By LARRY NEUMEISTER
Associated Press Writer
NEW YORK- New York City will install hundreds of video cameras in jails and improve training and accountability of guards to better control the use of force against inmates, according to a deal reached to settle a class action lawsuit.
U.S. District Judge Denny Chin in Manhattan will decide after a March 31 hearing whether to approve the deal, which would affect the majority of the 13,000 inmates in 11 city jails.
A new policy statement will ban using force to punish an inmate or more force than is necessary to restrain an inmate, control a situation or protect the jail staff.
The policy will say that “blows should not be struck if control holds, grasping or pushing would be adequate to restrain the inmate,” according to court papers.
The court papers said force is sometimes needed when an inmate refuses to go to court, leave a cell or comply with search procedures.
Those jails not covered by the agreement reached Feb. 17 had already undergone improvements after legal settlements stretching back more than two decades.
The latest agreement stems from a 2002 Legal Aid Society lawsuit brought on behalf of 22 inmates alleging a pattern of excessive force by jail guards. The settlement was first reported Wednesday in The New York Times.
As part of the deal, the city will pay $2.2 million (euro1.84 million) to the plaintiffs in amounts ranging from $15,000 (euro12,548) to $575,000 (euro481,010) for violent encounters with guards that left one man blind in one eye and others with fractures, lawyers said.
“It’s a sweeping settlement,” said Ilann Maazel, one of the lawyers who worked on behalf of the inmates. “Better training leads to fewer uses of unlawful force.”
The city did not admit liability.
City attorney Gail Donoghue said improvements were “nothing revolutionary.”
“It really fundamentally centers on the use of additional cameras around the jails,” she said of a system that already has 2,000 cameras. “This is an upgrade, so to speak.”
She noted that the settlement was not a consent decree and the court had no oversight responsibility.
The settlement calls for the installation of hundreds of cameras within three years.
It also calls for guards to be instructed to try to videotape potentially violent encounters and warns them not to strike inmates if they can be restrained through other means.
The agreement also calls for training in which guards are required to demonstrate defense techniques to deal with unruly inmates and for the city to track information concerning use of force and to discipline staff when necessary.
Until 2009, when the agreement expires, lawyers for the plaintiffs will be permitted to review reports of use-of-force incidents.