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Alliance Alert: The findings in this independent review are deeply disturbing and should serve as a wake-up call for every ���Ķ���vloger. The report documents not only individual acts of violence, but a culture in which correction officers, supervisors, and even medical staff systematically beat people who were incarcerated and then worked to conceal that misconduct by falsifying reports, minimizing injuries, and attempting to blame the very people they had assaulted. No correctional system can protect public safety or support rehabilitation when abuse is tolerated, accountability is absent, and those entrusted with protecting people’s lives instead participate in covering up violence.
The tragic killing of Robert Brooks should never have happened. His death, and the subsequent killing of Messiah Nantwi just months later, represent profound failures of leadership, supervision, accountability, and adherence to basic human rights. The report makes clear that warning signs existed long before these tragedies and that patterns of excessive force and misconduct had gone largely unchecked. Effective oversight and enforcement of human rights protections could and should have prevented these horrific acts. Every person in state custody has the right to be safe from abuse, regardless of why they are incarcerated.
This report also reinforces the urgent need for DOCCS to fully implement the HALT Solitary Confinement Act and dramatically improve conditions inside ���Ķ���vlog’s prisons. The recommendations included in the recent Corrections Omnibus Reform Act were an important first step, but they do not go far enough to address the systemic failures identified by these investigators. ���Ķ���vlog needs stronger independent oversight, greater accountability, full compliance with the HALT Act, and meaningful reforms that prioritize rehabilitation, safety, transparency, and the protection of civil and human rights.
The Alliance for Rights and Recovery will continue working alongside our criminal justice reform partners and members of the Legislature to advance these reforms and ensure that the abuses documented in this report are never repeated. People who are incarcerated deserve dignity, safety, and humane treatment, and ���Ķ���vlog has both a legal and moral obligation to ensure that those rights are protected.

NY Prison Review Finds ‘Misuse of Force’ and ‘Efforts to Conceal’ It
By Brendan J. Lyons | Times Union | July 6, 2026

ALBANY — A private law firm’s review of the use of force inside the central ���Ķ���vlog prisons where two inmates were beaten to death by correction officers has confirmed that a staffing crisis is fueling a lack of programming that leads to more misbehavior and unsafe conditions.
The searing 277-page report — distributed by the state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision on Friday afternoon, the observed holiday for July 4 — also confirmed that correction officers, supervisors and medical staff have systematically beaten inmates and then taken steps to conceal their misuse of force, including falsifying official reports that downplay injuries and attempting to blame the incarcerated persons for the incidents.
The department’s review also included input from  a public health and human rights advocacy program that seeks to change the culture of prisons to reduce debilitating health effects on inmates and staff, and a corrections consulting firm, 
The corrections department last year retained Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP to conduct the lead review of Marcy Correctional Facility in Oneida County, where 43-year-old Robert L. Brooks Sr. was beaten to death by correction officers in December 2024.
Brooks’ homicide was captured by body cameras that officers and supervisors mistakenly thought were not recording. The video evidence led to the convictions of multiple correction officers, including on charges of murder and manslaughter, and confirmed that unjustified physical violence has been used against inmates. That incident also exposed how prison administrators failed to ensure that officers were wearing and activating body cameras as required.
Less than four months after Brooks’ death, and as corrections officials had sought to reaffirm their policies on the use of body-worn cameras and use of force, 22-year-old Messiah Nantwi was beaten to death at Mid-State Correctional Facility in March 2025. His death also came at the hands of multiple correction officers, including some who worked at the nearby Marcy prison and had responded to a reported disturbance involving Nantwi.
An indictment filed in Oneida County Court alleged the officers mopped up Nantwi’s blood and planted a knife in his cell in a failed attempt to cover up and justify the attack. An autopsy determined he died from traumatic brain injuries and that his body had been struck nearly 70 times with batons, fists and boots. The members of a Correctional Emergency Response team that were involved in that incident were not wearing body cameras.

‘Stop resisting’
The department of corrections initially retained WilmerHale to review the agency’s use of force and assess internal procedures to identify any systemic issues. But the firm’s work was later expanded to include a limited review of Mid-State prison. The firm focused on several key areas in addition to use of force, including training, the department’s internal affairs unit, staff discipline, the inmate grievance program, risk detection, weapons, contraband, cameras and other areas.
“Our review found that both incarcerated individuals and DOCCS staff feel unsafe in the DOCCS system,” the 277-page report states. “In addition, a staffing crisis has led to a cycle that exacerbates safety issues: staff shortages lead to less programming, which leads to worse conditions for incarcerated individuals, which leads to misbehavior, which leads to unsafe and stressful working conditions, which causes attrition, which in turn leads to fewer staff.”
The report also cited a prevalence of contraband and gang activity that its investigators said exacerbates the safety problems, which undermine the goal of rehabilitation.
The investigators for WilmerHale conducted hundreds of confidential interviews with current and former inmates, corrections officers, supervisors and executives. They also visited Marcy and Mid-State numerous times to observe the conditions and surveyed inmates and staff at those two facilities as well as Sing Sing and Gouverneur state prisons.
The report also outlined numerous instances of unbridled violence against inmates by correction officers prior to Brooks’ death, including by officers who were later implicated in his homicide. But the investigation found that officers had faced little or no discipline for misconduct allegations, including assaults of inmates who suffered broken bones and other serious injuries.
A month before Brooks was killed, a group of correction officers, their supervisors and medical staff were investigated for an incident in which an inmate was subjected to chemical spray in his cell and then taken to a “decontamination room” where officers turned off the lights and beat him while a sergeant stood outside yelling, “Stop resisting.”
A nurse who evaluated the inmate for his facial and other injuries falsely reported he had sustained no injuries and the officers also lied in the use of force reports they filed, “stating that they had not been involved in the use of force and describing behavior by the incarcerated individual inconsistent with video evidence.”
An internal investigation “determined that nine staff members engaged in misconduct, including a captain, a lieutenant, two sergeants, four correction officers, and a nurse,” the WilmerHale report states. “DOCCS’ Bureau of Labor Relations … pursued disciplinary action against six staff members: two resigned and four settled for suspensions and disciplinary evaluation periods.”
It’s unclear why that incident was not referred to police or prosecutors.
It was among numerous incidents documented by the outside reviewers in which inmates were beaten and then officers, supervisors and other staff allegedly conspired to cover it up.
“The tragic killings of Mr. Brooks and Mr. Nantwi demonstrated systemic shortcomings in oversight, accountability, and culture within DOCCS facilities,” the WilmerHale report states in its conclusion. “Both incidents involved misuse of force and efforts to conceal misconduct, revealing deep cultural and procedural deficiencies at Marcy and Mid-State.”
The report said that the subsequent criminal prosecutions of correction officers and policy changes are “critical steps toward accountability, (but) more must be done.”

