Councilmember Salaam questions Judge Zayas on jail population projections and case management impact

We have questions from Councilmember Salam.

Yes, thank you, Chair, and thank you for your testimony so far, Judge.

Just a few questions.

DOC projects that the jail population could reach 8,800 by June 2027, while borough-based jails can hold roughly 4,160.

persons.

Given your case management reforms, what specific reduction in length of stay or population do you project by the August 2027 deadline?

And what is that projection based on?

Yeah, did you say 8,000?

Oh, no, I'm sorry.

I said it.

Yes, 8,800.

I don't know where you're getting that number from.

Right now it's 6,000.

We haven't projected that it's going to be 8,000.

So it's going down.

This is if it doesn't close.

So, you know, we're kind of like pushing it out, looking and seeing the data and saying, okay, well, based on DOC's report, they're basically saying that

by June of 2027, we would reach a population of 8,800 persons.

I'm a little surprised at that because now it's 6,000.

You know, I mean, maybe if there's...

It's an incredible increase in violence.

It's from a report in 2025 that they were projecting.

Okay.

Yeah.

I mean, I doubt the premise of that.

But the more that the...

The more that the courts collaborate with the stakeholders, the DAs, as well as the defense bar, and if the trends are continuing where there are

consistently more dispositions than filings.

So filings have been down.

If that trend continues,

You know, whether we're going to reach 4,000, I can't guarantee that.

But the– and you should also know that it's not just the cases that should get counted.

It's the number of the accused that's actually in jail because some people who are on rankers have multiple cases.

So, for example, right now I think the defendants with cases over two years old, I think the number is around 502.

But the number of actual defendants is at 460-something.

And so that's the number that we think should really be looked at because those are the number of people in Rikers Island.

I wish I could give you more information.

about what our prediction is with respect to that.

All I can say is that we're working hard to reduce the number of days that it takes to resolve a case.

And the trends in every area are that we're doing that.

The clearance, what's called the clearance rate, is getting better, which means that the difference between filings and dispositions.

Every time we have a case where dispositions are way greater than filings, that means that we've just reduced the caseload.

And that's been happening, that happened this year, that's happening in 2026, and it happened in 2025, and it happened in a bigger way than we expected.

Thank you for that.