A woman serving a six-year sentence in Rikers Island won a $425,000 settlement after wearing a wire and exposing three correction offers who sexually abused her from 2015 to 2016.
Officers Steven Santiago, David Johnson, and Nana Osei were represented by union lawyers and were required to pay a laughable $750 toward the settlement. All men deny the accusations. While the woman may have won the settlement, a notification was sent to the victim’s family, meaning she may have to pay them a portion of the money received.
According to The New York Daily News, the officer are no longer allowed to have any contact with the inmates and the department is looking to terminate Santiago and Osei.
In the woman’s suit filed inside the Manhattan Federal Court, the abuse started in September at Rikers’ Rose M. Singer Center. The woman alleges that Santiago, multiple times, forced her to touch herself while he watched. She also claims that he brought her into the control room, known as “the bubble” making her watch pornography with him while he masturbated.
Two months later, the woman claims Johnson “demanded” she show him what Santiago forced her to do.
About four months later investigators who were aware of the woman’s “relationship” with Santiago asked her to wear a wire. She later told authorities about Johnson.
In April 2016, Santiago can be heard on the wire instructing the woman to not tell authorities about what he did. The Bronx district attorney’s office contacted the inmate because they were investigating Santiago’s abuse of several other women.
The Daily News reports the woman was concerned with her safety and in September 2016, Osei began to abuse her, forcing the inmate to have sex with him inside a broom closet. The alleged assaults happened four times. At least twice, Osei smuggled in marijuana, opioid Suboxone, and tobacco inside cereal boxes as recompense.
A spokesman for the Bronx District Attorney’s office confirmed none of the officers have been charged.
Source: https://www.vibe.com/2018/10/rikers-island-inmate-wins-settlement/