Corrections officers who staged unauthorized strikes that have sowed chaos across New York State’s prisons for the last two and a half weeks received an ultimatum on Thursday night: Return to work on Friday or face termination, disciplinary action and the possibility of criminal charges.
In exchange for the officers’ returning to work, the state would place a 90-day pause on some provisions of the Humane Alternatives to Long-Term Solitary Confinement Act, known as HALT, which limits the use of solitary confinement for inmates, Daniel F. Martuscello III, commissioner of the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision, said in a news conference Thursday night.
The department will also create a committee to study the law, which many corrections officers say has made their jobs more dangerous and difficult.
Striking officers have also complained about staffing shortages and forced overtime, with some being required to work 24-hour shifts. The shifts of workers who return to duty on Friday will be limited to 12 hours, Mr. Martuscello said. When all workers are back in place and the prisons return to normal operations, he said, workers will not be forced to work shifts longer than eight hours.
Dozens of corrections officers and sergeants have been fired for participating in the illegal strikes, Jackie Bray, commissioner of the New York State Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Services, said Thursday evening. Others who refuse to return to work on Friday will also be fired, and will face possible disciplinary action, civil contempt charges or criminal prosecution, Ms. Bray said.
Those who return to work on Friday can avoid all of that, Ms. Bray said. Striking corrections officers and sergeants who already quit, who were fired, or who face contempt charges or other disciplinary actions will have their records swept clean and their jobs reinstated, but only if they accept the terms offered Thursday night.
“This deal will not be offered again,” Ms. Bray said. “We want you back. We need you back. You need to come back to work tomorrow.”
The state’s offer was authorized by Gov. Kathy Hochul, said Avi Small, a spokesman for the governor.
The deal offered Thursday did not include the New York State Correctional Officers and Police Benevolent Association, the union that represents prison guards. The schism between the union’s leaders and members dates at least to Feb. 17, when corrections officers at two prisons declared a strike that was not authorized by their union. After the work action spread to nearly all the state’s prisons, the union negotiated an agreement with the corrections department that would have ended the strikes on March 1.
Most officers ignored the agreement and continued to strike. In response, Mr. Martuscello said, he spent much of the last week traveling the state, speaking with strikers over the phone. He also ordered his deputies to go the picket lines and speak with workers directly. Those conversations informed the compromise offer, which Mr. Martuscello announced on Thursday.
Because that process excluded the union, union leaders said they would not sign on to the deal. That appeared to raise questions about whether the deal would be legally binding, even if striking officers did return to work on Friday.
“This agreement was not negotiated with NYSCOPBA — the legally recognized entity through which all negotiations must be conducted,” James Miller, a spokesman for the union, said in an email.
Governor Hochul deployed National Guard troops to staff the prisons and maintain order. At least nine prisoners have died during the strikes, including two men at Auburn Correctional Facility in central New York who did not receive needed medical treatment in time. At Sing Sing Correctional Facility, in the Hudson Valley, no one intervened as a man hanged himself in his cell.
Eleven corrections staff members were placed on administrative leave after the death on March 1 of Messiah Nantwi, 22, an inmate at Mid-State Correctional Facility, a medium-security prison in Marcy, N.Y. Nine prisoners interviewed by The New York Times said Mr. Nantwi had been brutally beaten by corrections officers. Their accounts could not be independently confirmed, and Thomas Mailey, a prisons spokesman, said the death was under investigation.
In some prisons, inmates went without hot food and showers because of the strikes. In others, they have missed court dates or have been confined in housing areas for more than a week.
Jan Ransom contributed reporting.