Press Room

"Happy Easter to all Christians celebrating the resurrection this morning in the city and around the world. My family and I join this celebration and amplify Jesus Christ’s powerful message of righteousness and redemption that can be applied to our own lives thousands of years later. 

"The story of Holy Week that culminates in Easter Sunday is one of an immigrant refugee, of revolutionary leader who sought to free the oppressed and persecuted, was targeted by a frightened, tyrannical regime because of his message, was imprisoned and killed, but ultimately emerged triumphant. The death and resurrection of Jesus is a story we can identify with and ultimately draw hope from today.

"Easter evokes themes of rebirth, of rising from sorrow and looking toward joy. The example of Jesus’ bold call for justice and willingness to suffer asks us to stand up for those who cannot, to humble ourselves, even to undergo sacrifice for the good of others. 

"Driven by the joy of the work we do for one another, the conviction that we are on the right side of history and morality, and the hope of what we can achieve, I wish all who celebrate a blessed and joyful Easter."

As the governor and mayor delay the budget in order to involuntarily commit more New Yorkers, New York City Public Advocate Jumaane D. Williams is questioning why they refuse to use tools they already have available. Under a decade-old law, the state has the ability to convene mental health incident review panels in the event of certain encounters involving individuals in a mental health crisis. These panels, intended to identify systemic failures and ensure services are adequately rendered, can be convened following a request from a municipality, but have never been used.

Under Mental Hygiene Law § 31.37, the Commissioner of the New York State Office of Mental Health has the power to establish a mental health incident review panel, either by their own initiative or at the request of a local government unit following a serious incident involving a person with mental illness. However, as affirmed in a February 5 hearing in Albany, these panels have never been requested.

The Public Advocate sent letters to both City Hall and Albany, questioning the mayor on why the city has not asked for these reviews in the past and asking the state’s mental health commissioner to convene one for a recent incident in Queens involving an individual in mental health crisis. 

“Monday's incident in Queens presents us with a clear example to review if any gaps in services contributed to this tragic loss of life,” Public Advocate Jumaane D. Williams wrote in his request to the state. “...People with mental illness are far more likely to be the victim of a crime than to perpetrate one, and we must be careful that the state itself is not persecuting this vulnerable population who need services, not detention. Convening a panel now would mean we actually are serious about doing all we can to prevent incidents like this from taking place. ”

This request comes as the state considers language to broaden the ability of law enforcement and other government actors to engage with and involuntarily commit people perceived as unable to meet their basic needs due to their mental health, an overly-expansive definition which threatens to criminalize homelessness, mental health issues, and poverty without providing meaningful aid. Rather than adopting this ineffective and harmful tool, the state can utilize the panels and implement the recommendations put forward by a state task force recommending a health-centered approach. 

The Public Advocate also questioned the mayor’s approach, saying in a letter “Often we see from your administration a rush to respond in the immediate aftermath of tragedy or crisis with more officers and fewer civil liberties. From homelessness to mental illness, your administration’s solution is police presence often budgetarily at the expense of the services aimed at preventing tragedies such as this."

Read the letters to city and state leaders here.

“As leaders, we are duty bound to use the resources we have at our disposal to protect individuals with serious mental illnesses. With mechanisms for transparency and accountability in place, like incident review panels, we can lessen the gaps in our mental health delivery system to enhance the safety of individuals and our larger community. By drawing upon the recommendations from incident review panels, we can address the broader failures in our mental health systems and services to ensure that fewer individuals in crisis fall through the cracks and receive the dignity and care they deserve,” said State Senator Samra G. Brouk, Chair of the Senate Mental Health Committee.

"Too often, tragedies point to gaps in our mental health system. Incident review panels are a woefully underutilized tool that can reveal systemic gaps in the continuum of care and inform policy makers how to improve treatment. By doing so, we will improve accountability and safety. When an incident occurs, we too often find out the individual had been previously involuntarily hospitalized. If expanding involuntary commitment were the answer, such incidents would not happen post discharge. We should focus on proactive, collaborative, and evidence-based solutions to the problems presented. Convening an incident review panel would show a commitment to learning from this tragedy and preventing future harm. I’m grateful to Public Advocate Williams for elevating this important resource and calling for action," Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon, Mental Health Committee Chair.

