In October 2024, a Rikers Island social worker came forward with a bombshell accusation: officers were routinely isolating severely mentally ill men in their cells for weeks and even months, a process known as “deadlocking.”
Days later, the city’s main oversight agency, the Department of Investigation (DOI), announced an inquiry into the allegation.
More than 450 days have since passed, and the investigation remains open with no end in sight.
“The Department of Investigation’s delay allows harm to continue in real time,” the former Rikers social worker, Justyna Rzewinski, told THE CITY. “When investigations stall, they fail the very people they are meant to protect.”
Diane Struzzi, DOI’s top spokesperson, declined to comment. The watchdog agency is currently run by an acting commissioner after Mayor Zohran Mamdani accepted the resignation of Jocelyn Strauber, who led the department under Mayor Adams.
The probe continues as the city’s Department of Correction will soon have a new leadership team in place: remediation manager Nicholas Deml and commissioner Stanley Richards. Both have previously expressed interest in improving conditions for people behind bars while maintaining security.
The two commissioners appointed by Adams, Louis Molina and Lynelle Maginley-Liddie, long insisted that “solitary confinement” does not exist at Rikers — even as they repeatedly fought legal efforts to ban or strictly limit prolonged isolation.
Current and former correction officials, incarcerated people and defense attorneys say that, regardless of the terminology, people at Rikers continue to be held alone for stretches that far exceed international standards governing the treatment of incarcerated people.
Confinement spots include so-called “intake” areas, cells in mostly vacant housing units and even shower stalls.
Days after taking office, Mamdani signed an executive order extending a long-running emergency declaration governing the city’s jails. The order also directed Correction Department leadership to produce a concrete plan to unwind years of suspended jail rules, including restrictions on solitary confinement.
Mamdani gave correction officials 45 days, which ends on Feb. 19.
What the Whistleblower Saw
The deadlocking allegations were first reported by the New York Daily News, which detailed Rzewinski’s firsthand account of life inside Rikers’ specialized mental health units. More than half of the people held at Rikers have some form of mental illness, according to city data.
Rzewinski worked with many detainees who were found unfit to stand trial and were awaiting transfer to state psychiatric hospitals such as Kirby Forensic Psychiatric Center.
Because of chronic bed shortages, those transfers were often delayed for months, leaving people with severe mental illness housed at Rikers instead. Officers would “deadlock” them into cells, justifying the isolation as a safety precaution, she said.
Those with the most acute psychiatric needs and the least outside support, she said, were often subjected to the harshest conditions. Some would cover their bodies in feces.
The DOC never documented those who were locked in, just listing them with a white tag by a control panel in an area known as the bubble, where officers are stationed, she added.
Rzewinski, who has since left her job on Rikers, said she was interviewed by DOI in December 2024 as part of the probe into deadlocking.
Dr. Robert Cohen, who recently retired from the city’s Board of Correction, said the prolonged silence on the investigation is especially dangerous given the stakes.
“Deadlocking is not just another cruel but routine DOC practice — it is extremely dangerous,” Cohen told THE CITY. “The danger is not theoretical. People inside have already experienced it.”
Cohen said DOI committed to investigating the practice because it was allegedly being used to deny incarcerated people access to critical services, including potentially life-saving medical and mental health care. Letting that investigation languish, he warned, only compounds the risks detainees face.
“They’ve been investigating deadlocking for more than a year,” Cohen said. “The failure to release a report puts everyone in New York City’s jails at risk of life and limb.”
If the probe is not complete, Cohen said, DOI should, at minimum, release an interim status report. “The public deserves to know what is happening.”
A June 2025 report by the city’s Board of Correction confirmed that deadlocking was happening on Rikers. The report, which covered a six week period, found instances of involuntary lock-ins inside mental observation housing areas.
Board staff identified seven involuntary lock-ins across two facilities: four at George R. Vierno Center and three at the Rose M. Singer Center. Correction officers cited a range of justifications for confining people to their cells, including allegations that someone had lice, thrown or attempted to throw feces, assaulted staff, argued with medical personnel or engaged in disruptive behavior.
But Correctional Health Services, which provides health care in city jails, told investigators that lice treatment is typically provided in clinics and does not require isolating patients inside mental observation units. In rare cases, patients may be transferred to a separate communicable disease unit, but seclusion is not part of standard treatment.
The report also raised concerns about poor record keeping by officers.
Of the seven involuntary lock-ins, officers recorded only three logbook entries that specifically referenced the alleged incidents that led to the detainee’s confinement. In some cases, people in custody disputed the reasons they were locked in, and the housing unit logs did not reflect the events described by staff.
Board investigators found that the involuntary lock-ins ranged in length from roughly an hour to a full day.
During the assessment, Board staff also examined the use of tags placed over cell numbers on control-room switchboards, a practice previously highlighted by Rzewinski during a 2024 public meeting.
Correction officials told investigators the tags were meant to signal that someone was out of the unit for court or programming, or to remind officers to keep doors closed following prior incidents. Investigators said they did not observe people confined in tagged cells for extended periods.
Former DOI Commissioner Mark Peters, who led the agency under Mayor Bill de Blasio, told THE CITY that lengthy investigations can undermine public trust.
“One of the reasons we tried to complete investigations in well under 14 months is because prolonged delays affect public confidence,” said Peters, who emphasized that he could not speak to the specifics of the deadlocking investigation.
Peters noted that during his tenure some probes did take longer than a year for “good and legitimate reasons,” particularly in complex cases.
But he said DOI has to balance thoroughness with timeliness.
“There’s clearly an imperative to do investigations carefully — you can’t sacrifice accuracy for speed,” Peters said. “At the same time, there’s an imperative to deal with investigations promptly to maintain confidence in DOI.”
