1.) How are you connected to this movement?  

Because I have a family member that is presently incarcerated there. 

2.) Why should Rikers close?  

Rikers should close, one, because the correctional officers that are there need correction themselves. They don't follow the rules. They have their own protocol. And that protocol is on the same line of criminal activity, and there's no one there to oversee them. So basically, I feel they run that place and they have no respect or regard for anyone. Even when we go to visit, the way they treat us is completely unacceptable, horrible. Who do you complain to? Because they truly don't care. And they really need to go back and get sensitivity training, and they have to be accountable for their actions too. I don't think anyone has a right, whether they are a police officer, a detective, whatever label they carry - they still have to be accountable to somebody, you just can't do what you want.  

And that's basically what happens in Rikers, there's no protocol. There's no set anything, it just is what it is. That's why I think it should close, because nothing and no one comes out of there with any positive anything. Nothing. Even as a visitor you come out with the most negative feelings. I mean, honestly, I'm 65 years old, and when I have gone there, God knows that I have wanted to do something horrible in my mind to them. So imagine someone that's being detained there for months, for years, how they're feeling on a 24-hour basis, and I'm just there for a visit. 

You know, they go in, that's it, we beat them up. We teach them wrong and then we want them to come out and be better. This is never gonna work. And it hasn't worked obviously. Rikers has to be closed. It's been going on forever. And the correctional officers and everybody that runs that needs to be retrained or they need to get a different job. Because none of them are good. 

3.) What is your vision for a more just and equitable post-Rikers New York City?  

My vision is to close Rikers and perhaps come up with a plan where when people are being detained or have to be detained, let's try to put them in an atmosphere to bring out the good in them, the better in them.  

Obviously, everything has a root. People come from communities, problems, families where they don't have all the tools they need and didn't get the perfect upbringing. So let's create a place where we can inspire, bring out the best in them, bring out their strengths, and try to make them better people. Does it work for everybody? No, we know that. But if we don't try, we don't know.  

And I'm sure people are in there because they're dealing with inner problems, and they don't have the tools, never had the tools to get their needs met. So it comes out like a child: when a child wants what they want, they have a tantrum. While a small child grows into an adult, it doesn't change because you hit from 18 to 19 or 20. You're still dealing with that inner child. But if we could find the good in them, their strengths, and work on them and show them, This is what you have in you. This is what you can do. They'll come out and be better people. But if we keep beating them up while they're in there, what do you expect them to come up to be? It doesn't make sense. It just doesn't make sense.  

I mean, even a person with a disability as a child comes with a disability, but we see all the other strengths they have as opposed to just focusing on their disability. Now we show them what you can still do and you can still accomplish. What does that do for a person with a disability? It makes them feel great. Because now they're no longer focused on what they can't do, but now they've learned: I can do this. Okay, if I'm blind, I can't see but I can learn how to sing, write, there are so many other facets that I can do.