“Connecting our most vulnerable New Yorkers to a full continuum of care including supportive housing and the clubhouse model, will ensure individuals are placed on the path to recovery and rehabilitation,” said Council Member Linda Lee, Chair of the Committee on Mental Health, Disabilities, and Addiction. “The Administration has continuously relied on involuntary removals as a catch-all solution without providing funding for the necessary treatment measures for people in need of long-term services. The City Council previously passed my legislation to provide data on the Administration’s involuntary removal directive to provide our city the crucial insight for policy creation for our most vulnerable communities. I remain committed to working with my City and State colleagues to create better solutions for New Yorkers experiencing severe mental illness.”

With the city far behind its legal deadline to close Rikers Island by 2027, New York City Public Advocate Jumaane D. Williams condemned the Adams administration for their lack of progress toward the goal and efforts which undermine it. This comes after the administration agreed last week to allow ICE onto Rikers in violation of the law, and the City Council moved to sue as a result.

“This has been an open secret, as the Adams administration has sat on its hands for most of its tenure, allowing the dysfunction in the jails to spiral and the death toll to rise,” said Public Advocate Williams on the delayed closure. “Though the jail population reached historic lows during the pandemic, and despite the planned borough-based jails’ capacity of only about 4,500 people, this administration has facilitated a consistent rise in the number of people incarcerated on Rikers Island every year since Adams took office. This lack of diligence and urgency has compromised the dignity and safety of people on both sides of the bars, and has cost at least 38 people their lives. 

“The blame for the city’s imminent failure to meet its deadline cannot be placed solely on Mayor Adams,” he continued. “But that is no exoneration from the direct and clear failure to put any systems at all in place to move toward this deadline.” He cited the administration’s anti-transparency policies and refusal to implement Local Law 42, saying “Efforts to obfuscate the abuse and dysfunction in the jails and to shirk transparency and accountability—including through dubiously legal executive orders to get around city laws the mayor doesn’t like—have exacerbated the suffering on Rikers Island.”

Public Advocate Williams further highlighted the enormous cost – $400,000 a year – of keeping a single person on Rikers, and raised his resolution as a cost-effective way of helping to prevent recidivism and promote public safety. Helping people meet immediate costs post-incarceration, he said, “is a relatively inexpensive, tangible way that we can ease the transition from incarceration back into the community.”

Finally, the Public Advocate emphasized the need for accountability and change, asking “How we can avoid another mayoral tenure—be it under Eric Adams, hopefully not, or someone else—of inaction and negligence.”

Read the Public Advocate’s full comments below.

STATEMENT OF PUBLIC ADVOCATE JUMAANE D. WILLIAMS TO THE NEW YORK CITY COUNCIL COMMITTEE ON CRIMINAL JUSTICE APRIL 16, 2025

Good afternoon,

My name is Jumaane D. Williams and I am the Public Advocate for the City of New York. I thank Chair Nurse and the members of the Committee on Criminal Justice for holding this hearing and giving me an opportunity to make a statement.

Despite the urgent humanitarian crisis on Rikers Island, it is impossible for the city to meet its legally mandated deadline to close Rikers by the year 2027. This has been an open secret as the Adams administration has sat on its hands for most of its tenure, allowing the dysfunction in the jails to spiral and the death toll to rise; however, the Independent Rikers Commission recently confirmed what we already knew in a report released last month. Though the jail population reached historic lows during the pandemic, and despite the planned borough-based jails’ capacity of only about 4,500 people, this administration has facilitated a consistent rise in the number of people incarcerated on Rikers Island every year since Adams took office. This lack of diligence and urgency has compromised the dignity and safety of people on both sides of the bars, and has cost at least 38 people their lives.

The blame for the city’s imminent failure, we have to be honest, to meet its deadline cannot be placed solely on Mayor Adams but that is no exoneration from the direct and clear failure to put any systems at all in place to move toward this deadline. The pandemic contributed to a backlog of court cases, and a wildcat strike at upstate prisons has forced the city to hold people in jail past the dates they were supposed to be transferred to state prisons. At the same time, there is a clear lack of urgency from this administration to decrease the population and ensure the city is hitting the benchmarks it needs to close the jails on time. Efforts to obfuscate the abuse and dysfunction in the jails and to shirk transparency and accountability—including through dubiously legal executive orders to get around city laws the mayor doesn’t like—have exacerbated the suffering on Rikers Island. It is clear that there must not only be the physical construction of new jails, but a radical culture shift to prevent the recreation of Rikers Island in each borough—an example the mayor has thus far failed to set.

