AG LETITIA JAMES DECLINES TO DEFEND DOZENS OF PRISON GUARDS, WORKERS IN 7 ABUSE LAWSUITS
4 OF THE GUARDS WHO KILLED ROBERT BROOKS AT THE MARCY CORRECTIONAL FACILITY ARE NAMED IN 4 OF THE SUITS. SUITS SUGGEST STATE KNEW GUARDS AT MARCY WERE OUT OF CONTROL, COULD HAVE PREVENTED BROOKS' KILLING
Handcuffed prisoner being escorted across the “Bridge of Sighs” at the old Tombs in lower Manhattan 2015. Photo credit: JB Nicholas.
EXCLUSIVE Apr. 6, 2026
In the weeks after Robert Brooks was killed by guards at the Marcy Correctional Facility, state Attorney General Letitia James refused to represent or continue representing at least 46 state correction officers and medical personnel in seven lawsuits against them by prisoners alleging abuse.
Parts of this story have been previously reported but the complete puzzle has not. It is assembled and reported here for the first time.
Leonard Robinson is the plaintiff in one of the seven lawsuits. To hear him tell it, he should be dead. His lawsuit alleges he was pepper-sprayed, beaten and thrown down four flights of stairs, all while he was handcuffed, by guards at the Elmira Correctional Facility in 2023.
"We're going to kill you!," they yelled, according to Robinson’s lawsuit, filed in State Supreme Court in Albany in 2024.
Robinson, now 29, suffered a broken face, broken teeth, broken rib and "bruises all over this body," his lawsuit alleges. "Some of his teeth were pushed completely through his top lip."
An investigation by state prison officials determined Robinson was telling the truth. They brought employee disciplinary charges against some of the guards, but the guards were acquitted after an administrative trial before private arbitrators, court records show.
While state law imposes the responsibility for maintaining officer discipline on state officials, New York's contract with the guards' union allows arbitration by private judges instead of public officials. 9 out of 10 cases of alleged misconduct are not prosecuted and, of those few that are, the private arbitrators dismiss 9 out of 10.
Robinson's lawyer, Mark A. Overall of United Legal Fighters, called the disciplinary system for guards "questionable at best and laughable at worst."
The guards who beat Robinson got their jobs back "because their union was able to secure an arbitrator who took the officers' word at face value," Overall said. "The arbitrator disregarded all of this and reinstated the officers based on their unsupported assertions that 'we didn't touch him.'"
James, the Attorney General, said in a letter to State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli it "would not be inappropriate" for her office to represent 10 of the guards sued by Robinson. DiNapoli agreed to pay for them to have private lawyers, as he did in all seven cases.
State Supreme Court justice Daniel C. Lynch denied a defense motion to dismiss the lawsuit on Mar. 25, 2025.
Overall, Robinson's lawyer, told The Free Lance Robinson's beating "wasn't an isolated incident. Inmates are assaulted daily."
Some of the prison guards charged with murder and manslaughter for killing Robert Brooks handcuffed in court during their arraignments. Photo credit: JB Nicholas.
The public release of body-worn camera video capturing guards torturing and allegedly murdering Brooks at Marcy on Dec, 9. 2024 showed what Overall and many others have long alleged: that guards regularly beat prisoners for no real reason or, if they do have a real reason, more than necessary—and with no real consequences.
Brooks' murder also put a spot-light on James and the state Attorney General's role in covering up sadistic beatings of prisoners by guards. While James has been celebrated in the Liberal press for successfully suing Pres. Donald J. Trump, she allowed the beat-up squad of guards that killed Brooks to become a Death Squad.
The Attorney General's historic and primary role is defending state employees from lawsuits, as required by state law. 13 months before Brooks was killed, while her office was defending against a lawsuit by former Marcy prisoner William Alvarez, Alvarez warned in sworn testimony that the same beat-up squad that would go on to kill Brooks savagely beat, choked and threatened to kill him while he was handcuffed in 2020.
“They tried to kill me,” Alvarez testified in 2023, The Free Lance reported . They said “they were going to kill me. And there was nothing anybody can do about it.”
Instead of dismantling the beat-up squad, James tried but failed to have Alvarez's lawsuit dismissed.