Solitary confinement
In the backdrop of the findings, there is a continuing debate in the state Legislature and ongoing battles in the state court system over what the department of corrections contends is its inability to safely implement the Humane Alternatives to Long-Term Solitary Confinement Act, which went into effect in March 2022 and is supposed to limit the use of solitary confinement.
Prison advocacy organizations and civil rights groups contend the department’s failure to follow the provisions of that law is a factor in the problems plaguing the state prison system. 
The 2022 law limited the ability of the corrections department to place an inmate in solitary confinement for offenses such as sexual harassment, lewd conduct, throwing bodily fluids or the contents of a toilet bowl onto staff, extortion, rioting or an escape attempt. 
In September 2025, the corrections department announced proposed amendments that were recommended by a committee that was formed a year earlier to review the statute, known as the HALT Act.
The committee’s recommendations included giving the corrections department the flexibility to place an inmate in segregation for up to 15 days for “recidivist misconduct” when they are in the prison’s general population. The panel also suggested three incidents within a 30-day period could trigger that provision, which they said would be invoked “in cases where it has been determined that alternative interventions have failed, and the ongoing misbehavior creates an unreasonable risk to safety or disruption to the operation of the facility.”
Opponents of the HALT Act contend poor safety and an inability to properly discipline inmates for misconduct are behind the ongoing staffing crisis that was exacerbated last year during an unsanctioned strike by correction officers — a walkout that depleted their ranks after many officers were later fired for refusing to return to duty. It has led to more than 2,000 National Guard troops being deployed in state prisons for more than a year.
The Legal Aid Society, which is challenging the state’s solitary confinement policies in court, issued a statement Monday saying the report by WilmerHale confirms the department is failing to implement and comply with the provisions of the HALT Act.
“Investigators found little or no required out-of-cell programming in several restrictive housing units, people held in solitary confinement for more than 50 or 60 days despite legal limits, and one person who reportedly spent 140 consecutive days moving through restrictive housing units,” the Legal Aid Society said in its statement.
The organization added that the report also found “that the lack of therapeutic programming and congregate activity made it harder for people to move out of restrictive housing, potentially prolonging their isolation.”  
“���Ķ���vlog cannot respond to violence and dysfunction by unlawfully isolating people while denying them the programming and out-of-cell time the law requires,” the statement added. “DOCCS must confront the systemic failures documented in this report and comply with the laws enacted to protect the safety and dignity of people in its custody.” 
State corrections Commissioner Daniel F. Martuscello III said the reviews conducted by the outside consultants “reflect both the important work already underway to strengthen safety, accountability, and professionalism across DOCCS, and the significant work that still lies ahead.”
“We remain committed to instituting meaningful reforms, implementing the requirements of the Corrections Omnibus Reform Act, and working closely with external partners, service providers, and stakeholders to strengthen transparency, improve operations, and advance safer conditions for everyone in our facilities and communities,” Martuscello added.
A spokesman for the department said the agency has completed more than a dozen of the 77 combined recommendations of the outside consultants and “is currently in the process of implementing another 47.”
Robert Brooks Jr., whose family has a pending federal civil rights lawsuit against the state over his father’s homicide, issued a statement through his attorneys Monday questioning by the state needed to pay more than $9 million for the outside review to find “what everyone already knows.”
“���Ķ���vlog prisons are dangerously unsafe and the system is broken,” the statement adds. “It does not take a $9.3 million report to see that. Advocacy organizations, journalists, and incarcerated people have been telling DOCCS about these problems and proposing reforms for years. The need for change was obvious before my father was killed.”
Chris Summers, president of the ���Ķ���vlog State Correctional Officers & Police Benevolent Association, which represents thousands of correction officers, said, “���Ķ���vlogers deserve more than carefully timed press releases issued over a holiday weekend.”
“Our members have been ,” Summers said. “Instead of listening to the correction officers who work inside these facilities every day, DOCCS and ���Ķ���vlog state policymakers dismissed their concerns. Now, they are releasing reports and independent assessments that confirm many of the same warnings our members have been raising all along.”