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PUBLIC TESTIMONY
Testimony by Sharon Brown on Closing Rikers Island
4:10:57
·
127 sec
Sharon Brown testifies in support of closing Rikers Island immediately, citing dangerous conditions and ineffective mental health services. She suggests the City Council should sue to expedite the closure before 2027 and criticizes the current system for warehousing people who cannot afford bail or proper legal representation.
- Argues that the mental health system at Rikers is ineffective and debilitating
- Expresses concern about innocent people being caught in the system due to lack of resources
- Suggests that the same ineffective mental health practices would persist in new facilities
Sharon Brown
4:10:57
Hello.
4:10:57
My name is Sharon Brown.
4:10:59
Before I begin, remember Israel released the hostages, let Yahweh's people go, defend Israel.
4:11:06
Okay.
4:11:06
For criminal justice, we definitely need to close Rikers Island now.
4:11:13
So the city council sued ICE immigration so that they will not be at Rikers.
4:11:19
I believe you should also sue so that Rikers Island should close now.
4:11:24
So I believe that the City Council, since you can sue for things that happen at Rikers, you can sue for the delay in the closing.
4:11:33
It should close well before 2027.
4:11:38
People cannot be institutionalized in order to close Rikers Island.
4:11:44
For many people, the legal aids haven't done their jobs to dismiss cases and they wind up warehoused in Rikers than in mental institutions.
4:11:54
So they're just again as I've said previously, they're warehousing people and warehousing bodies because it's very dangerous there, people are actually dying.
4:12:06
Many people are innocent and as someone mentioned they don't have the bail monies and things like that to get out or get a proper lawyer, so they're in the system and they're caught up in there in the mental health system, the jail system, and then they get into all the other stuff homelessness and things like that.
4:12:28
And the mental health system debilitates people, it's not helping people.
4:12:33
Over all the years that Rikers Island has had this turmoil, they have had the mental health system there and it's still the way that it is and people are dying there and there is a mental health staff system there, the same mental health system that's there would be where the 500 beds or where they build other mental health communities, all the same things that they know and that they teach in the mental health system would still be there.
4:13:02
It's ineffective.