The governor of New York declared herself “horrified” after the publication of images showing a group of police officers beating Robert Brooks, a 43-year-old handcuffed inmate in prison, who ended up dying.
In a newly released video of a fatal beating in a New York prison, several prison guards repeatedly abuse a handcuffed man, hitting him in the chest with a shoe and lifting him by the neck and then dropping him.
Body camera footage of the Dec. 9 assault on Robert Brooks was made public Friday by the state attorney general, who is investigating the officers' use of force.
Brooks, 43, was pronounced dead at a hospital the morning after the attack at Marcy Correctional Facility, a state prison in Oneida County, where he was incarcerated.
Thirteen prison guards and a nurse involved in the attack could be fired, according to New York Governor Kathy Hochul, who said she was “outraged and horrified” by the videos of the “senseless murder.”
The footage, made public on Friday, shows guards repeatedly punching Brooks in the face and crotch while he is handcuffed on a medical examination table.
One of the officers uses a shoe to hit Brooks in the stomach, while another picks him up by the neck and drops him back onto the table. The officers then remove his shirt and pants as he lies motionless and bloodied on his back.
“These videos are shocking and disturbing, and I advise everyone to take appropriate precautions before deciding to view them,” said New York Attorney General Letitia James.
Final autopsy results for Brooks are still pending.
Possible suffocation
Preliminary findings from a medical examination indicate “concern for asphyxiation due to neck compression as a cause of death, as well as death due to the actions of another person,” according to court documents.
The videos do not include audio because the body cameras had not been activated by the officers wearing them. The state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision issued a directive following Brooks' death that staff must wear body cameras in every interaction with incarcerated people.
James said his office is already investigating the use of force that led to Brooks' death, but did not reveal whether any of the guards would be charged with a crime.
With the release of the videos, “the public can now see for themselves the horrific and extreme nature of the deadly attack on Robert L. Brooks,” said an attorney for his family, Elizabeth Mazur.
“As viewers can see, Mr. Brooks was fatally and violently beaten by a group of guards whose job it was to keep him safe,” Mazur said.
“He deserved to live, and all the other people who live at the Marcy Correctional Facility deserve to know that they do not have to live in fear of violence from prison staff.”
Integrity undermined
The state prison guards union, which viewed the footage of the attack before its release, said in a statement: “What we witnessed is, to say the least, incomprehensible and certainly does not reflect the great work that the vast majority of our elements “does it every day.”
“This incident not only endangers all of our members, but undermines the integrity of our profession. We cannot and will not tolerate this behavior,” said the union, the New York State Police and Prison Guards Charitable Association.
Brooks had been serving a 12-year prison sentence for first-degree assault since 2017. He had arrived at the Marcy Correctional Facility a few hours before the beating, after being transferred from another nearby state prison, authorities said.