THE CITY This story was originally published by THE CITY.
Stanley Richards, who did multiple stints on Rikers Island as a youth before going on to lead the city’s largest nonprofit assisting people who have been locked up, was announced on Saturday by Mayor Zohran Mamdani as the city’s Correction Department commissioner.
Richards takes over the department at a pivotal moment. Last week, a federal judge appointed a court-ordered remediation manager with sweeping powers to reform conditions at Rikers, which has been long plagued by safety issues and which the city is under pressure to shutter. He is expected to work closely with that remediation manager, Nicholas Deml, a former top detention official from Vermont, who will have final say over many key issues there. “Today, we turn the page and we start a new era,” Richard told reporters Saturday night. “Under Mayor Mamdani’s leadership, we will chart a path of hope, healing, and transformation.”
Mamdani said he had not yet spoken to Deml, but his administration has been in touch.
“We look forward to working with the remediation manager on improving conditions in our city’s jails, both for those in custody and for correction officers,” the mayor told reporters. Richards echoed that sentiment, saying Deml will work in “partnership” with him and his team.
Richards’s appointment marks a major change in direction from the administration of former Mayor Eric Adams, who vowed to bring back the use of solitary confinement and appointed a former police detective to lead Correction while the union representing its officers cheered on.
By contrast, Richards served as a deputy commissioner of the Correction Department during the last six months of the de Blasio administration, in-between decades of work at the Fortune Society. During his previous stint at DOC, the Correction Officers Benevolent Association (COBA) repeatedly attacked him and his boss, Vincent Schiraldi, arguing that they put the interests of people behind bars over officers and other jail staff.
“We will prioritize the safety of staff and incarcerated people,” Richards said Saturday, adding that he planned to “strengthen connections to community services” for housing, healthcare and employment.
In a statement issued Saturday night, COBA President Benny Boscio said the union had long been willing to work with jail leaders, despite what he called “false narratives” portraying the union as an obstacle to reform.
Boscio said COBA expects Richards to respect the rights of correction officers and recognize that officer safety is central to the functioning of the city’s jails. “The jails cannot and will not operate as safely as possible if the concerns of our members are brushed aside,” Boscio said.
He added that the union hopes Richards will demonstrate a commitment to putting safety and security ahead of “any political ideology.”
Richards’s appointment was welcomed by leaders in the legal defense community.
Tina Luongo, chief attorney of the Criminal Defense Practice at the Legal Aid Society, said few people understand the city’s jail system “and what is needed to reform it” more deeply than Richards, pointing to his lived experience, previous senior leadership role in the Department of Correction and his tenure at the Fortune Society.
Luongo added that Mamdani’s decision to support the appointment of a remediation manager presents “a new opportunity to turn the page on Rikers Island and finally end its dysfunction, disorder, and depravity.”
Richards spent time in Rikers during the late 1980s as he struggled with substance addiction. He has described himself as a “predator” during that time who would sell smuggled contraband cigarettes and drugs to fellow detainees. He turned his life around and most recently served as president and CEO of the Fortune Society, where he helped people successfully re-enter society after jail and advocated for alternatives to incarceration. Richards first joined the nonprofit in 1991 as a re-entry counselor and rose through its ranks over three decades.
He later served as first deputy commissioner of the Department of Correction, becoming the first formerly incarcerated person to hold a senior leadership position at the agency. COBA was enraged by his appointment and opposed multiple proposals he made during his short tenure. More than 1,000 officers called out sick for long stretches, creating a massive staff shortage. The staffing crisis largely abated shortly after an Adams appointee, Louis Molina, took over the department in January 2022.
Richards also made history as the first formerly incarcerated person appointed to the city’s Board of Correction, where he led the working group that pushed to end punitive segregation.
In recognition of his work, Richards was named a Champion for Change by the Obama administration. He holds an associate degree from Medaille University and earned both a bachelor’s degree and master of public health from Hunter College.
The first challenge Richards and Deml will face together will be to come up with a plan to strictly reduce the use of solitary confinement. Mamdani has ordered the department to issue a roadmap to finally make that reform possible after a City Council law ordering that change has been put on hold for close to five years.
“I pledge to work with the City Council, our unions, advocates, and communities to deliver results,” Richards said. “We’ll innovate boldly and measure success by the lives that are transformed, not by lockups.”