The Rikers Island Longitudinal Study: Research Report

By Samantha Plummer and Jaclyn Davis

From July 2019 to May 2021, the Columbia Justice Lab developed and conducted a longitudinal interview study of nearly 300 people facing new criminal charges in New York City. The Rikers Island Longitudinal Study aimed to understand how defendants’ experiences in the pretrial process affected and were affected by their social and economic life conditions. After first interviewing people at court or in jail soon after their initial arraignments, the study re-interviewed them 3 months, 6 months, and 12 months later. This report highlights our key findings. The goals of this report are to: • Share the experiences of defendants who have varying degrees of contact with the criminal legal system in New York City. • Provide organizations that work with court-involved people information to understand the socioeconomic conditions of people going through the criminal courts. • Contribute to a citywide and national discussion about how to safely reduce jail populations. Key Findings Over 100,000 people are prosecuted in the New York City criminal courts every year. While there is excellent research on case processing and jail incarceration, less is known about the social and economic lives of people with court involvement. The Justice Lab’s analysis of over one thousand interviews with 286 defendants, and linked administrative data on criminal histories and social benefits use, shows that: • The sample of criminal defendants faced severe housing insecurity. – In the month before being arrested, about one-third of the sample had spent most nights in unstable housing. – About 20 percent of the sample had spent at least one night in a Department of Homeless Services shelter in the year before and/or after their arrest. • Unstable housing was strongly associated with mental health and substance use issues. – Study respondents with histories of mental illness and addiction were more than twice as likely to be unhoused or in a shelter or other temporary housing when they were arrested. – Half of study respondents without a history of substance use or mental illness had stable housing, compared to under a third of those with histories of mental illness and substance use problems. • Unemployment and precarious employment in the study sample were high and were closely related to housing, health, and substance use problems. – Only 25 percent of respondents in temporary or unstable housing reported employment at the initial interview whereas about 60 percent of individuals in any form of private residence reported employment. – Of the respondents who reported that they were employed at all four interview waves, only 41 percent reported working the same job across the entire study. • Exposure to violence was common, mostly in the form of victimization and witnessing rather than perpetration, and different experiences of violence were closely related. – Men, young people aged 18 to 34, and people with a history of mental illness and drug problems were more likely to report assaulting someone in the year after arraignment. Still, in each of these groups, around 80 percent of respondents reported not engaging in any threats or assaults. – Among respondents who were never attacked or had not witnessed other violence, only about 5 percent said they had attacked someone else, whereas 30 to 40 percent of those who had been attacked or witnessed violence reported attacking someone else. • Emerging adults (ages 18 to 25), who are incarcerated at more than double the rate of the adult population as a whole, faced particular health vulnerabilities. – Emerging adults reported a very low rate of health insurance coverage; a third of emerging adults in the sample were uninsured at their first interview, compared to 13 percent of respondents over age 25. – Three quarters of emerging adults reported some kind of ongoing health issue. Those who reported health conditions were much more likely to be uninsured (37%) than people over age 25 who reported health conditions (9%). • The sample reported a high prevalence of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), which were associated with poor health and substance use problems in adulthood. – Childhood adversity was more common in the project sample than in the U.S. population; RILS respondents were much more likely to have been removed from the home by the state, to have been physically or sexually abused, and to have lived with an incarcerated household member. – Respondents who reported four or more ACEs were significantly more likely to report mental health problems – Respondents largely did not receive support from adults to deal with extreme adverse events in childhood; across all ACEs, an average of 28 percent of respondents reported receiving help from an adult. • Criminal court processes were long and unpredictable, and disrupted study respondents’ social and economic well-being. – Ninety-five percent of respondents reported that court involvement disrupted their lives. One sixth of respondents reported losing housing due to their criminal case. – Respondents with mental health problems and living in unstable housing were more likely to have their focal arrests result in conviction

New York: Columbia University, Justice Lab, 2024. 50p.