New York hitting and kicking a handcuffed prisoner earlier than his loss of life. New York Lawyer Basic Letitia James’s workplace, which is investigating the incident, launched the footage on Friday.

‘Horrific and excessive’

The movies don’t embody audio as a result of the physique cameras had not been activated by the officers sporting them.

The state’s Division of Corrections and Neighborhood Supervision issued a directive within the wake of Brooks’s loss of life requiring that employees use physique cameras in each interplay with incarcerated individuals.

James stated her workplace was investigating using power that led to Brooks’s loss of life, however didn’t say whether or not any of the officers could be charged with crimes.

With the discharge of the movies, “members of the general public can now view for themselves the horrific and excessive nature of the lethal assault on Robert L. Brooks,” stated a lawyer for his household, Elizabeth Mazur.

“As viewers can see, Mr. Brooks was fatally, violently crushed by a gaggle of officers whose job was to maintain him protected,” Mazur stated. “He deserved to reside, and everybody else dwelling in Marcy Correctional Facility deserves to know they don’t have to reside in worry of violence by the hands of jail employees.”

‘Systemic points’

The union for state correctional officers, which seen footage of the assault earlier than its public launch, stated in a press release: “What we witnessed is meaningless to say the least and is definitely not reflective of the nice work that the overwhelming majority of our membership conducts each day.”

“This incident not solely endangers our total membership however undermines the integrity of our career. We can not and won’t condone this behaviour,” stated the union, the New York State Correctional Officers and Police Benevolent Affiliation.

Brooks had been serving a 12-year jail sentence for first-degree assault since 2017. He had arrived on the Marcy Correctional Facility solely hours earlier than the beating, after being transferred from one other close by state jail, officers stated.

Marcy is about 323 kilometres northwest of New York Metropolis, between the cities of Rome and Utica.

The Correctional Affiliation of New York, a jail oversight group, stated it had documented stories of pervasive brutality and racism contained in the Marcy Correctional Facility throughout a monitoring go to two years in the past.

The group’s government director, Jennifer Scaife, stated the footage of Brooks being crushed “is sickening and appalling, however not stunning” given its earlier findings. She referred to as on the state jail system to “tackle the systemic points that permit such brutality to flourish.”

David Condliffe, the chief director of the alternatives-to-incarceration nonprofit Middle for Neighborhood Alternate options, stated in a press release: “For each occasion caught on digicam, numerous extra acts of violence and homicide in prisons are ignored, justified, or lined up.

“Accountability should embody, however can not cease with, the firing of some people. Their violence shouldn’t be an anomaly; it’s the product of a system steeped in impunity.”