New York corrections officers have been charged with murder in the killing of a state prison inmate who was handcuffed while being beaten in an assault captured by officers’ body-worn cameras, Gov. Kathy Hochul said on Thursday.
Ms. Hochul did not say how many officers had been charged with murder or what charges others implicated in the killing of the man, Robert Brooks, might face. A special prosecutor was expected to unseal indictments in the case Thursday afternoon.
“The brutal attack on Mr. Brooks was sickening, and I immediately moved to terminate the employment of those involved,” Ms. Hochul said in a statement. “Now, the perpetrators have been rightfully charged with murder and State Police are making arrests.”
Mr. Brooks was declared dead early on Dec. 10, hours after he was assaulted at the Marcy Correctional Facility in upstate New York. At the time of the attack, he was serving a 12-year sentence after pleading guilty in 2017 to first-degree assault in the stabbing of a former girlfriend, court documents and prison records show.
Ms. Hochul said two weeks ago that an autopsy had determined that Mr. Brooks’s death was a homicide. She did not share additional details, but investigators said in court filings that preliminary findings showed “concern for asphyxia due to compression of the neck as the cause of death.”
The attack was filmed by body-worn cameras belonging to four officers. Footage captured by the cameras was made public by Letitia James, the state attorney general, who described it as “shocking and disturbing.”
The videos do not include sound; the officers’ cameras were running but the devices do not record audio unless activated by the wearer to film an encounter.
The footage shows one officer kicking Mr. Brooks, whose face is bloodied, and then forcing him onto his back on an infirmary examination table while another officer punches Mr. Brooks in the upper body.
The videos also show officers yanking him up and dragging him to the back of the room, where they press him against a window. He sinks down, and the officers hoist him back up and push him against the window again.
Mr. Brooks had been serving his sentence at Mohawk Correctional Facility, a short drive from the Marcy prison. Both are medium-security facilities. He was moved the day he was attacked and arrived at the Marcy prison just before the fatal beating began.
A corrections department investigator testified at a court hearing last month that Mr. Brooks had been moved for “his safety” after being involved in altercations with other Mohawk prisoners, according to a transcript of the proceeding.
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