While it is impossible to put a numerical value on a person’s life, the crisis at Rikers has cost the city in many other ways as well: holding one person in jail costs $400,000 annually. Closing Rikers Island and transitioning to the proposed borough-based jails will save the city $2.2 billion annually in operating and overtime costs. The closure of Rikers Island must not only be an investment in infrastructure—the new jails themselves—but in people and in communities. Rikers Island is currently the largest provider of mental health services in the city, I believe in North America, and this is neither appropriate nor practical. The city and state can decrease the number of people in jails by investing in and expanding mental health treatment and services—both inpatient and in the community. While the mayor likes to blame changes to the state’s bail laws for recidivism, the city is divesting from programs and services that help people successfully reintegrate back into civilian life – and recidivism has been a problem long before the state's bail laws were changed.  

In addition to this report from the Commission, several pieces of legislation are also being heard today. Resolution 371, sponsored by Councilmembers Hudson, Nurse, and myself calls on the State Legislature to pass S6643A/A9115, which would provide eligible incarcerated individuals with a monthly stipend upon release from a state correctional facility. A person released from incarceration is immediately faced with expenses, including housing, clothing, food, and acquiring identification documents. This is a relatively inexpensive, tangible way that we can ease the transition from incarceration back into the community. The Independent Rikers Commission report makes numerous clear and direct recommendations to lead the city back to the path to close Rikers Island as soon as possible, though after 2027. I want to focus here on accountability for the administration that has failed to meet its legal mandate and how we can avoid another mayoral tenure—be it under Eric Adams, hopefully not, or someone else—of inaction and negligence. We owe the families of those whose lives have been taken by Rikers Island that much. Thank you.

"The idea that Mayor Adams was recused from this decision is laughable. The deal was made a month ago, in the mayor’s agreement with ICE. His weak attempt to insulate himself from criticism for doing the Trump administration’s bidding is transparently ridiculous, and New Yorkers will see through it.

"The truth is that the mayor has long looked for every opportunity to expand collaboration with ICE – whether it was his own position or Donald Trump’s. By misleading the public about our sanctuary policies, he’s attempting to make it more acceptable to chip away at them and deport more immigrant New Yorkers, regardless of criminality or 'illegality.' This mayor has already demonstrated a willingness to ignore laws he doesn’t like, especially on Rikers, and this latest example is nothing more than an attempt to aid the Trump deportation machine that rips immigrant families from their homes and students from their campuses."

The Public Advocate will hold a virtual media availability at 1:00 PM today to further discuss this issue. Reporters can join by registering here.

"Mayor Adams offered a 'Hats Off' to ICE and Kristi Noem today as they have ripped families from homes, students from streets, and mistakenly sent people like Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia to a horrific prison in El Salvador. At least now we know the so-called “independent” mayor’s hat is now MAGA-red by choice.

“Like so much of the mayor’s conduct, this is a disgrace. This has never been about criminality or 'illegality.' While families are being swept up in Sackets Harbor and student activists are being abducted at Columbia and elsewhere, Mayor Adams is more interested in scolding the media, misleading New Yorkers, and falsely re-litigating the last few years than in dealing with the real inhumanity and danger of the moment. 

“No matter what he claims, the mayor is neither a messiah nor a martyr. And it is clear he is only interested in defending himself and Donald Trump, not New Yorkers. It’s up to the rest of us to stand with our neighbors – as they did in Sackets Harbor – and stand up to irresponsible, harmful leaders.”

"The mayor was always entitled to his day in court – instead, he’s used his power and privilege to sidestep the process. No matter what he’ll now claim, this isn’t a testament to his innocence, but to his capitulation and fear.

"Judge Ho may have refunded the sale today, but Mayor Adams still sold out New York in the first place – and would unapologetically do so again and again. We’ll soon find out if his refusal to stand up to Donald Trump was because he was afraid, or because he agreed with him. 

"Prosecutors Danielle Sassoon, Hagan Scotten, First Deputy Torres-Springer and Deputy Mayors Parker, Joshi, and Williams-Isom are just some of the people who resigned because the mayor hasn’t cared enough about the city to do so himself. Based on the judge's own words, how can New Yorkers ever believe that the mayor won't continue to put his own interests above the best interests of our city?"