Father of Robert Brooks speaks about prison reform at State Legislature hearing

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Father of Robert Brooks speaks about prison reform at State Legislature hearing

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ROCHESTER, N.Y. – Robert Ricks, the father of Robert Brooks who died after corrections officers beat him at Marcy Correctional Facility, spoke at a joint hearing of the State Assembly and Senate.

The hearing on Thursday was to discuss public protection. Ricks, who runs a youth reform program, called for justice for people who experience brutality in prisons. He supports passing a prison reform bill that would allow the corrections commissioner to fire officers after grievous offenses and to create a new watchdog body to oversee state prisons.

“Y’all know it’s broke. Y’all know that people are being beat to death in jail. Y’all know that. So it’s like, what are you going to do. I do my job. My expectation is that you all do your job,” he said.

Body-worn camera video shows corrections officers beating Brooks, a Greece man, in a medical exam room on Dec. 9. He died in the hospital the next day. The medical examiner determined that Brooks died from compression of the neck and multiple blunt impact injuries.

So far, there have been no criminal charges in Brooks’ death. Seventeen employees at Marcy Correctional Facility have been suspended without pay or have resigned since Brooks’ death. We’re still waiting to hear the results of a grand jury, which was expected to hear evidence this week on whether to bring charges against the corrections officers and nurses seen in the video.

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