MARCY, NY – Some of the Oneida County, NY, prison guards accused in the fatal prison beating of prisoner Robert Brooks recently have been implicated in previous attacks in New York prisons, reported The New York Times.
The New York Times said two of the corrections officers and a sergeant, associated with the death of prisoner Brooks in New York’s Marcy Correctional Facility, have previously been accused for “brutal attacks that left one man disfigured and another in a wheelchair.”
NY State Attorney General Letitia James released body cam footage worn by four officers that showed Brooks being punched, kicked, and choked by the guards—Brooks is seen handcuffed on the ground outside the prison at the time of the assault, according to The New York Times.
Officers involved in the attack picked up Brooks, held him by his feet and, once inside the infirmary, continued to attack him, wrote the Times, reporting this to be “a painful technique used by emergency service workers to try to revive unresponsive patients.”
The executive director of the Correctional Association of New York, Jennifer Scaife, told the Times this was “another day in the office” for the guards, and the Times notes some of the same guards had been previously described to brutally punish prisoners without being provoked.
The New York Times wrote, in February of 2020, prisoner Adam Bauer was attacked in a bathroom at Marcy prison. One of the officers involved in the attack was Nicholas Anzalone, and Bauer’s lawyer said, “They knew about Nicholas Anzalone for many years and they did nothing.”
The New York Times describes one of the sergeants hitting Bauer so hard with a clipboard that Bauer suffered a hole in his scalp from this attack.
Photos are provided from the Times depicting Bauer bleeding in the infirmary, with blood dripping down his face onto the floor.
The New York Times writes, Bauer claimed: “I was scared to death. I really truly thought they were going to kill me.”
The Times stated the officers responsible for the attack covered up the assault and claimed Bauer had injured himself—putting him in solitary confinement for 60 days. Once investigated, the corrections department’s Office of Special Investigations deemed the actions “necessary and reasonable.”
In the same year in September, two guards who were implicated in the assault of Brooks also participated in another assault on prisoner William Alvarez. The guards involved were Sgt. Glenn Trombly and Officer Anthony Farina, reports The New York Times.
Alvarez was cleaning the bathroom area at the time of the attack when he was pepper sprayed and later had his head slammed repeatedly against the wall, describes The New York Times, adding, on the way to the infirmary, Alvarez was punched repeatedly.
The New York Times stated Alvarez is now permanently disfigured, has required facial surgery, and, like Bauer, was also placed in solitary confinement for 60 days.
The New York Times also describes that before Trombly was moved to the prison in Marcy, NY, he worked at the Green Haven Correctional Facility in Stormville, NY, where he was also accused of beating three prisoners.
Before body cam footage of Brooks’s final moments were released, the State Police filed applications seeking red-flag orders for Officers Anzalone, Matthew Galliher and Robert Kessler, reported the New York Times, adding the application was denied by an Oneida County judge.
The orders “allow law enforcement authorities to remove guns from people believed to be a potential threat to themselves or others,” the Times added, noting the State Police is doing background checks on the officers and a hearing is scheduled for Jan. 7.
