Rikers Island detainee dies — first fatality at troubled jail complicated this yr

A detainee awaiting sentencing for repeatedly peddling medicine outdoors a Midtown quick meals joint died early Saturday on Rikers Island, the primary dying of 2023 on the troubled jail complicated, the Day by day Information has realized.

The lifeless physique of Marvin Pines, 65, was discovered within the bathe space of the island’s North Infirmary Command at 6:18 a.m. after struggling a seizure, stated sources conversant in the case and the inmate’s lawyer. He was housed on the unit, the place the sickliest detainees are held, since his arrival on the jail final summer season.

“It’s very unhappy,” stated protection lawyer Javier Damien. “I simply assume Rikers Island must get higher medical care … You may’t deny there’s a difficulty with the medical care there. It’s a major problem.”

Pines was due for sentencing on Feb. 21 after pleading responsible two months in the past, and confronted a yr in state jail and one yr of post-release supervision.

Final yr, 19 detainees died on Rikers Island, spurring calls from inmate advocates for the jail’s closure. Sixteen individuals died on Rikers in 2021.

“At 65, he was despatched to a penal colony that’s totally failing to supply medical care or security for anybody,” Darren Mack, co-director of the Freedom Agenda and a one-time inmate at Rikers. “Mayor Adams desires New Yorkers to look away from these tragedies by telling us that folks held at Rikers are ‘unhealthy individuals’ however we all know Mr. Pines was a human being, he must be alive, and our metropolis failed him.”

Mack famous that Pines is the twentieth individual to die at Rikers since Adams took workplace in January 2022.

“Dozens of households are grieving the lack of their family members within the custody of this metropolis, and the mayor continues to be encouraging judges and prosecutors to ship extra individuals to this dying camp, as an alternative of investing in options for actual group security,” he stated.

Pines, of Pennsylvania, was busted thrice for drug possession and sale outdoors a McDonald’s on W. thirty fourth St. and Eighth Ave., sources instructed the Day by day Information. He was twice launched earlier than a July 28, 2022, arrest led to his incarceration.

A supply stated 4 individuals overdosed close to the McDonald’s on the day Pines was taken into custody, though there was by no means a direct hyperlink to the defendant.

When arrested in Might, police recovered glassine envelopes stamped with the quick meals big’s brand and the phrases “I’m lovin’ it,” the supply stated. He pleaded responsible to all three prices in November and was remanded to Rikers Island.

Pines’ daughter — who requested that her title not be used — stated her father had psychological well being points and likewise suffered from complications and issues along with his blood stress.

In August, the daughter stated, Pines suffered a seizure that prompted him to fall in a Rikers bathe, inflicting a wound in his head that required stitches. “What I need to know is, have been they monitoring after he fell? … They need to have been monitoring him.”

Pines, who had labored for a automobile dealership and as a prepare dinner, “acquired into petty issues, and he had a tough time managing his dependancy,” the daughter stated.

“He had spent plenty of time out and in of services like Rikers. He’s all the time had slightly one thing flawed with him. He had a really tough childhood.”

“Any dying in custody is a tragedy,” stated Division of Corrections Commissioner Louis Molina. “We sincerely ship our deepest condolences and sympathy to this particular person’s household and family members. As with all deaths in custody, we’re working with our companion companies to conduct a full investigation.”

The commissioner stated all deaths in custody are reviewed by the state Legal professional Basic’s workplace and town Division of Investigation.

The DOC has been repeatedly accused of offering inmates with poor medical care. Final yr, the failure of Rikers Island staffers to get detainees to their medical appointments was an oblique issue within the deaths of 9 inmates in 2022, town Board of Correction stated in a report.

The Authorized Support Society filed a category motion lawsuit in November over the missed medical appointments, claiming that the Correction Division owed detainees $3 million for for failing to deliver them to medical appointments