A convoluted system of arbitration, secrecy and collusion prevents New York’s correctional facilities from removing abusive guards. The same thing is true for the prison’s doctors. Despite numerous instances of negligence, incompetence or felonious behavior, prison physicians and healthcare workers are rarely disciplined or terminated, perpetuating a cycle of medical neglect for inmates throughout New York State.
In fact, many doctors who have had their licenses restricted outside of prison seek refuge in correctional healthcare.
Dr. Mark Chalom, found guilty of negligence and moral unfitness after severing a baby’s finger during delivery and attacking two nurses, retained his medical license. Instead of being barred from practice, Chalom was employed in New York prisons for over 20 more years, earning $151,033 across two facilities in 2021.
Dr. John Ricciardelli, convicted of a federal felony in 2018 for writing 48 unjustified oxycodone prescriptions, was suspended for just two months. In 2023, he earned $223,612 while working at Elmira Correctional Facility.
In 2023, according to analysis from The City, doctors who worked in prisons were twenty times more likely to be disciplined for failing to meet basic medical standards than other doctors. Yet many continue working for years or even decades in the correctional system.
The apparent absence of serious accountability stems from two main issues: staffing shortages and lenient oversight.
Staffing shortages
New York prisons face chronic staffing shortages — healthcare positions are the most severely affected. Data obtained by the Correctional Association of New York reveals that 25% of healthcare positions in New York prisons are vacant.
This lack of personnel forces the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (DOCCS) to hire professionals that other employers might avoid. According to attorney Amy Agnew, a lawyer who filed an ongoing class action suit on behalf of approximately 3,000 inmates, “They take what they can get, which is often what other people don’t want.”
“The truth is DOCCS is desperate to hire doctors,” Agnew said. As of last month, the system, which employs 68 full-time physicians, listed seven job openings for doctors and more than 300 for nurses.
The DOCCS claims that “medical staff is onsite at all correctional facilities. Incarcerated individuals have access to medical services on a daily basis through each facility’s sick call procedure.” It’s a tall order for a department that oversees approximately 25,000 inmates at 44 state correctional facilities, as of Feb. 1, 2024.
“To people who are inside, it’s not always clear what the credentials are of the person who is treating them,” Andrea Armstrong, a law professor at Loyola University New Orleans who has studied prison medical care, told NBC News. “They have a general sense that they are getting the people who can’t get jobs anywhere else.”
Oversight
Oversight of prison healthcare in New York is routinely navigated by internal review. State medical boards, responsible for investigating and disciplining doctors, are often composed of other physicians, creating a culture of “doctors helping doctors” that places leniency above accountability.
“The culture of the physician world in general is deference to other physicians and is focused on second chances, remediation, taking courses. So generally people are given second chances, sometimes third, fourth, and fifth chances,” Carol Cronin, the executive director of Informed Patient Institute, a nonprofit that seeks to empower patients in and out of prison, told The City.
Suspensions are frequently reduced to probation, and serious charges are often downgraded to minimal offenses, allowing these doctors to work with limited supervision.
Oversight is further hampered by a lack of transparency and consistency in disciplinary decisions. While the state’s Office of Professional Medical Conduct issues sanctions annually, these often fail to prevent repeat offenders from continuing to practice. New York state allows doctors who have had their licenses restricted because of disciplinary reasons to continue working in prisons
A 2019 bill to broaden oversight for vulnerable incarcerated people was vetoed by then-Gov. Cuomo. Subsequent attempts in 2020 and 2021 to bring the bill up were watered down or failed to gain full support.
Current health department oversight is “far too narrow,” said Assembly Health Committee Chair Richard Gottfried, the bill’s lead sponsor. New York has a “moral and legal obligation to ensure high-quality health care for incarcerated people.”
At least one inmate agrees. “I think it would be a good idea if an outside agency had review authority over DOCCS’ medical,” Davide Coggins, an inmate at Great Meadow, told New York Focus. “It would likely change some treatments and such for the better.”
No other choice
If you’re outside of prison, you can research doctors until you find the right one. If you’re in prison, you’re stuck with the physician the state provides you, regardless of their credentials or history of infractions. The only alternative is to avoid seeking medical care at all.
Among incarcerated women, 71% admitted avoiding medical treatment to escape inappropriate or inadequate care.
This lack of choice is compounded by systemic failures. The Correctional Association of New York (CANY) found that among eight state prisons between 2020 and 2021, 40% of incarcerated individuals could not access medical care when needed and 90% expressed distrust in prison medical staff’s ability to make sound medical decisions. Only 32% of all incarcerated individuals expressed satisfaction with the medical care they received. More than half of the individuals surveyed reported leaving appointments without their concerns addressed.
A separate CANY report from 2019 found that nearly three-quarters of respondents reported being unable to see a doctor or provider when needed.
Incarcerated individuals can pay for private health insurance coverage, but Medicaid is not available as an option for incarcerated people.
