Author: 1010 WINS Newsroom with Audacy
February 19th, 2025
NEW YORK (1010 WINS) — A Rikers Island jail complex inmate died while in custody on Wednesday morning, marking the first detainee death so far in 2025, according to the New York City Department of Correction.
Ramel Powell, 38, was pronounced dead at the Otis Bantum Correctional Center on Rikers Island at about 2:14 a.m., officials said. Correction Commissioner Lynelle Maginley-Liddie said that the department is conducting a full investigation into the death.
“I, and the entire NYC Department of Correction, express our deepest sympathy to the loved ones of Mr. Powell,” Maginley-Liddie said.
The jails agency said that it had notified the federal monitor, Board of Correction, New York State Attorney General’s Office, State Commission of Correction and the city’s Department of Investigation of Powell’s passing. This has become part of the standard procedure for in-custody deaths.
Powell has been in custody for 19 months and it was not immediately clear what caused his death.
Five people died last year in the department’s custody or shortly after release, according to the Board of Correction, but Powell is the 34th person to die while in custody during the Adams administration, the Katal Center for Equity, Health and Justice said.
By order of a 2019 city law, Rikers Island is slated to close by the end of August 2027 and have its function replaced by four borough jails in what the city has called a “historic decarceration plan.” Facilities are being built in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx, though it is unclear whether the mandate will be met.
Rikers Island has been heavily criticized and is facing federal takeover in the form of federal receivership due to long-standing allegations of violence and dilapidated conditions. A decision by a federal judge could allow the Justice Department to directly oversee it.
The death comes on the third day of illegal correction officer strikes at state prisons, which prompted Gov. Kathy Hochul to deploy National Guard troops on Wednesday.
