Former Queens Council Member Ruben Wills stated he suffered “extreme anxiety attacks” after watching surprising bodycam video of a number of New York state correction officers mercilessly beating a defenseless inmate earlier than his demise in December.
“It was not just the brutality of this man being beaten,” Wills advised NBC New York in an unique interview, “It was because I remembered some of those officers.”
Wills says a number of the officers caught on bodycam assaulting Robert Brooks, 43, are the identical officers who tormented and psychologically tortured him when he was incarcerated on the identical Upstate Marcy Correctional Facility in 2017-2018.
The previous councilmember — who represented southeast Queens till his conviction — says he spent about eight months incarcerated at Marcy. On the time, he was serving a 2- to 6-year sentence for misusing roughly $30,000 in public and marketing campaign cash.
Finally, Wills’ conviction was reversed on enchantment and dismissed by a decide, however not earlier than having had some brutal experiences behind bars, he says.
“There was one group that took particular joy in hurting people,” Wills stated, describing what he says had been each day beatings by a specific group of officers.
Wills stated the group was referred to as the “hands-on-crew” as a result of they put their palms on prisoners. The group operated like a gang, he recalled, ruling with racist insults, concern of retribution, and even demise threats.
“I would never be found,” Wills stated, describing what the officers advised him when he questioned their conduct. “They would just put me in the back of the prison in the ground and my family wouldn’t know for months that I was gone.”
In keeping with Wills, “They said this is where they take everybody for punishment. I said suicide watch isn’t punishment!”
Throughout a latest sit-down interview with NBC New York on the Rochdale Group Heart, Wills turned emotional whereas describing the abuse he says he endured from the 2 correction officers outdoors that solitary cell.
“They were coming and kicking the door, slamming against the door all night long, telling me to kill myself, singing “Suicide,” Wills said, describing a song by musical artist Sean Kingston. Wills says the officers held a hangman-style sketch of him up against the cell door while calling out “Is he useless but? He isn’t useless but!”
After Wills was launched, he labored with an animation producer to create a sequence of video re-enactments he says characterize his model of encounters with correction officers. He stated one purpose he created the re-enactments was to assist individuals envision his model of how he ended up in a wheelchair for eight months.
Wills stated it occurred on day certainly one of his jail sentence on Rikers Island. He says that due to a pre-existing medical situation, he was imagined to be positioned within the Rikers NICU, however that as an alternative, correction officers took him on a violent van trip throughout which he was thrown round in a steel compartment of the van.
When the van trip stopped, he was unconscious, Wills stated.
Citing medical neglect at Rikers, in 2018, Wills sued the town for $10 million, a incontrovertible fact that has been beforehand reported. Now, six years later, Wills says the town is “stonewalling” — withholding medical data he wants for his case.
Wills advised Mayor Eric Adams may have helped.
“I mean, this is not a shot at him, but we have a mayor who went through police brutality when he was younger. So you would think that he would direct his Corporation Counsel to clear this backlog up,” stated Wills.
The NYC Legislation Division and Division of Correction each declined to touch upon Wills’ allegations and lawsuit.
At Marcy, a number of investigations are underway. Gov. Kathy Hochul demanded jail officers start termination proceedings towards 14 officers, calling the incident “sickening.” Two have already resigned.
However state officers say terminating a correction officer will not be straightforward, as a result of below the foundations of their contract, the governor doesn’t have ultimate say. An arbitrator does.
The New York State Division of Corrections and the Correction Officers Union declined to touch upon Wills’ allegations about his time inside Marcy Correctional Facility.
Footage of the December assault — which New York officers advised NBC New York was unintentionally recorded by physique cameras in stand-by mode — exhibits Brooks showing limp and sporting handcuffs. These bodycams had been initially offered in 2024 with funding from Hochul, her workplace famous.
In an announcement, Hochul added that the overwhelming majority of correction officers do extraordinary work below tough circumstances.
Ruben Wills agrees.
“There are a lot of really, really good correction officers,” he stated. “Some of them actually came to my aid.”
Wills says when he first arrived at Marcy, he was surrounded by a gaggle of correction officers who advised him they knew who he was and that they had been “happy he was there.” He stated they advised him they didn’t approve of the “hands on” strategy of a few of their fellow officers.
One in every of Wills’ animated re-enactments posted on-line in 2021 depicts a gaggle of officers urging Wills to make use of his political entry to show what he would see inside Marcy — however warned him to not do it till he was out.
Wills stated he tried to lift consciousness as soon as he not feared returning to Marcy. He wrote a sequence of essays, advocated in Albany, and went for remedy to cope with the trauma. However he stated struggled to generate a lot curiosity in jail circumstances.
Presently, the problem is gaining traction after Brooks’ demise and the video of what led as much as it.
“I started feeling a guilt that maybe if I did more, it would have prevented his death,” stated Wills.
Preliminary post-mortem outcomes decided that Brooks suffered quite a few bruises, hemorrhages of the neck and genitals, and a damaged nostril. Brooks’ household filed a Federal Civil Rights Lawsuit and 62 state lawmakers despatched a letter to the governor demanding that Marcy be closed.
Ruben Wills was not the one one with one thing to say about what occurs at Marcy.
In 2022, The Correctional Affiliation of New York, which has authorized authority to watch circumstances in New York prisons reported rampant abuse, retaliation and assaults by employees after interviewing greater than 110 incarcerated individuals.
In its report, the CANY additionally highlighted different alleged patterns Wills had beforehand famous, together with racial abuse,references to a “hands on ” facility and misuse of the SHU for suicide watch.
Wills stated he hasn’t determined if he’ll return to politics. Some suspect he’s mulling one other run for his outdated council seat at the moment held by term-limited Speaker Adrienne Adams, whose time period is up this yr.
Both manner, Wills is recommitted to pushing for jail reform. He stated if he had the ability, he’d instantly flood Marcy with psychological well being companies.
“Everyone must have heard that man’s screams,” stated Wills. “There’s going to be recidivism and you’re going to create monsters from people who weren’t monsters when they went in.”
