NYC Man, 22, Held Without Trial For Three Years in NYC Kills Himself

Kalief Browder, 22, Took His Own Life After Being Held Three Years Without Trial In Rikers Island, NYC Jail

[From article]
In May 2010, 10 days before Kalief’s 17th birthday, he and a friend were arrested after a man accused them of stealing his backpack and Kalief of striking him in the face, which led to Kalief being charged with robbery, grand larceny and assault.
His friend was not held behind bars. Although Kalief insisted he’d done nothing wrong, a judge set his bail at $3,000, a sum his parents were unable to raise, because he was on probation. After his indictment, another judge ordered him held without bail because of his probationary status. He was locked up in the vast city jail on Rikers Island — for three years — awaiting a trial that never came.
He was held in solitary confinement for about two years, punishment for fighting and other infractions, his lawyer Paul Prestia told me.
A security video from inside Rikers showed him being slammed to the ground and pummeled by a correction officer as his hands were cuffed behind his back. Another showed him being beaten by about 10 teen inmates.
[. . .]
A prosecutor offered him a deal allowing him to plead guilty to felonies in exchange for a sentence of 3½ years in prison, then 2 ½.
Then a judge offered to let him plead guilty to two misdemeanors and go free immediately.
In each case, he refused. He wanted to stand trial.
Then by 2013, the guy who’d accused Kalief and his pal of robbing him had returned to Mexico and could not be located by authorities.
Charges were dropped. Kalief was sent home.
But he never really was free.

http://nypost.com/2015/06/11/the-tragedy-of-kalief-browder-must-never-happen-again/

The tragedy of Kalief Browder must never happen again
By Andrea Peyser
New York Post
June 11, 2015 | 11:19pm