We must end the conspiracy of silence
Statement from COBA President Benny Boscio On the Fatal Assault of Robert Brooks, an Inmate at the Marcy Correctional Facility
“The egregious and repugnant action of the officers who committed this heinous and fatal assault of Robert Brooks at the Marcy Correctional Facility do not in any way reflect the values of the vast majority of Correction Officers, including my members, who put themselves in great danger every day, maintaining the safety and security of everyone in our facilities. This incident is completely contrary to the values we hold dear and the oath we take as Correction Officers, to provide care, custody and control on behalf of everyone in our facilities. These officers are a disgrace to our profession and should be held fully accountable for their abhorrent misconduct. Our hearts go out to the Brooks family during this painful time.”
Benny Boscio COBA President
We at Destination Freedom Media Group appreciate the statement by the New York City Correction Officers’ Benevolent Association (COBA). However, we strongly disagree and have dispute with the statement because the facts on the ground tell a completely different story.
On December 9, 2024 at the Marcy Correctional Facility (Oneida County, New York), a group of White correctional officers hogtied and then brutally beat a Black human being named Robert Brooks in a medical treatment room. After watching the video and discussing the case further, both my partner/colleague, Gale Washington, and I cried. We just could not understand nor fathom how these officers could blatantly ignore the humanity of someone they had the responsibility to care for and protect. Remember, they are being paid by the taxpayers of New York.
Video of inmate’s fatal beating shows him handcuffed as correctional officers punch and kick him
https://www.cnn.com/2024/12/27/us/marcy-correctional-facility-death-robert-brooks/index.html
Robert Brooks died on December 10, 2024 at the hospital where he was taken after this brutal and senseless beathing by these correctional officers. Our independent nonprofit news organization strongly encourages our readers and legal observers to watch this video – study the video – and share it broadly in order to facilitate further exposure and discussion of this heartbreaking case. Robert Brooks had a 10-year-old son with whom he loved to make music
One of the first details that I noticed when watching this beating is that Robert’s hands were handcuffed behind his back. Then, you will see in the video where an officer intentionally stuffs a rag into Robert’s mouth in order to stifle his cries for help.
WATCH THIS VIDEO!
The Attorney General for New York, Leticia James, said that the officers involved would be fired. Our independent nonprofit news organization is asking Leticia James directly why are these officers still walking around in free society? Why aren’t they being flown to New York City on a special helicopter and perp walked so all the world can see them? Funny how that works! I suppose there is a different value placed on the life of a young Black man incarcerated in America in comparison to that of a White, rich, Chief Executive Officer of a large health care corporation. Think about this for a moment.
“Two of the corrections officers and a sergeant accused in the death of Robert Brooks, an inmate at the Marcy Correctional Facility in central New York, were previously named in federal lawsuits filed by prisoners accusing them of brutal attacks that left one man disfigured and another in a wheelchair.”
Guards in Fatal Prison Assault Were Accused of Beating Inmates Before
As I said previously, we strongly disagree with the statement made by COBA and, as always, we provide facts and historical evidence to bolster our belief. We’d like our readers to consider and study a 2023 report by the Marshall Project which analyzed use of force by New York State Correctional Officers against incarcerated people. Here are bullet points of the five takeaways from this report:
- New York’s discipline system favors prison guards
- In many cases of serious abuse, officials didn’t try to discipline the officers accused
- A culture of cover-ups among guards makes it hard to hold them accountable
- The corrections officers’ powerful union has protected this disciplinary process
- Our investigation captures only a fraction of prisoner abuse
We Spent Two Years Investigating Abuse by Prison Guards in New York. Here Are Five Takeaways
Allow us to pull an excerpt from the COBA statement by Benny Boscio, President: “This incident is completely contrary to the values we hold dear and the oath we take as Correction Officers, to provide care, custody and control on behalf of everyone in our facilities.” In light of the information that is contained in the Marshall Project report, we beg to differ.
