Over a hundred legal advocacy and prisoner rights groups called on the state to pursue more ways to shrink the state’s prison population, including expanded use of clemency powers.

A week after Governor Kathy Hochul enacted her first round of clemencies this year, 135 organizations co-signed and published a letter to state leaders demanding more be done to address “the urgent crisis of racist brutality, medical neglect and denial of basic dignity in New York State prisons.”

The letter is the result of months of escalating tensions following the death of Robert Brooks, whose murder by prison guards inside a state correctional facility cast a spotlight on the treatment of incarcerated New Yorkers.

The letter said incarcerated persons inside state prisons continue to be subject to prolonge

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