The Free Lance correctly predicted James would have to recuse herself from prosecuting Brooks' killers. Seven days after that, James recused herself and Onondaga County District William Fitzpatrick was appointed special prosecutor in her place. Fitzpatrick secured an indictment charging 10 guards with murder, manslaughter and associated charges.
The same day James recused herself from investigating Brooks' killing, her office also sent a letter to the Comptroller recusing herself from defending five of the guards sued by Alvarez—including CO Anthony Farina Sgt. Glenn Trombly, respectively charged and believed to be charged in connection with Brooks' killing.
In addition, the Attorney General recused herself from defending the two guards and two sergeants Adam Bauer alleged beat him for smoking a cigarette in a bathroom at Marcy in 2020. Nicholas Anzalone was one of the guards. Anzalone, like Farina, is now awaiting trial on murder charges for killing Brooks.
But the federal judge overseeing Bauer's lawsuit, Glenn T. Suddaby, did not immediately allow James to withdraw from the case. He ordered her to explain why he should let her withdraw at a hearing on Mar 7.
"OAG cannot ethically continue representing the Defendants in this case," James' office argued in legal filings.
Instead of deciding the motion, Judge Suddaby ordered James' office to try negotiating a settlement with Bauer and report back to the court on May 6.
The Mar. 1 killing of another state prisoner, Messiah Nantwi, 22, by guards at the Mid-State Correctional Facility caused the same legal headaches for James's office Brooks' killing did because it represents some of the guards implicated in Nantwi's death in pre-existing abuse lawsuits as well.
James recused herself from investigating it, and again handed it off to Fitzpatrick. His investigation remains ongoing.
The four remaining lawsuits James' office recused herself from defending include one filed by Roger Domroes. His lawsuit alleges he was beaten and left in solitary confinement with four broken ribs and a collapsed lung for 18 days at Elmira in 2020. James recused herself from defending a sergeant, a nurse and a doctor.
Nurse Carolyn Hakes examined Domroes after the assault but told him he "looked perfectly fine except for some superficial abrasions," Domroes's lawsuit alleges. Eight days later, Dr. Kevin Ott diagnosed Domroes with only two broken ribs—missing two more broken ribs and the collapsed lung. Dr. Ott sent Domroes back to solitary with ibuprofen, according to the suit.
It "would be inappropriate" for the state Attorney General to represent Hakes, Ott and another defendant, Sgt Chad Bechler, James' office said in a letter to the State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli dated Feb. 11, 2025.
James also found it "would be inappropriate" to represent Fishkill Correctional Facility guard Jordano Rivera-Padilla. In a handwritten complaint, Joshua Hobes alleged Rivera-Padilla repeatedly assaulted him for no good reason. He also alleged there was "evidence (video footage) that proves ... I was assaulted and battered by officers."
The Attorney General's refusal to represent Rivera-Padilla suggests she agreed.
Two more handwritten lawsuits by two prisoners in the Residential Mental Health Unit at Marcy, the same prison where Brooks was killed, alleged they were unjustifiably beaten by guards in 2021 and 2022, among other things.
The two suits, by David Gibson and Keno Ramsay, name Robert Kessler as a defendant. Kessler is also one of the guards who killed Brooks, video shows. Kessler is believed to be cooperating with prosecutors. The charges against him, if any, are currently secret.
In addition to detailing the abuse he says he suffered, Ramsay's lawsuit adds he observed female Marcy employees who appeared to be victims of domestic violence: "Female employees come to work with Black and Blue face and eye ..."
Previously, The Free Lance reported a female Correction Officer at Marcy killed herself after being raped by a supervisor—while working inside the prison.
James' office originally represented the defendants in Gibson's and Ramsay's lawsuits before Brooks' killing. It withdrew from defending Kessler and 22 other defendants after Brooks was killed, court records and two additional letters from James to the Comptroller show.
There "is a Big Cover Up of Employees unprofessional conduct and misconduct," Ramsay's handwritten legal complaint alleged in 2022. They "work together to cover up criminal action that happening [sic]."
Ramsay's allegation appears prophetic—given Brooks' killing three years later.
James' press office and lawyers for the prison workers did not immediately respond to a request for comment. If they do, their response will be added.
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