Thread by @ScottHech

PLEASE READ: For all of you praising @NYGovCuomo's urgency, care, & action in the face of COVID-19, please consider demanding he act w/ that same commitment in response to the growing crisis in NY jails & prisons. It's spreading. People will die inside & out. He's doing nothing.

Here are some things @NYGovCuomo can do:

Grant mass clemencies
Stop working to repeal bail reform that will jail 1000s more
Order NY parole to release all those held on or sentenced for technical parole violations
Un-suspend speedy trial law to prevent indefinite detention

We know the Governor responds to public pressure. He finally changed the rules to allow people incarcerated to use hand sanitizer. Pressure needs to build. As state executives throughout the country are considering ways to reduce jail populations, he's incredibly doing opposite.

Why is @NYGovCuomo spending precious time during this crisis huddled with @NYSenDems, police, & prosecutors to try to undo bail reform that has already resulted in thousands less charged w/ misdemeanors & non-violent felonies locked up to be exposed to Coronavirus? Jail more now?

Why isn't @NYGovCuomo using his clemency power to ensure speedy & immediate release of large swaths of those incarcerated? He can do this. If he's scared of politics & decides only to value certain lives more, start w/ low-level offenses, elderly, those in last years of sentence.

Right now: **20,493 people** in New York State prison are 50 years or older. A catastrophe in the making. Release the elderly, who also happen to have the lowest recidivism rates.

https://twitter.com/RAPPcampaign/status/1241058598383468546?s=20

NY reincarcerates more for "technical parole violations" (curfew, missed appointment) than any state other than IL.

1/3 of all NY prison admissions are for these violations
5x nat'l average
12x more likely if you're Black

Release those caged on technical parole violations!

While hundreds jailed on technical parole violations in NY county jails, here's Rikers:

666 people are being held awaiting their parole hearing for technical parole violations. @NYGovCuomo can free them.

519 serving less than 1 year. Cuomo can free them.

https://twitter.com/BiancaTylek/status/1241390501481373701?s=20

We also just got word that @NYGovCuomo took the extraordinary step of suspending "speedy trial rules." One immediate impact. All cases now where bail is set, people can be held indefinitely, even where prosecutors take no action. Longer jailed & exposed.

https://twitter.com/Abolishthe50a/status/1241556390944165890?s=20

I feel outrage. I feel helpless. I'm sitting here, essentially quarantined, on my computer typing. My wife & son asleep. Hoping somehow this Twitter thread does something. For me, it's not just I don't want people to die. Or hate jail & prison. I *know people inside.* I'm scared.

I know an asthmatic father of a 1 y/o locked up on a technical parole violation. I know a kid in his early twenties who was brutally abused & now serving years. I know a profoundly intellectually disabled man, who can't even read the word "red" jailed on bail he can't afford.

I'm thinking of the 50-something y/o man I represented who was sentenced a few months ago to 1.5-3 years in prison. He had been released for 2 years during case. Begged for alternative to jail. Didn't get it. Took plea. A look of terror as he was cuffed. He had reason to be.

I'm thinking of all those people who I've represented, who were locked up previously, deeply damaged by the experience, & couldve been locked up right now. A strange feeling they "lucked out" even though they were deeply traumatized. Folks like Angel:

In honor of Gabriel, this mindless, spiteful, sociopathic idiot, please let @NYGovCuomo hear that you demand he take swift, definitive action to release as many people as possible from NY jails & prisons.