Prison guard: ‘We’re getting treated like criminals’

Dozens of corrections officers gathered around a burn barrel outside the Otisville Correctional Facility on the morning of Feb. 25, for the seventh day of a wildcat strike that many fear will cost them their jobs.

“Not one person wants to be here,” said one striking prison guard, whose loss of a paycheck and health insurance last week came just as he learned his wife was expecting a baby girl. “The reason I took this job was for the benefits.” The guards started picketing on Feb. 19, and their paychecks were cut off the next day, they said.

But after being repeatedly let down by a union they’ve lost faith in, the guards say they have no choice but to join thousands of corrections officers statewide who started walking off the job on Feb. 17.

They describe severe staffing shortages, forced overtime during which they may not see their children for weeks on end, and working conditions that have gotten untenably dangerous since the passage of the Humane Alternatives to Long-Term Solitary Confinement Act (HALT) in 2022.

Their demands include a suspension of HALT until it can be revised; a repeal of the Department of Corrections and Community Supervision directive to make do with 70% staffing levels; an end to nonessential mandatory overtime and to all mandatory overtime surpassing 16 hours; salary increases and required body scans for visitors to the prison; the resignation of Commissioner Daniel Martuscello; and no retaliation for the protesters. Lawmakers from both parties are calling for an overhaul of New York’s prison system, as corrections officers statewide continue to walk off the job.

The Otisville corrections officers describe themselves a brotherhood, so it’s fraught that some of them are crossing the picket line to earn 2.5 times their normal salary. That skeleton crew is now patrolling the prison along with National Guard soldiers that Governor Kathy Hochul has deployed. Visiting has been suspended at the prison.

“As we reach day 10 of this illegal strike, we take a moment to recognize and commend the exemplary work being done by the current staff and the National Guard,” said Thomas Mailey, DOCCS communications director, on Feb. 26. “Their dedication and professionalism are critical in maintaining facility operations and ensuring the safety and security of our facilities and the neighboring communities. However, the longer this illegal strike continues the greater the risk becomes to the stability of these facilities and for the people inside them. It is imperative that this unlawful job action come to an end without further delay. The state remains fully engaged in ongoing mediation effort and remains hopeful for a swift and fair resolution.”

All but one of the picketers, a retired lieutenant, asked not to be identified by name. The strike has been deemed illegal by Governor Hochul and 10 striking officers from Otisville have been named on a state police court order threatening arrest if they don’t return to work.

The HALT Act limits the amount of time inmates can be kept in solitary or “segregated confinement” to 15 days, even for repeated violence against corrections officers. The result, they say, is that inmate-on-inmate violence and gang-related extortion are now the norm within the sprawling medium-security prison complex, where guards and inmates occupy the same space. It’s unsafe not only for the guards, nurses, therapists, food service staff and teachers, but also for the approximately 568 inmates, the vast majority of whom want to do their time and go home, the guards say. Meanwhile, visitors are free to decline going through the new, expensive body scanners the state bought, and are allegedly smuggling in drugs and weapons like ceramic razor blades.

New York is a “pro-inmate state” that allows things like contact visits, giving visitors a chance to pass off contraband to prisoners. In the meantime, said the guard, “We’re getting treated like criminals.”

Among the picketers was a father of four recuperating from rotator cuff surgery after an inmate who had been smoking K2, or synthetic marijuana, threw him into a water fountain, as part of an assault on five corrections officers that the inmate later didn’t recall. Another guard had been assaulted nine times over the course of his career. Another narrowly missed being on the receiving end of a boulder thrown through a window by a mentally ill inmate – who are increasingly being housed in the prison as mental health facilities close. “He had mental issues and that’s why he did that; he didn’t belong here,” said the guard. Yet another was attacked with a nail clipper by a mentally ill inmate. Still, the issues at Otisville “aren’t that extreme,” said a guard, compared to some prisons upstate.

Assaults on prison staff jumped from 1,043 in 2019 to more than 1,938 in 2024, according to New York State data. Inmate-on-inmate assaults jumped from 1,267 to more than 2,697 during that time. Though most of the assaults take place in maximum security prisons, the spike in violence has been particularly pronounced at medium-security prisons like Otisville, which saw nearly three times as many assaults on staff in 2024 as they did five years earlier.

Inmates convicted of violent felonies now make up 64% of the population of medium-security prisons statewide, up from 56% in 2014.

The picketing guards say the violence is exacerbated by staffing shortages, an issue faced by prisons nationwide. Otisville employs about 160 guards, out of a recommended full staff of 248, said one guard. (Those numbers could not be verified by press time.) Between 20 and 62 corrections officers patrol the prison, depending on time of day, the guards explained. The overnight shift, when only 20 guards are on duty and they’re locked into the dorm with the inmates without a key, is when they’re most susceptible, they said.

“We have been at a critical, emergency level for two and a half years now,” said Assemblyman Brian Maher, describing prison staffing shortages at a press conference on Feb. 21.

But perhaps worse than the threat of violence are the hours. Regular shifts were extended from eight to 16 hours during COVID, then recently they were extended again to 24 hours. Guards may not know until they show up at work that they have to work 16 or 24 hours instead of eight, they said. That makes it impossible to help with childcare, make doctor appointments or look for another job.

“The biggest issue is you can’t plan anything,” said a guard. “Who’s going to pick my kid up at daycare? We’re all married-single. Our wives are married to us but they don’t see us.”

Correctional officers’ life expectancy in the U.S. is 59 years, compared to the population average of 75 years, according to a recent study of over 1,000 prison guards, and they suffer an unusually high suicide and divorce rate.

“It was always about sacrifice,” said retired Lieutenant Frank Smith, 56, of Minisink, who was manning the food table at the strike. Smith worked at Otisville Correctional Facility for 26 years, beginning in the 90s. Back then, “it was a decent job,” he said. Now, “these officers, they don’t have a life. Hochul is forcing these guys to choose between their families and career.” Between 24-hour shifts, risk of exposure to physical violence and drugs that can cause overdoses just by contact, and the removal of the tools that guards need to keep order, no one in their right mind would take this job anymore, he said. “If that was the job description when they took the civil service exam, they would never entertain the thought,” he said.

“Fathers are missing their kids grow up,” he said. “If you take what these officers are putting themselves up against, it would not be tolerated in any other field.”

A sedan pulls up alongside the picketers. The driver, Nick Omendola, owner of Nick’s Pizza, leans out the window to discuss what they want for lunch. Like many in the community, he’s been donating food. “Pizza, pasta, whatever I got to do,” he said. “They’re my guys, because my daughter’s a CO too. I know a lot about what’s going on. I think it should be fair. They’re here for a reason.”