Also, here are some articles that dispute Mr. Boscio’s statement:
2 New York state prison inmates say they were waterboarded, beaten by guards (January 2024)
https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/10/us/new-york-state-prison-inmates-waterboard-lawsuit
Guards Brutally Beat Prisoners and Lied About It. They Weren’t Fired (May 2023)
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/19/nyregion/ny-prison-guards-brutality-fired.html
How Brutal Beatings on Rikers Island Were Hidden From Public View (March 2022)
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/02/nyregion/nyc-jail-beating-rikers.html
Five guards at NYC’s Rikers Island convicted in inmate beating (June 2016)
Abuse of teen inmate at Rikers Island prison caught on surveillance cameras
Finally, we re-visit the 2017 beating by New York State Correction Officers of 69-year-old Herman Bell. On September 5, 2017 at Great Meadow Correctional Facility (Comstock) while talking to his wife on the phone, correction officers ordered him to hang up; he complied. Immediately, the officers took Herman to a secluded area with no cameras where they proceeded to beat him in his facial area nearly knocking his right eye out of the socket. Here is the picture of the aftermath of Herman’s beating by correction officers.
There is more detailed information that we would like to share regarding this incident. The demographics at the Great Meadow Correctional Facility are as follows: approximately 99% of the correctional officers are White and from the area and approximately 80-85% of the prisoners housed there are Black.
So, the question is whether or not some White males join the ranks of correctional officers in New York so that they can torture, beat, and abuse Black men? This question was prompted by the evidence in the incidents we’ve studied (see articles above).
Herman Bell is a respected elder in the prisoner human rights movement. His experience in 2017 should have been a loud warning to us all. There is something foul and deranged happening inside facilities operated by the New York Department of Corrections and beyond. We must not look away. My intent with my journalism is to continue to draw attention to the increasing culture of abuse that festers inside America’s prisons and jails.
This disease of hatred appears to be residing in the hearts and minds of many correctional officers throughout the U.S. Is this what the MAGA movement means when they profess that they are the party of law and order? Or is this hypocrisy? Collectively, as a society we have work to do. Journalism is only one aspect of the struggle.
I end with a quote from Matulu Shakur, Anthony X. Bradshaw, Malik Dinguswa, Terry Long, Mark Cook, Adolfo Matos, and James Haskins from a piece entitled, “Genocide Against the Black Nation in the U.S. Penal System (abridged)” – 1988, from the book entitled, “Imprisoned Intellectuals: America’s Political Prisoners Write On Life, Liberation, and Rebellion” edited by Professor Joy James, page 195:
“This is war. This is a war of attrition, and it is designed to reduce prisoners to a state of submission essential for their ideological conversion. That failing, the next option in deadly sequence is to reduce the prisoners to a state of psychological incompetence sufficient to neutralize them as efficient, self-directing antagonists. That failing, the only option left is to destroy the prisoners, preferably by making them desperate enough to destroy themselves. The purpose of this isolation and sensory deprivation is to disrupt one’s balance, one’s inner equilibrium, to dehumanize the prisoner, to depersonalize him, to strip him of his unique individuality, rendering him pliant in the hands of his vicious captors.”
Ladies and gentlemen, I stand before you today as an efficient, self-directing antagonist. I will not be pliant nor silent in the hands of the oppressors. My goal and purpose are to give voice to the voiceless and to confront ALL who dare to exploit, mistreat, or abuse incarcerated human beings with a special emphasis on the disabled and the mentally ill. Help us raise the public’s awareness in regard to these issues.
Remember, these incarcerated individuals are in prison because they were convicted of a crime. Their incarceration and time away from their families and loved ones is the punishment for their crimes. Any correctional officer(s) who believe that they have the right to be judge, jury, and executioner during the time that these individuals are in prison, not only need to find another occupation, but their actions are that of a criminal/vigilante and not a do-gooder.
The struggle for prisoner human rights is a protracted one. In the operative word for us who participate in the struggle, is “patience.” With that being said, we encourage our followers to watch the video and listen carefully to the words of Nas & Damian “Jr. Gong” Marley’s song entitled, “Patience,” ft. Amadou & Marriam
Malik Washington is a freelance journalist and Director at Destination: Freedom and Destination Freedom Media Group.
