CBH Talk | Inside Rikers
In their new book Rikers: An Oral History, Graham Rayman and Reuven Blau present a stark portrait of the notorious jail by turning the narrative over to those who know firsthand. They spent over two years interviewing the incarcerated, their families, prison officers, lawyers, commissioners, and food workers who speak for themselves in this unflinching narrative of injustice and resilience inside the country’s largest detention complex. Join the authors, former detainee Lloyd Haines, and Sidney Schwartzbaum, former president of the Assistant Deputy Wardens / Deputy Wardens Association, for a conversation about Rikers' unfathomable conditions and what might, finally, effect change. Moderated by Errol Louis, NY1 Political Anchor and host of Inside City Hall.
Participants
Graham Rayman is a journalist who writes mainly about criminal justice and policing. He has won multiple journalism prizes over his thirty-year career. He has worked at the New York Daily News and before that The Village Voice, Newsday, and New York Newsday. He is the author of The NYPD Tapes.
Reuven Blau is a senior reporter at The City. He has previously worked at the New York Daily News, the New York Post, and the Chief-Leader. He is known as the dean of Rikers reporters.
Sidney Schwartzbaum joined the Correction Department in 1979. Over a 37-year career, he rose to deputy warden and became the president of the Assistant Deputy Wardens/Deputy Wardens Association, a key union post representing the uniformed middle management of the jail system. In that role, he tirelessly fought for his members and took on mayors and commissioners alike. He retired in 2016.
Errol Louis is the Political Anchor of NY1 News, where he hosts "Inside City Hall," a nightly prime-time show about New York City politics, featuring interviews with top political and cultural leaders. Louis has conducted interviews with mayors Ed Koch, David Dinkins, Rudy Giuliani, Mike Bloomberg, Bill de Blasio and Eric Adams; Govs. George Pataki, Eliot Spitzer, David Paterson, Andrew Cuomo and Kathy Hochul; and presidential candidates including Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump.
Louis has moderated dozens of debates between candidates for Mayor, Governor, Public advocate, city and state Comptroller, state Attorney General, Congress and U.S. Senate. In 2016 he was a questioner in the final CNN presidential debate between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.
In addition to political leaders, Louis has interviewed iconic cultural figures including filmmaker Ken Burns, activist Gloria Steinem and authors Robert Caro and Gay Talese. In 2019 he launched a popular weekly podcast, “You Decide with Errol Louis,” that features longer discussions with political and cultural figures including ex-President Bill Clinton; playwright Aaron Sorkin; actors Edward Norton and Brian Cox; and congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Louis is a longtime CNN Contributor, providing on-air commentary on key events including presidential primaries and Election Night. He writes regularly for CNN.com, as well as a weekly column for New York Magazine on a range of political and social affairs.
Louis was recently ranked #36 on the list of the 100 most powerful people in New York City politics.
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