More than 750 New York women to sue over sexual abuse in state prisons
More than 750 women who say they were sexually abused while locked up in New York correctional facilities will get their day in court under a new state law that allows them to take legal action against their alleged abusers — even if the claims are decades old.
The Adult Survivors Act — which passed the Albany legislature earlier this year and will take effect on Thanksgiving Day — opened up a one-year window for victims to file civil lawsuits against their attackers and the institutions that shielded them, despite statute of limitation laws that previously made the claims moot.
The claims, which will likely be directed at the state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision, as well as the the officers allegedly involved, are expected to cost taxpayers millions.
“These brave survivors of sexual assault were in prison serving prison sentences decided by our justices but what they were given were life sentences of trauma,” Adam Slater, whose law firm Slater Slater Schulman is representing the survivors, said during a news conference Wednesday.
One of those women, Sadie Bell, 61, said she was “violently raped” by a sergeant and later suffered an ectopic pregnancy that left her infertile while she was locked up at the since-shuttered Bayview Correctional Facility in Manhattan decades ago.
“After that he kind of put me in silence, put me in solitary confinement so no one could know that he had raped me. I asked to speak to a correction officer about the situation and she told me ‘Listen, don’t tell anyone that you told me this,’” Bell recalled.
Later, she started experiencing severe pain and when a doctor examined her, he told her she was about seven weeks pregnant from the rape and her fallopian tube had ruptured.
“[The doctor] said ‘Ms. Bell you lost five pints of blood. You have a fallopian tube [rupture] so I went to the hospital and I had to get 5 pints of blood,” she said.
“When the sergeant raped me… He didn’t use any type of condom… After he finished all I see was blood and semen running down my legs.
“So this is my story and he needs to be accountable for it. I suffered a lot. I can’t have kids at all.”
Jacqueline Wiggins, 58, said she was raped by a correctional officer at the same facility in the 1990s, and hopes to see her attacker finally held accountable.
“An officer came into my cell one night, held me down, put his hand over my mouth… He penetrated me and told me that if I told anyone that he would make sure that my work release got revoked,” Wiggins said.
“Their job is to protect me and guide me and make sure that I lead a productive life and be safe, not to sexually assault me… I would like to see those officers brought up on charges and that this never happens to any other women prisoner.”
Mia Wheeler’s 15-year-old brother died in prison, which is why she stayed silent after she was sexually assaulted at the Bedford Correctional Facility, famed civil rights attorney lawyer Ben Crump, who will help litigate the claims, said at the press conference.
“The officer first befriended me then after the sexual assaults occurred… [he told me] that if I would tell [anyone] that I would reap the repercussions,” Wheeler said as she broke down in tears.
“I felt isolated and alone,” she continued. “I am here with my sisters who share a painful bond but I ask that we be silent no more. There are too many women who have fallen victim to rape and sexual assault that has fallen on deaf ears.”
State Sen. Brad Hoylman, who sponsored the landmark legislation, said it’ll be worth the steep price tag.
“It’s important that these women have their day in court and that we identify the perpetrators and the institutional powers responsible,” Hoylman told The Post Thursday. “But I think also these claims will point to longer term reforms in our correctional system and elsewhere to prevent this kind of abuse in the future.
“Whatever the price tag is, I argue it’ll be worth it,” he added, “not just for these women but for institutional change to prevent these travesties from occurring down the road.”
