Repositioning The Court

Architecture, Criminal Justice System

2016

Repositioning The Court

Approximately 80% of the population of Rikers Island are detainees that have not been convicted of a crime and are awaiting trial. Kalief Browder was a detainee on Rikers Island and his arrests and time spent incarcerated without a conviction exemplifies how the current system is broken. Kalief was arrested twice, about 8 months apart. The first time he was not detained after the night of his arrest and during his court appearance he was charged and plead guilty to a crime in which he was a bystander. He given probation as his sentence. The second time, Kalief was arrested a few days after the alleged crime and he maintained innocence in court. Since he was on probation at the time of the second arrest, he was given a high bail which he and his family could not pay. He was then taken to Rikers Island for detainment.

Real time means that the pain and stress of being confined damages one’s mental health. Kalief’s first two suicide attempts were in Rikers. And his last attempt took place on June 6, 2015, in which he succeeded.

Real time means missed years of high school and four missed birthdays.

Kalief’s case begs us to confront the difference between realtime and legal time.

Only 102 days counted toward the speedy trial maximum established in New York State law. This is because the courts are so clogged that to reschedule a court date after a one week extension means in reality, a three month extension. The prosecution is allowed six months to try a case, but this stretches due to the inefficiencies of the court.

He went to court at least 17 days during this period.

He spent 546 days in solitary confinement.

Kalief was detained for 1109 days.

People usually don’t stay in Rikers as long as him, because people plea out. In 2011 the Bronx Criminal Court only 165 people with felony charges went to trial, while nearly 4,000 pled guilty. Fewer felony defendants have been going to trial than they have historically. This is in large part due to mandatory minumums and sentencing guidelines which ultimately give the prosecution more power in the court than the judge. Essentially the prosecution determines the sentence length because the charges they file already have sentence lengths attached to them. So, who are these people that are being detained currently? 89% of Rikers Island detainees are black or latino while only 53% of New York City residents are Black or Latino. The majority of the detainees are too poor to pay bail, even if the amount is a couple hundred dollars. The maps below look at the connection between race, poverty, and historic disinvestment by comparing the 1938 Redling Map with 2010 per-capita income levels in New York city and mapping the intersections of race and wealth.

Urban environments in disinvested areas predispose arrest. During detainment one's health and opportunities decrease. While one’s physical health might improve after release, mental health takes a long time to heal. If the arrested person pleads guilty, they then have a mark on their record which prevents them from education and career opportunities. We should understand that the moment of arrest is the moment at which the failure of the system of governance is revealed and an opportunity to engage with citizens who need the services that often have historically been denied to them.

If the arrestee is charged, their family has 2 hours to pay bail before the arrestee is transported to Rikers. Often, the detainees are brought back and forth from the Rikers to the court, with the hearings only serving to postpone trial dates until the detainee pleads guilty.

The charges are brought against the arrestee, then plea and bail options are discussed.

The arrestee is brought up to the arraignment courtroom through a secure elevator from holding.

Then the police officer drives you to Central Booking at the Criminal Court where you are processed in a batch and held. An agent from the non-profit criminal justice agency interviews arrestees and recommends bail options to the judge seeing their case.

You are then brought to a police station where your belongings are confiscated. You are interviewed (although it not recommended that you to talk because you could incriminate yourself) and you are held in a cell in the police precinct.

When you are arrested, you are handcuffed and read your miranda rights.

Traditional misdemeanor and felony courts are located in all five boroughs. Newer community courts are more dispersed and cater to one or two precincts rather than an entire borough. There are many non-profits operating outside the court that are trying to provide alternatives to incarceration and to divert people considered “low risk,” have mental health problems, or drug issues into services. However theses services are usually engaged as part of a plea or a sentence. While community courts are ideal, there are few, and often they come too late in the process to assist in diverting people. Mediation is now provided as an alternative adjudication method, however there are inadequate spaces for this to take place. The most progressive diversion program is L.E.A.D which is fully functional in only five cities. This program depends on communication between social workers, police officer, prosecution, and community members to identify individuals whose crimes are a product of their own drug addiction or due to prostitution. This allows for early identification of potential arrestees who would benefit from services and diverts them from the incarceration system completely. In the first 24 hours after arrest, an individual should have the opportunity to be diverted into a program that helps them, rather than deferring the course of action until a later court date. The rigidity of the current criminal justice system is designed with an equally rigid architectural logic that does not allow for flexibility of process.

Diagram of the height and body orientations of the different roles in court proceedings.

Floor Plan of Trial Court Room

Architecture in the court enforces roles for certain procedures through positioning of bodies within a space— the direction they face and the height at which they sit as well as whether they are stationary or itinerant positions. Within the temporal space of a trial, persons inhabit the same space with the same roles over days, months, or years. The repetitive inscription of the roles into the space reaffirms the legitimacy and normalcy of the procedure. The dense and heavy furniture of the courtroom, regulated within the Standard Level Features and Finishes for US Courts Facilities by the US General Services Administration, naturalizes the intractability of the procedure and the inflexibility of the process. The architectural logics that support traditional power dynamics within a courtroom can be redeployed, to negate the traditional hierarchy of the existing system. Reorienting the heights of the roles, their furniture, and their positions relative to each other while including existing roles that currently happen outside of the arraignment process can provide space for other outcomes than pleas deals or years of detainment.